The Thames was so situated in the island that a crossing place of a permanent sort had to be established as far down the stream as possible. This place was found where the stream was still broad, tidal, and a port. Once bridged the same spot would mark the terminal of sea-borne traffic and the place of exchange between foreign and domestic produce, while the roads radiating north and south from such a crossing would further establish its pre-eminence.
But that pre-eminence was, from some very early period, commercial. The first mention of London in recorded history, the phrase of Tacitus, speaks of the town particularly as a market. As a market London has grown, and as a market it is still chiefly eminent. But London is a market only because it is a port, and it is the port of the Thames. In that aspect I will next consider the connection between the town and its river.
STRAND ON THE GREEN
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Warfare in England, Williams & Norgate.
[2] The Old Road, Constable & Co.
[3] The arguments with regard to the age of the bridge and the earliest position of the crossing will be found set out in their most recent form and most fully by Mr. R. A. Smith, F.S.A., in the first volume of London in the Victoria County Histories.