The Monument to the Great Fire of London
Photo: Padraig, in the public domain
Spiral staircase going up the Monument
Photo: Artybrad, GNU Free Documentation License
The Monument to the Fire of London, or quite simply, The Monument, is a 61-metre (202-foot) tall stone Roman doric column in the City of London. It is near the northern end of London Bridge. It marks the location where the Great Fire of London started in 1666. The nearby tube station is named after it.
The Monument to the Great Fire was designed by Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke. It consists of a large fluted Doric column built of Portland stone topped with a gilded urn of fire. There is an emblematical sculpture on the west side of the base of the Monument. Its height of 61-metre is also symbolic, for it marks the distance between the monument at the king's baker's shop in Pudding Lane, where the fire started. When it was constructed, (between 1671 and 1677) it was the tallest freestanding stone column in the world.
There is a narrow spiral staircase inside the monument enabling visitors to reach the top in 311 steps. A cage was added to prevent people from leaping out, after six people had committed suicide from it, between 1788 and 1842. Three sides of the base carry carry inscriptions in Latin detailing how the fire started, what damage it caused, what actions were taken in the aftermath, and how the monument was erected. There was also inscriptions blaming Roman Catholics for the fire, but these were chiselled out in 1831.
Base of the Monument
Photo: Morwen, GNU Free Documentation License
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