Newington Green London N16 9PX
Newington Green London N16 9PX
Newington Green is an area with a long and interesting history and it was first recorded as 'Newtone' in the Domesday Book in 1086 and as 'Newington Green' in 1480, when it was a small clearing used as a village green within the Middlesex Forest. The Forest used to be a popular hunting venue for royalty such as Henry V111, who also kept a house for his mistresses on Newington Green. The word 'Newington' comes from Old English and means 'new homestead or village' (Oxford Dictionary of English Place Names).
The author of the world's first novel, Daniel Defoe (1660-1731) was one of the famous pupils who went to Charles Morton's Dissenting Academy on Newington Green (a new student accommodation block on Green Lanes has been named 'Charles Morton Court' to remind us of this influential educator). Defoe married a local woman and kept 70 civet cats on Newington Green, intending to use their oils for the perfume trade.
In 1708 the Dissenters' Chapel was built on Newington Green and it became the focus for many influential thinkers and writers, particularly when Dr Richard Price was minister there.
When the banker-poet Samuel Rogers, who was born at Newington Green in 1763 wrote 'The Pleasures of Memory' (1792) which starts as 'the description of an obscure village, and of the pleasing melancholy which it excites on being revisited after a long absence'. One of Roger's memories was of frequently watching the emmets (wrynecks) flying to their nests amongst the elms by the village green. Times change - wrynecks are extremely rare now, on the Red List for conservation concern and the elms are all gone. However elms were still around when Edgar Allen Poe wrote of the time he lived at Newington Green 1817-20, describing 'a misty looking village of England where were a vast number of gigantic and gnarled trees... and the houses excessively ancient'.
In 1811 there was a women's cricket match on the Green, an illustration of which recorded it for posterity. This may be seen in NGAG's publication 'The Village That Changed the World' along with a photo showing the newly fenced-in Green in 1876. This shows that just a couple of mature trees still survived and the Green had been formally re-planted with young trees - which have grown to be the magnificent plane trees that surround the Green now. Another thing that remains today, is that Newington Green is still being used like a village green.
Today
Newington Green still has a number of listed buildings on its perimeter and it lies within two conservation areas which straddle the border between the London boroughs of Hackney and Islington. The Green itself plus the East, South and the West side which contains the oldest brick terrace in Britain, built in 1658, are within Islington. The North side of the Green with the historic Unitarian Church is in Hackney. Both buildings can be seen in the collage above.
The Green itself is a popular social hub for the area, and continues to feel like a village green that is used by many people, including the various ethnic communities that live locally. It is a small, accessible park with a playground, there is an accessible toilet and a kiosk that provides hot drinks and snacks April - October. There are also a number of good cafes, restaurants and shops around the immediate area of Newington Green.
You can find more information about this area and the influential people that have lived here, in NGAG's award winning book, which is available through some local shops and directly through NGAG:
'The Village That Changed the World. A History of Newington Green London N16' by Alex Allardyce
Photos and Collage by Alex Allardyce
2009
