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staple: but this church being destroyed
by the fire of London, and not rebuilt,
the parish was annexed to the church of
St. Mary Woolnoth. Maitland.
St. MARY WOOLNOTH, at the corner of
Sherborne lane, and adjoining to the Post
Office in Lombard street, is supposed to
derive its additional epithet of Woolnoth
from its being almost contiguous to the
above wool staple, whence it might be
called Woolneah or Woolnigh, which, by
an easy transition, might pass into Wool-
noth.
We read of a church with the same ad-
dition in 1355. The last suffered by the
fire in 1666, when every thing within it
was destroyed but the walls; however,
being soon after repaired, it continued in
a very crazy condition, till it was appoint-
ed to be one of the fifty new churches to
be erected within the bills of mortality.
In digging a foundation for the present
church in 1716, there were discovered,
at the depth of fifteen, and twenty-two
feet, a great variety of Roman earthen
vessels, both for sacred and profane uses;
but all broken, together with a consider-
able number of the tusks and bones of
boars and goats, with several medals and
pieces of metal; some tesselated work, a
part of an aqueduct, and at the bottom of
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all a well full of dirt, which was no sooner
removed, than a fine spring arose, in
which is placed a pump with an iron ba-
son. By the great quantity of pot-sheards,
&c. found in this place, Mr. Maitland is
of opinion, that here was a pottery; and
from the tusks and bones he imagines,
that near this place stood the temple of
Concord, mentioned by the Romans.
The new church was finished in the
year 1719, and is a very handsome struc-
ture built with stone. On the north side
which fronts Lombard street, instead of
windows there are three very large and
lofty niches adorned with Ionic columns,
and surrounded with a bold rustic. Over
these is a large cornice, upon which is
placed a balustrade. The entrance is at
the west end by a lofty rustic arch, over
which rises an oblong tower, ornamented
with six Composite columns in the front,
and two on the sides; upon this is raised a
lesser tower of the same form crowned
with a balustrade, from the center of
which rises a flag staff with a fane. The
windows are on the south side, where
the edifice is intirely surrounded with
houses.
It would be impossible, perhaps, to find
a place in the whole city where the prin-
cipal ornaments of a building could be more
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