Covent Garden - 400 Years of History

Covent Garden's thriving history started as early as the 7th century as a Saxon settlement. It is believed that it was the supporting town, then called Lundenwic, of a nearby Saxon port. It was on the River Thames whose shoreline then was the Strand.

After that initial settlement the area was never empty again, whether it were the monks of St. Peter's at Westminster who used it as their ´Convent Garden´ or, for a long time, the Earls of Bedford, the first developers of this bit of land, who made a fortune out of levying taxes on the busy market there.

Situated outside the City, Covent Garden has been of interest to a great variety of people down the ages. A fact that is shown in its history.