Editing Covent Garden (section)

===Early history===
[[File:Covent Garden from the Ralph Agas 1572 map of London - marked.jpg|thumb|upright=1.25|Covent Garden on the [[Woodcut map of London|"Woodcut" map]] of the 1560s, with surrounding wall marked in green]]

During the [[Roman Britain|Roman period]], what is now the [[Strand, London|Strand]] – running along the southern boundary of the area that was to become Covent Garden – was part of the route to [[Silchester]], known as "Iter VII" on the [[Antonine Itinerary]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.roman-britain.co.uk/classical-references/the-antonine-itinerary/ |title=The Antonine Itinerary |publisher=Roman Britain |access-date=10 May 2021 |archive-date=7 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210507170350/http://www.roman-britain.co.uk/classical-references/the-antonine-itinerary/ |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url=http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=22101 |title=A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 1 |author=J. S. Cockburn |year=1969 |editor=H. P. F. King |editor2=K. G. T. McDonnell |pages=64–74 |publisher=Institute of Historical Research |access-date=31 July 2010 |archive-date=25 November 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101125234231/http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=22101 |url-status=live}}</ref> Excavations in 2006 at [[St Martin-in-the-Fields]] revealed a group of late Roman graves, suggesting the site had been sacred since at least 350&nbsp;AD.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6196972.stm |title=Ancient body prompts new theories |work=BBC News |access-date=31 July 2010 |date=1 December 2006 |archive-date=11 April 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120411173632/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/6196972.stm |url-status=live}}</ref> The area to the north of the Strand was long thought to have remained as unsettled fields until the 16th century, but theories by [[Alan Vince]] and [[Martin Biddle]] that there had been an [[Anglo-Saxon]] settlement to the west of the old Roman town of [[Londinium]] were borne out by excavations in 1985 and 2005. These revealed that a trading town, called [[Anglo-Saxon London#Lundenwic|Lundenwic]], developed around 600&nbsp;AD,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.pre-construct.com/Sites/Highlights/Bedford.htm |author=Jim Leary |title=Excavations at 15–16 Bedford Street, Covent Garden, London |publisher=Pre-Construct Archaeology |access-date=13 August 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100531174328/http://www.pre-construct.com/Sites/Highlights/Bedford.htm <!--Added by H3llBot--> |archive-date=31 May 2010}}</ref> stretching from [[Trafalgar Square]] to [[Aldwych]], with Covent Garden at the centre.<ref name=Lund>{{cite web |url=http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/English/EventsExhibitions/Past/MissingLink/Themes/TML_themes_Lundenwic.htm |title=The early years of Lundenwic |publisher=Museum of London |access-date=2 May 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090108035413/http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/English/EventsExhibitions/Past/MissingLink/Themes/TML_themes_Lundenwic.htm |archive-date=8 January 2009}}</ref> [[Alfred the Great]] gradually shifted the settlement into the old Roman town of Londinium from around 886&nbsp;AD onwards, leaving no mark of the old town, and the site returned to fields.<ref name=Clark>{{cite journal |author=John Clark |year=1999 |title=King Alfred's London and London's King Alfred |journal=London Archaeologist |volume=9 |issue=2 |pages=35–38 |publisher=London Archaeologist Association |url=http://ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/adsdata/arch-457-1/dissemination/pdf/vol09/vol09_02/09_02_035_038.pdf |access-date=7 May 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110510095059/http://ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/adsdata/arch-457-1/dissemination/pdf/vol09/vol09_02/09_02_035_038.pdf |archive-date=10 May 2011}}</ref>

The first mention of a walled garden comes from a document, {{circa|1200&nbsp;AD}}, detailing land owned by the [[Benedictines|Benedictine monks]] of the [[Westminster Abbey|Abbey of St Peter, Westminster]]. A later document, dated between 1250 and 1283, refers to "the garden of the Abbot and Convent of Westminster".<ref name=Burford1>{{cite book |title=Wits, Wenchers and Wantons – London's Low Life: Covent Garden in the Eighteenth Century |author=E. J. Burford |publisher=Robert Hale Ltd |pages=1–3 |year=1986 |isbn=0-7090-2629-3}}</ref> By the 13th century this had become a {{convert|40|acre|ha|adj=on}} quadrangle of mixed orchard, meadow, pasture and arable land, lying between modern-day [[St Martin's Lane]] and [[Drury Lane]], and [[Floral Street]] and [[Maiden Lane, Covent Garden|Maiden Lane]].<ref>{{cite book |url=http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=46082 |title=Survey of London: volume 36: Covent Garden |author=F. H. W. Sheppard |pages=19–21 |publisher=Institute of Historical Research |access-date=1 August 2010 |year=1970 |archive-date=5 August 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110805130406/http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=46082 |url-status=live}}</ref> The use of the name "Covent"—an Anglo-French term for a religious community, equivalent to "monastery" or "convent"<ref>{{cite dictionary |url=http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=convent |title=Convent |dictionary=Online Etymology Dictionary |access-date=31 July 2010 |date= |archive-date=30 July 2012 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120730174651/http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=convent |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=[[The Concise Oxford Dictionary]] |page=202 |publisher=Clarendon Press |edition=4th |year=1951 |author1=H. W. Fowler |author2=F. G. Fowler | author-link1=H. W. Fowler | author-link2=F. G. Fowler}}</ref>—appears in a document in 1515, when the Abbey, which had been letting out parcels of land along the north side of the Strand for inns and market gardens, granted a lease of the walled garden, referring to it as "a garden called Covent Garden". This is how it was recorded from then on.<ref name=Burford1/>