A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume 2 (of 2)

by Johann Beckmann

Of modern cities, Paris, as far as I have been able to learn, was the first that followed the example of the ancients by lighting its streets. As this city, in the beginning of the sixteenth century, was much infested with street robbers and incendiaries, the inhabitants were, from time to time, ordered to keep lights burning, after nine in the evening, before the windows of all the houses which fronted the street. This order was issued in the year 1524, and renewed in 1526 and 1553[446]; but in the month of October 1558, falots were erected at the corners of the streets, or, when the street was so long that it could not be lighted by one, three were erected in three different parts of it. These lights had, in a certain measure, a resemblance to those used in some mines; for we are told, in the Grand Vocabulaire François[447], that falot is a large vase filled with pitch, rosin, and other combustibles, employed in the king’s palace and houses of princes to light the courts. At that period there were in Paris 912 streets; so that the number of lights then used must have been less than 2736.

In the month of November, the same year, these lights were changed for lanterns of the like kind as those used at present. The lighting of the streets of Paris continued, however, for a long time to be very imperfect, till the abbé Laudati, an Italian of the Caraffa family, conceived the idea of letting out torches and lanterns for hire. In the month of March 1662, he obtained an exclusive privilege to this establishment for twenty years; and he undertook to erect, at certain places, not only in Paris, but also in other cities of the kingdom, booths or posts where any person might hire a link or lantern, or, on paying a certain sum, might be attended through the streets by a man bearing a light. He was authorised to receive from every one who hired a lantern to a coach, five sous for a quarter of an hour; and from every foot-passenger, three sous. To prevent all disputes in regard to time, it was ordered that a regulated hour-glass should be carried along with each lantern.

In 1667, however, the lighting of the city of Paris was put on that footing on which it is at present. At the same time the police was greatly improved, and it afterwards served as a pattern to most of the other cities in Europe. Affairs of judicature, and those respecting the public police, instead of being committed, as before, to one magistrate, called the “Lieutenant civil du prevost de Paris,” were by a royal edict, of the month of March in the above year, divided between two persons. One of them, who had the management of judicial affairs, retained the old title; and the other, who superintended the police, had that of “Lieutenant du prevost de Paris pour la police,” or “Lieutenant général de police.” The first lieutenant of police was Nicholas de Reynie, a man who, according to the praises bestowed on him by French writers, formed an epoch in the history of modern police. In the History of Paris, so often already quoted, he is called an enlightened, upright, and vigilant magistrate, as zealous for the service of the king as for the good of the public, and who succeeded so well in this new office, that we may say, adds the author, it is to him, more than to any other, that we are indebted for the good order which prevails at present in Paris. The first useful regulation by which La Reynie rendered a service to the police, was that for improving the (guet) night-watch, and the lighting of the streets. I can find no complete account of the changes he introduced; but four years after, that is, on the 23rd of May 1671, an order was made that the lanterns every year should be lighted from the 20th of October till the end of March in the year following, and even during moonlight; because the latter was of little use in bad weather, and even in fine weather was not sufficient to light some of the most dangerous streets.

Before this period the streets were lighted only during the four winter months; and on account of the numberless atrocities committed in the night-time, when there were no lights, the Parisians offered to contribute as much money as should be sufficient to defray the expense of keeping the lamps lighted throughout the whole winter. The lamps employed by La Reynie were, on account of their likeness to a bucket, called lanternes à seau, and succeeded those invented by one Herault, called lanternes à cul-de-lampe.

When De Sartines held the office of lieutenant de police, a premium was offered to whoever should discover the most advantageous means of improving the lighting of the streets; and the Academy of Sciences were to decide on the different plans that might be proposed. In consequence of this offer, a journeyman glazier, named Goujon, received a premium of 200 livres, and Messrs. Bailly, Le Roy, and Bourgeois de Chateaublanc 2000 livres. To the last-mentioned gentleman is ascribed the invention of the present reverberating lamps, described by La Vieil, which were introduced in 1766.

In a small work, called an Essay on Lanterns, by a society of literary men[448], which, though written to ridicule antiquarian researches and certain persons at Paris, contains some authentic information respecting the lighting of the streets, we are told that reverberating lamps were invented by an abbé P., who therefore, says the author humorously, is the second abbé who can boast of having enlightened the first city in the world. The superiority of these lamps cannot be denied; but, besides their expense, they are attended with this disadvantage when they hang in the middle of the street, that they throw a shade over it, so that one cannot be known by those who pass. In cities also, where people walk principally in the middle of the streets, or where the streets are broad, they are not very convenient, and they occasion a stoppage when it is necessary to clean them.

In the year 1721, the lamps in Paris are said to have amounted to 5772; but in the Tableau de Paris, printed in 1760, the number is reckoned to be only 5694, and in the Curiosités de Paris, 1771, they are stated to be 6232.

In 1777, the road between Paris and Versailles, which is about nine miles in length, was lighted at the yearly expense of 15,000 livres by the same contractors who lighted Paris. The city of Nantes was lighted the same year; and in 1780 had 500 lamps. Strasburg began to be lighted in 1779.

If what Maitland says in his history[449] be true, that in the year 1414 an order was issued for hanging out lanterns to light the streets, and if that regulation was continued after the above period, which I very much doubt, then must it be allowed that London preceded Paris in this useful establishment. Maitland refers for his authority to Stow’s Survey of London; but in the edition of that work published in 1633, I find only, where a list of the magistrates is given, the following information:—“1417, Mayor, Sir Henry Barton, skinner. This Henry Barton ordained lanthorns with lights to bee hanged out on the winter evenings, betwixt Hallontide and Candlemasse.” Nothing more occurs in the edition by Strype, published in 1720.

In the year 1668, when several regulations were made for improving the streets, the Londoners were reminded that they should hang out lanterns duly at the accustomed time[450]. In the year 1690 this order was renewed, and every housekeeper was required to hang out a light or lamp every night as soon as it was dark, between Michaelmas and Lady-day; and to keep it burning till the hour of twelve at night. In the year 1716 it was ordained by an act of common council, that all housekeepers, whose houses fronted any street, lane, or public passage, should, in every dark night, that is, every night between the second night after every full moon till the seventh night after every new moon, set or hang out one or more lights, with sufficient cotton wicks, that should continue to burn from six o’clock at night till eleven o’clock of the same night, under the penalty of one shilling. All these regulations, however, seem to have been ineffectual, owing to bad management. The city was lighted by contract, and the contractors for liberty to light it were obliged to pay annually to the city the sum of six hundred pounds. Besides, the contractors received only six shillings per annum from every housekeeper whose rent exceeded ten pounds; and all persons who hung out a lantern and candle before their houses were exempted from paying towards the public lamps. The streets were lighted no more than one hundred and seventeen nights; and as this gave great opportunity to thieves and robbers to commit depredations in the night-time, the lord mayor and common council judged it proper, in the year 1736, to apply to parliament for power to enable them to light the streets of the city in a better manner; and an act was accordingly passed, by which they were empowered to erect a sufficient number of such sort of glass lamps as they should judge proper, and to keep them burning from the setting to the rising of the sun throughout the year. Instead therefore of a thousand lamps, the number was now increased to 4679; but as these even were not sufficient, several of the wards made a considerable augmentation, so that the whole could amount to no less than 5000. This, however, was not the amount of all the lamps in London, but of those in what is properly called the city and liberties. As this division forms only a fifth part of London, Maitland reckons the whole number of public and private lamps to have been, even at that period, upwards of 15,000. The time of lighting also, which before had been only 750 hours annually, was increased to 5000. In our cities of Lower Saxony, the streets of which are not so dark as those of London, the lighting continues 1519 hours.