Georgian Christmas

Dan Snow's History Hit

History Hit

History

4.7 • 12.9K Ratings

🗓️ 21 December 2023

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Pantomimes, pleasure gardens, bare-knuckle boxing and political upheaval. Christmas in the 18th and early 19th centuries was a very different affair from the peaceful family celebration of the Victorian Age. Georgian Christmas was raucous, rowdy and time for a bit of fun before heading back to work.

In this seasonal episode, Dan delves into the festivities of London's working classes with Footprints of London tour guide Rob Smith who has a fascinating anecdote for just about person who's called the city home. From an 18th-century showman who would put two joints of beef under his arms and walk into an oven - cooking them and miraculously not himself - to Joey Grimaldi, the world's first clown and the men who tried to start a revolution at a cake shop, Christmas in Regency London was surprising, lewd and quite extraordinary.

You can book one of Rob's tours here: https://footprintsoflondon.com/live/guides/rob-smith/

Produced by Mariana Des Forges, Rob Smith and edited by Dougal Patmore

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Try royal opera house stream this Christmas for just one pound and watch enchanting productions including the nutcracker
0:07.0	enjoy unlimited access to over 80 extraordinary ballets, operas and exclusive behind-the-scenes features.
0:15.0	Sign up for Royal Opera House Stream now with your first month for just one pound.
0:19.0	For details, visit R.OH.org. UK forward slash offer.
0:23.0	One pound for the first month after 14 free days,
0:26.0	and nine 99 a month thereafter.
0:28.0	Cancel any time Ties and sees apply.
0:30.0	Attention all passengers. You can now book your train tickets on Uber and get 10% back in Uber credits to spend on your next train journey.
0:41.0	So no excuses not to visit your in-laws this Christmas.
0:46.5	Trains now on Uber. Tees and sees apply check the Uber app. Hi buddy welcome to Dan Snow's history hit. It is freezing cold in London town.
1:01.6	I'm walking through the streets and in fact I'm walking through a very special part of London.
1:05.7	Islington terraced houses with their uniform fronts, their dark brick covering the walls
1:10.9	of the ground floor.
1:12.3	I was born here in Islington and the reason I'm here is because this is a great place to talk about Christmas, Christmas in London.
1:20.6	In the past long suffering listeners to this podcast will know that I've done
1:25.2	de Kensian Christmases I've done Tudor and medieval Christmas traditions but I've tended
1:31.0	to look at what the elites were doing for Christmas. People who could afford to have a table groaning with food, to have family around in their large private dwelling.
1:41.0	This year I've come to this part of London to talk about the 18th century
1:45.3	as London was exploding. People moving here in vast numbers, businesses and factories starting
1:51.2	up London on its way to becoming the biggest and biggest. and was an interesting mix of slum dwelling, new developments and open fields where cows grazed
2:12.1	before being taken into town and slaughtered and Smith Mill market.
2:15.8	The Georgian period is one of the, well it's a pretty easy one to define, it begins with the
	...

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