Re: John Leland's "suburbe"
Dave Postles (pot@leicester.ac.uk)
Sat, 21 Oct 1995 12:54:36 +0100
Steve Rappaport, WORLDS WITHIN WORLDS: STRUCTURES OF LIFE IN SIXTEENTH-CENTURY
LONDON (Cambridge, 1989), p. 45, quotes an act of parliament in 1523 referring
to the suburbs of London. However, while that would be an earlier use of the
term than Leland's, I would be very surprised if it were the earliest. In
early modern London the term 'suburbe' commonly referred to areas that lay out-
side the City's ancient walls but still within the civic boundary.
Joe Ward
Wayne State University
jward@cms.cc.wayne.edu
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