Frost fairs on the Thames
During the Little Ice Age , when the climate in Great Britain was a little cooler than it is today and the London Bridge had not yet increased its flow rate, the Thames sometimes froze over in winter. In London then often found on the river Fairs , called instead Frost Fairs ( Engl. Frost fairs ).
The earliest account of the Thames freezing over dates back to 250 AD by a Roman chronicler, when the river was covered in a thick layer of ice for nine weeks. There are also reports of this kind for the Medieval Warm Period , for example for 998, 1061, 1063 and 1092. In 923 the river was open for goods transport with carts for 13 weeks, and in 1410 for 14 weeks. The period from the 14th to the early 19th century is also known as the Little Ice Age due to the cooler climate and severe winters . If the ice was thick enough and stable long enough, Londoners held fairs on the river in some years.
King Henry VIII is believed to have slept from the city center on the Thames to Greenwich in the winter of 1536 , and Queen Elizabeth I took a walk on the ice in the winter of 1564. The first frost fair took place in 1608, the most famous of these markets on the ice in the winter of 1683/84. John Evelyn described him as follows:
“Coaches plied from Westminster to the Temple, and from several other stairs too and fro, as in the streets, sleds, sliding with skates, bull-baiting, horse and coach races, puppet plays and interludes, cooks, tippling and other lewd places , so that it seemed to be a bacchanalian triumph, or carnival on the water. "
“Carriages made their way from Westminster to the Temple and up and down numerous other flights of stairs, as in the streets; Sleigh rides, ice skating, bull rushing, horse and carriage races, puppet shows and interludes, cooks, booze and other vicious places; it seemed to be a Bacchanal triumph , a carnival on the water. "
A printer named Croom sold souvenir cards for six pence; on these were the customer's name, the date, and the fact that the ticket had been bought on the Thames. It was said to be making five pounds a day, ten times the average worker a week. Even King Charles II is said to have bought a card.
However, the frost fairs were often short-lived. No sooner had they started than the weather improved and people had to withdraw from the melting ice. A sudden thaw caused death and property damage. In January 1789, melting ice caused an anchored ship to crash into a riverside pub, causing the building to collapse, killing five guests.
Between the early 15th and early 19th centuries there were a total of 23 winters that the Thames froze in London: 1408, 1435, 1506, 1514, 1537, 1565, 1595, 1608, 1621, 1635, 1649, 1655, 1663 , 1666, 1677, 1684, 1695, 1709, 1716, 1740, 1776, 1795 and 1814.
In addition to cold winters, the flow speed of the Thames was a decisive prerequisite for the freezing over. Until the 19th century, the Thames was much wider and shallower than it is today, which resulted in a significantly slower flow rate. In addition, the London Bridge , on which there were also houses, rested on numerous closely spaced pillars, which looked like a kind of dam.
The last frost fair began on February 1, 1814 and lasted four days. An elephant was being led across the river under Blackfriars Bridge , and a printer named Davis published a book called Frostiania . In the following years the climate became milder. The old London Bridge was also replaced by a new one in 1831 and the Thames was forced into a narrower river bed in several stages, so that the water flowed faster and the river was unlikely to freeze over.
literature
- M. Lockwood et al. a .: Frost fairs, sunspots and the Little Ice Age . In: Astronomy and Geophysics . tape 58 , no. 2 , March 2017, doi : 10.1093 / astrogeo / atx057 ( reading.ac.uk ).
- G. Davis: Frostiana: A History of the River Thames, in a Frozen State; With an Account of the Late Severe Frost and the Wonderful Effects of Frost, Snow, Ice, and Cold, in England and in different Parts of the World; Interspersed with Various Amusing Anectodes . To Which is Added, the Art of Skating. London February 5, 1814 ( National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Rare Books from 1600-1800, PDF - In Chapter 1 Reports on Frost Fairs on the Thames).
swell
- John Evelyn: London - Portrait of a City , revised by Roger Hudson, Folio Society, London 1988
- Hubert Horace Lamb : Climate - Present, past and future. , Pp. 568-570, 1977
Individual evidence
- ^ JB Rigg: Influence of Local Conditions on the Freezing of the River Thames . In: Weather . February 1964, doi : 10.1002 / j.1477-8696.1964.tb02732.x .