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Shoreditch is a place in the London Borough of Hackney. It is a built-up area of the inner city immediately to the north of the City of London, located 2.3 miles (3.7 km) north east of Charing Cross . It is situated at the point where five postal districts converge. more...

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History

The etymology of 'Shoreditch' is debated. A legendary early tradition connects it with Jane Shore, the mistress of Edward IV who according to an ancient ballad died in the eponymous ditch....However as the place is attested as 'Soersditch', long before this, a more plausible suggestion is 'Sewer Ditch', in reference to an ancient drain or watercourse in what was a boggy area adjacent to the 'fens' of Finsbury/Fensbury to the west (Mander 1996). Possibly it refers to the headwaters of the river Walbrook which rose in the Curtain Road area.

Though now part of the inner city, Shoreditch was previously an extra-mural suburb of the City of London, centred around Shoreditch Church at the crossroads where Shoreditch High Street and Kingsland Road are intersected by Old Street and Hackney Road.

Shoreditch High Street and Kingsland road are a small sector of the Roman Ermine Street and modern A10. This, known also as the Old North Road, was a major coaching route to the north, exiting the City at Bishopsgate. The east-west course of Old Street-Hackney Road was also probably originally a Roman Road, connecting Silchester with Colchester, bypassing the City of London to the south (Sugden n.d.).

Shoreditch church (dedicated to St Leonard) is of ancient origin and features in the famous line: 'when I grow rich say the bells of Shoreditch', from the nursery rhyme: Oranges and Lemons.

Shoreditch was the site of a house of nuns, the Augustinian priory of 'Halliwell' or 'Holywell' (named after a Holy Well on the site), from the 12th Century until its dissolution in 1539. This priory was located between Shoreditch High Street and Curtain Road to east and west and Batemans Row and Holywell Lane to north and south. Nothing remains of it today (Wood 2003).

On this site, in 1576, James Burbage built the first playhouse in England, known as 'The Theatre' (commemorated today by a plaque on Curtain Road). Some of Shakepeare's plays were performed here and at the nearby Curtain Theatre, built in 1577 200 yards to the south (marked by a commemorative plaque in Hewett Street off Curtain Road). It was here that Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet gained 'Curtain plaudits' and where Henry V was performed within 'this wooden O'. In 1599 Shakespeare's Company literally upped sticks, and moved the timbers of 'The Theatre' to Southwark, after the lease had run out, to construct The Globe. The Curtain continued performing plays in Shoreditch until at least 1627 (Shapiro 2005).

The suburb of Shoreditch was attractive as a location for these early theatres because it was outside the jurisdiction of the somewhat puritanical City fathers. Even so they drew the wrath of contemporary moralists as did the local:

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