HISTORICAL SOUNDS | LONDON STREETS 1909
A collection of descriptions and references to sounds drawn mainly from primary sources such as autobiographies, diaries and statutes, as well as novels written around the times they depict.
| Sub-category | 1st to 10th |
11th to 15th |
16th to 17th |
18th | Early 19th |
Late 19th |
Early 20th |
Late 20th |
| General sounds of street and town | 7 | 2 | 10 | 4 | 1 | |||
| Open-air markets | 1 | 1 | 2 | |||||
| Road traffic | 1 | 1 | 2 | |||||
| Communal living and confinement | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | ||||
| River traffic and related sounds | 5 | 1 | 1 | |||||
| Plague, war and disaster | 1 | 6 | 1 | 3 | ||||
| Sound qualities of buildings | 1 | |||||||
| Sounds of crowds | 1 |
Period referred to: 1880s
Sound category: Ambient > Road traffic
Title of work: The Nether World
Type of publication: Novel
Author: George Gissing
Year of publication: 1889
Page/volume number: Chapter XXXVIII
A horse-drawn cab on Pentonville Hill
Having a few shillings in her pocket, she took a cab at King's Cross and bade the driver drive his hardest to Clerkenwell Close. Up Pentonville Hill panted the bony horse, Clem swearing all the time because it could go no quicker. But the top was reached; she shouted to the man to whip, whip! By the time they pulled up at Mrs. Peckover's house Clem herself perspired as profusely as the animal.
Period referred to: 1850s
Sound category: Ambient > Road traffic
Title of work: Bleak House
Type of publication: Novel
Author: Charles Dickens
Year of publication: 1853
Page/volume number: Chapter VI
Horse-bells heard on the outskirts of London in Bleak House
By and by we began to leave the wonderful city and to proceed through suburbs which, of themselves, would have made a pretty large town in my eyes; and at last we got into a real country road again, with windmills, rick-yards, milestones, farmers' waggons, scents of old hay, swinging signs, and horse troughs: trees, fields, and hedge-rows. It was delightful to see the green landscape before us and the immense metropolis behind; and when a waggon with a train of beautiful horses, furnished with red trappings and clear-sounding bells, came by us with its music, I believe we could all three have sung to the bells, so cheerful were the influences around.
"The whole road has been reminding me of my namesake Whittington," said Richard, "and that waggon is the finishing touch. Halloa! What's the matter?"
We had stopped, and the waggon had stopped too. Its music changed as the horses came to a stand, and subsided to a gentle tinkling, except when a horse tossed his head or shook himself and sprinkled off a little shower of bell-ringing.
Period referred to: Early 1700s
Sound category: Ambient > Road traffic
Title of work: Amusements Serious and Comical
Type of publication: Satire
Author: Thomas Brown
Year of publication: 1700
Page/volume number: Amusement III
‘Make Room there, says another Fellow driving a Wheel-Barrow of Nuts’
Some Carry, others are Carry'd: Make Way there, says a Gouty-Leg'd Chairman, that is carrying a Punk of Quality to a Mornings Exercise: Or a Bartholomew-Baby Beau, newly Launch'd out of a Chocolate-House, with his Pockets as empty as his Brains. Make Room there, says another Fellow driving a Wheel-Barrow of Nuts, that spoil the Lungs of the City Prentices, and make them Wheeze over their Mistresses, as bad as the Phlegmatick Cuckolds their Masters do, when call'd to Family Duty. One Draws, another Drives. Stand up there, you Blind Dog, says a Carman, Will you have the Cart squeeze your Guts out?
Period referred to: 1820s
Sound category: Ambient > Animal- and engine-powered traffic
Title of work: Lavengro
Type of publication: Autobiography
Author: George Borrow
Year of publication: 1851
Page/volume number: Unknown
‘Oh the cracking of whips, the shouts and oaths of the carters’
Thousands of human beings were pouring over [London] bridge. But what chiefly struck my attention was a double row of carts and wagons, the generality drawn by horses as large as elephants, each row striving in a different direction, and not infrequently brought to a standstill. Oh the cracking of whips, the shouts and oaths of the carters, and the greating of wheels upon the enormous stones that formed the pavement!