Mayfair
According to Sydney Smith, Mayfair enclosed “more intelligence, human ability, to say nothing of wealth and beauty than the world ever collected in so small a space before”. And indeed, this area of London has always been associated with social status and prestige; a Mayfair address is as desirable today as it has been for the past three centuries. However, the origins of the name “Mayfair” reveal a somewhat less respectable side of life in the early days. The May Fair was originally St James’s Fair, held in aid of St James’s Hospital, a hospital for leprous women which stood where St James’s Palace is now. The fair was held on the eve of St James’s Day (May 1st, the feast of St James the Less), the day itself, and for four days following. It was held in the grounds of the hospital and as it became more popular, the many booths and stalls spread to the north and west into the area now known as Mayfair, then nothing but open fields and meadows.
The fair had a chequered history. The earliest record of it is in 1560, although it is possible that it dates back much further than this to the thirteenth century. The fair enjoyed its heyday in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, when its reputation attracted people from far and wide. It was frequented by people from all levels of society including the nobility and gentry. It was a rowdy event, with showmen, tricksters, gamblers and prostitutes jostling with each other to entice the throngs of customers. Frequent quarrels and drunken brawls added to the riotous atmosphere. Attempts were made to put an end to the fair in 1664, as it was “considered to tend rather to the advantage of looseness and irregularity than to the substantial promotion of any good, common and beneficial to the people”. However, the popularity of the fair made it difficult to suppress. Later on during that century, in 1688, Royal permission was granted for a cattle market to be held in Brookfield (so called because the Tyburn stream ran through it) in the vicinity of modern-day Curzon Street. This was where the old St James’s Fair had taken place and within a few years, the market had become an excuse to revive the old custom. The May Fair, as it became known, extended to last throughout the first two weeks in May.
The fair offered attractions of many kinds. As well as the stalls selling food and drink, there were booths housing puppeteers, jugglers, prize-fighters, acrobats, dancers, fire-eaters, wild animals, freaks and all kinds of shows and sights persuading people to part with their money. One such show was the spectacle of a woman who, in spite of her small build and delicate appearance, demonstrated how she could lift a blacksmith’s anvil with her long hair. She would then lie down, the anvil would be placed on her chest, and a horseshoe would be forged upon it, and all this “without the least discomposure of her dress or person”.
Tight-rope walking and dancing was a particularly popular show. One famous rope-dancer was a certain Lady Mary, said to be the daughter of a nobleman who had eloped from her home in Florence with a showman. Lady Mary met her death at the May Fair one year when she fell from the rope. She gave birth to the child she was carrying, which was stillborn, and subsequently died herself.
With thanks to David Herbert, Lansdowne club for this article.