Central London

History

Toponymy

The name London may derive from the River Thames
The etymology of London is uncertain. It is an ancient name, found in sources from the 2nd century. It is recorded c. 121 as Londinium, which points to Romano-British origin.^[40] The earliest attempted explanation, now disregarded, is attributed to Geoffrey of Monmouth in Historia Regum Britanniae.^[40] This had it that the name originated from a supposed King Lud, who had allegedly taken over the city and named it Kaerlud.
From 1898, it was commonly accepted that the name was of Celtic origin and meant place belonging to a man called *Londinos; this explanation has since been rejected.^[40] Richard Coates put forward an explanation in 1998 that it is derived from the pre-Celtic Old European *(p)lowonida, meaning 'river too wide to ford', and suggested that this was a name given to the part of the River Thames which flows through London; from this, the settlement gained the Celtic form of its name, *Lowonidonjon;^[42] this requires quite a serious amendment however. The ultimate difficulty lies in reconciling the Latin form Londinium with the modern Welsh Llundain, which should demand a form *(h)lōndinion (as opposed to *londīnion), from earlier *loundiniom. The possibility cannot be ruled out that the Welsh name was borrowed back in from English at a later date, and thus cannot be used as a basis from which to reconstruct the original name.
Until 1889, the name "London" officially only applied to the City of London but since then it has also referred to the County of London and now Greater London.

Prehistory

Two recent discoveries indicate probable very early settlements near the Thames in the London area. In 1999, the remains of a Bronze Age bridge were found on the foreshore north of Vauxhall Bridge.^[43] This bridge either crossed the Thames, or went to a (lost) island in the river. Dendrology dated the timbers to 1500BC.^[ In 2010 the foundations of a large timber structure, dated to 4500BC, were found on the Thames foreshore, south of Vauxhall Bridge. The function of the mesolithic structure is not known. Both structures are on South Bank, at a natural crossing point where the River Effra flows into the River Thames.