"men of superior quality"
The association that FitzStephen seems to imply between sports and the men of the city is that it is the heavy involvement in sporting activities that produces manly males. On the other hand we should not forget that this account of London is a preface to the biography of Londoner Thomas Becket, a man of superior quality in FitzStephen's eyes.

"weak slaves of lust"
This quotation, part of which is missing from the L.C. version, in this context means decadent.

"church of St. Paul"
St. Paul's cathedral was founded in the early 7th century as the seat of the bishop of the East Saxons. After fire destroyed one of a succession of versions of the building in 1087, it was rebuilt on an even larger scale and this version lasted throughout the Middle Ages. It was the largest structure in the city.

"if the citizens return to this island"
The seemingly cryptic phrase "if the citizens return to the island" (which I have modified with a slight clarification) has been identified as an allusion to Geoffrey of Monmouth's History [Leo Gourde, An Annotated Translation of the Life of St. Thomas Becket by William Fitzstephen, M.A. thesis, Loyola University, Chicago, 1943, p.2] specifically the prophecies of Merlin therein. Professor Brooke believes that in his adaptation of part of one of the prophecies, FitzStephen envisaged a possible restoration following the Second Coming of Christ. However, Derek Keene, while agreeing on the source, links the phrase to Geoffrey's portrayal of the relationship between Britain and Brittany and the possibility that Britons would return from the latter to the former ["Text, Visualization and Politics: London 1150-1250", Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6th ser., vol.18 (2008), p.90]. How FitzStephen saw the connection betwen that issue and the upgrading of London to an archbishopric is less clear, but it is evident he was torn between his loyalties to Canterbury and London.

"just grounds"
The L.C. version of the passage concerning whether Canterbury or London should have metropolitan status (i.e. the head of an ecclesiastical province) omits – probably more than a scribal error – an additional argument favouring Canterbury: that Becket's tomb was there.

"one hundred and twenty-six"
The number of 126 parish churches cannot be confirmed with certainty, but historians generally accept the high figure on the understanding that the "suburbs" included a large surrounding area of what is now Greater London. Having said that, it is likely that most of these churches (perhaps a hundred or so) lay within the city walls. English townspeople seem to have preferred worshipping in small churches with their close neighbours.

"royal fortress"
The fortress on the east side of the city was the Tower of London, built by William the Conqueror to ensure his control of one of England's power centres, which had resisted his claims to sovereignty. Although its size, intentionally, overawed the citizens, the Tower in the 12th century occupied a smaller site than it did later: basically the great keep (the White Tower) atop an existing small hill, surrounded by a palisaded ditch/rampart. The myth about the keep's mortar being mixed with the blood of beasts perhaps, Brooke cautiously implies, had some connection with the fact that butchers operated in East Smithfield, to the northeast of the Tower. FitzStephen's choice of "fortress" to describe the Tower, as opposed to "castle" for the other Norman strongholds in London, may have been intended to differentiate the royal bastion from those that were privately held.

"castles"
The western strongholds, likewise probably built by William the Conqueror or with his permission, as part of his early programme to subdue England, were (subsequently) known as Montfichet Castle and Baynard's Castle, both named after families who at one time held the lordships of those fortifications. Castle Baynard was built in the southwestern corner of the city, just inside the city wall, and its lords later claimed – perhaps with justice – to hold the hereditary generalship of the city militia. The original castle lasted only to the 13th century, when the site was given to the Dominicans, although a more scaled-down version was later built. The site of Montfichet Castle is not known with certainty, but was probably just to the north of Baynard's, and was also gobbled up by the Dominican precinct.

"wall"
The city wall was the medieval citizens' principal inheritance from Roman Londinium. Unlike its medieval successor, which had no stretch along the riverfront, the Roman wall surrounded the city on all sides, and the Thames stretch evidently survived into the early Middle Ages, for local place-names such as Billingsgate and Dowgate would seem to reflect openings through the wall; it was around such openings that goods were being landed. Archaeologists found the remains of part of this stretch in 1975. But that side of the walled circuit was not maintained, since the river frontage was gradually being extended into what had once been river and built on. Whether FitzStephen's reference to the Thames stretch was just a folk memory by his time, or whether some fragments of wall remained, we are not sure. Around the remainder of the wall there were six main gateways at this time: Aldgate on the east side; Bishopsgate, Cripplegate, Aldersgate on the northern circuit; and Newgate and Ludgate facing west. FitzStephen probably intended the Tower's postern gate as the seventh.

"suburb"
The suburb between the city and the palace of Westminster was more properly the site of the old Saxon town of Lundenwic, straddling the Strand and with settlement spreading as far west as the future Westminster. Although largely abandoned during the period of Viking incursions, this area was repopulated after Edward the Confessor refounded and enlarged the abbey there and established a palace nearby. In the 13th century Westminster attained borough status of its own. We can understand why Professor Brooke preferred to translate FitzStephen's suburbano as "faubourg", thinking of the orientation towards Westminster rather than London. The administrative capital and the commercial centre together defined what is modern London.

"suburban houses"
The suburban stretch between London and Westminster was beginning to become popular as the location of town houses of the nobility.

"if it has a good lord"
This aside is taken by some to be as close as FitzStephen dared come to an admonishment to Henry II, who is markedly absent from the list of worthy monarchs at the end of the Description. The dig, however, may be aimed more at the Empress Matilda, to whom the Londoners were opposed, rather than at Henry – Christopher Brooke suggests that FitzStephen had in mind the crisis of 1173, when London supported Henry against his rebellious son.

"20,000 cavalry and 60,000 infantry"
These figures are an obvious exaggeration (not atypical of medieval writers dealing with numbers greater than were countable), for the total population of the city in the 13th century is unlikely to have amounted to half that total. But certainly London did muster large forces to take part in the civil war between Matilda and Stephen.

following "dress, manners, and dining"
Curiously, the L.C. version omits here two sentences one might think the scribe would have taken pains to include. The first states (Butler's translation) that: "The inhabitants of other towns are called citizens, but of this they are called barons"; it has been suggested that the term represents a Latinization of the Anglo-Saxon burh-thegn, reflecting the superior status of merchants active internationally, but this is looking further than necessary – "baron" was a term widely employed in a variety of circumstances, ranging from no more than male head of a household to a tenant-in-chief of the king, either of which might be applicable to the leading men of London. Possibly, however, the omission of this sentence from the L.C. version reflects a change in use of "baron", restricting it more to the upper urban class. The second omitted sentence states (Butler) that: "With them a solemn oath ends all strife", a reference to the prominence of purgation in urban judicial procedures, which is echoed in the charter of Henry I to London.

"Sabines"
The Sabine women of Roman legend had become a metaphor for chastity, propriety and fidelity.

"schools"
The school attached to St. Paul's is heard of during the reign of Henry I. St. Martin-le-Grand was a college of secular canons in existence by 1068. Holy Trinity, Aldgate, was an Augustinian priory founded by Queen Matilda; its prior was also an alderman of the city, due to the priory's lordship of the Portsoken ward of London, acquired from the cnihtengild.

"enthymemes"
An enthymeme is a simple type of argument, in contrast to a syllogism which is a more complex form of argument. The quotation may have been a paraphrase of something by Juvenal.

"versified arguments"
Versification was presumably a device for assisting with memorization.

"Fescennine"
Fescennine verses were a crude precursor to Roman dramatic verse, often with a satirical or sarcastic bent (in some regards, limerick-like).

"Theon" "dithyrambs"
The L.C. version does not actually use those two terms, the copyist (or the source from which he copied) having failed to understand the terms, or their classical source (Horace), and having substituted other terms. A dithyramb was a song in praise of Bacchus and here perhaps connotes a bawdy verse.

"cookshop"
The cookshop that FitzStephen singles out may have been located on the vintner's quay, near to where the Walbrook flowed into the Thames. There was no shortage of cookshops along that stretch of the Thames bank between the bridge and the Fleet estuary, where most harbourage was situated; these shops catered particularly to travellers, and some were partitioned to create modest accommodations, despite municipal injunctions against cooks keeping hostels, and efforts to dismantle the illicit lodgings. By the thirteenth century many of the cookshops had been superseded by legitimate hostels.

"goose"
Butler argues that "goose" (anserem) is a corruption of "sturgeon" (acipenserem), which appears in other versions, on the grounds that the latter would appear more of a delicacy.

"cookery"
The point which FitzStephen, in somewhat garbled fashion, has taken from a Latinized version of Plato is that cookery is like medicine in catering to the physical needs of citizens.

"field that is smooth"
The derivation of Smithfield is, as FitzStephen correctly states, from the fact that the field was "smooth" (level and/or trampled flat). It is West Smithfield to which he refers, there having been another field of the same name on the east side of the city, just outside the Tower.

"palfreys"
Horses of subdued temperament, easy to ride (especially for women).

"two or sometimes three boys"
An addition in some other versions, meaning "according to what the arrangement is", may imply the races were organized by spectators wishing to wager on the results.

"kine"
Here the term means cattle.

"middlemen"
FitzStephen's use of the term "institores" (salesmen or hucksters) rather than "mercatores" may or may not have some significance (perhaps derogatory?), so "middlemen" may catch his tone better than "merchants".

following the verse on merchandize
This lengthy quote (by an author unknown, but inspired by Virgil), while it may appear fanciful at first glance, and likely FitzStephen's knowledge of geography was weak, nonetheless provides a fair reflection of the type of goods involved in the London luxury trade of this period, and of the general area of the world from which they came. London had long been an important trade destination. I have used verbatim Butler's translation of this part of FitzStephen's text.

"it was founded"
FitzStephen doubtless took this legend of London's founding by Trojans fleeing the wreck of their Homeric city from the Brut or, more likely, Geoffrey of Monmouth, who had it from even older tradition; the oracle quoted in chapter 25 is from Geoffrey, although FitzStephen reassigns the source from Diana to Apollo. The Trojan legend was of some psychological significance to Londoners, judging from the fact that it resurfaced periodically. At one point leading politician Nicholas Brembre was said (perhaps scurrilously) to be contemplating renaming London "New Troy", as the legend had it named originally. By 1433 the myth was sufficiently engrained for the London authorities to be prepared to assert the claim before a royal commission, in the context of a jurisdictional dispute with the Dean and Chapter of St. Martin-le-Grand, that the city had been founded on the model of Troy and had been called at some point prior to the Conquest "Troynovant". Furthermore at the same period the claim was made that a certain city custom – that a villein would become free who resided in London for a year and a day without challenge from his lord – was in effect before the time of Edward the Confessor and was modelled on similar provision at Troy. Thus the legend had come to serve as more than just a fancy or pretension.

"in common"
Some continued to argue, down into the 19th century, the influence of Rome on medieval urban institutions. The comparable elements are, however, so fundamental to organized civic life that we do not need to resort to such an argument.

"wards"
The two dozen wards – 12 on either side of the Walbrook – were a basis for raising manpower for policing and defence of the city (several encompassed territory surrounding a part of the city wall). An alderman had authority in each ward and presided over his own court (wardmoot), comparable to a hundredal jurisdiction; wards seem to have been named after the incumbent alderman. The wards may perhaps trace their roots to a time when London lacked a centralized authority and certain areas were administratively independent communities of varying types; their precise boundaries may not have become fixed until the 11th century.

"sheriffs"
By the time FitzStephen wrote, two sheriffs administered on behalf of the king London and a large area of adjacent territory (Middlesex); as a collection of administrative areas comparable to hundreds, this territory had a status analogous to a shire. The fundamental duty of a sheriff was to collect and deliver revenues due to the king. During Henry II's the office was frequently held by citizens, and sometimes earlier – the charter of Henry I to the city tries to formalize this, but we cannot be certain of the authenticity of the charter. It was likely the sheriffs who came to preside in the husting court, although that institution is heard of as early as the late 10th century, later to be superseded by the mayor (an office post-dating FitzStephen) in the role.

"senatorial order"
In using this term (Senatoriam dignitatem), FitzStephen is probably thinking more in terms of the office of alderman than a class of patricians, although it would be possible to read into it that some Londoners were at this time perceived as worthier than others of holding aldermannic office.

"custom"
Even though FitzStephen's term is jus statuendi, I am inclined to think that he was not referring to any specific statute formulated by city government – at this period it being doubtful whether London had such communal organization – but by the 'natural law', or custom, later encapsulated in writing as a quasi-constitution.

"assemblies"
Here the term refers to governmental meetings involving public presence and participation. He was likely thinking of the folkmoot, which met three times a year, and the husting court which, as Henry I's charter indicated, convened every Monday.

"drink"
The transcription has putatio, which would be nonsensical in its translation of "pruning" but has been interpreted as "fornication". Entirely apart from the fact that the Latin for that would be putagio, it seems unlikely that fornication, although doubtless as offensive to FitzStephen, would have been as conspicuous a folly as drunkenness, and we may recall that he has already (section 1) praised the chastity of London's matrons. We can clearly prefer the potatio of other versions.

"citizens"
FitzStephen makes an interesting distinction between cives and municipes. While it is risky to read anything too precise or fixed into this, FitzStephen himself grew up in the urban community and may have been conscious of a distinction. To effect a translation inevitably results in an interpretive decision, and the temptation is to distinguish between those who were residents of the town, which the passage goes on to support, and those who were members of the civic community – the latter being fully subject to local jurisdiction and sharing in communal privileges and obligations. Whether "citizenship" was, at this date, more formally defined in terms of freeman status is questionable; FitzStephen's statement might suggest not. But we may remember that true Londoners had, by the time FitzStephen wrote and perhaps within the scope of his personal memory, forcefully expressed collective identity in the form of the commune.

"boys' games"
It is possible that FitzStephen was using pueri in the general sense of "children", but more likely that his thinking was focused on boys – himself and his fellow playmates from school. His text as a whole shows little perception of the female dimension of urban society.

"Carnival"
Carnival (or Carnilevaria in the Latin) was Shrove Tuesday, the festival marking the beginning of Lent when meat-eating (carnivorax) was put aside (levare); it was consequently taken as an opportunity for great feasting and drinking – by the end of the Middle Ages it had almost become orgiastic in its excesses, which were condemned by the Church.

"ball game"
FitzStephen's use of the term is the earliest reference in England to what eventually became football.

"workers"
By workers (exercitatores), FitzStephen was probably thinking of the apprentices and journeymen; the masters of the trades and crafts were perhaps included among the older (majores natus) citizens.

"Lent"
Lent, the few weeks before Easter, was presumably a natural time to practice horsemanship, weapons and combat skills, since it preceded the preferred campaigning season. That the river-based contests were later may have been to allow the water to lose some of its winter chill.

"lay sons"
FitzStephen means those who were not being trained for a career in the Church.

"military spears"
By qualifying spears with "military" FitzStephen as presumably contrasting the pike-like spears used by soldiers with shorters spears used for hunting.

following "cannot stand still"
FitzStephen appears to have forgotten he has already made use of this quotation (section 13).

"bridge"
This is of course London Bridge; since it was the only one in existence at that period, it needed no distinguishing name. It is not clear whether the galleries (solariis) were actually part of the structure of the bridge, as was the case in later centuries, or were part of buildings on the riverbank. FitzStephen probably felt no need to clarify, expecting his readers to know. The bridge was one of those features of London FitzStephen took for granted and felt no need to dwell on. He could not know that, by representing the crossing of the Thames, it also reflected the reason why settlement was established at London in the first place and why London became important under the Romans, the hub of their road system in Britain. It was they who built the first London bridge, just east of the site of the medieval and present bridge. The site was probably dictated primarily by the availability of suitably solid ground on the southern bank of the Thames, which was marshier than the northern bank, for a road leading south. Not long after FitzStephen wrote, the city authorities rebuilt the bridge in stone; it was an expression of the confidence of communal government, and has remained one of the foremost symbols of the city, down to modern times.

"athletics"
This seems to be a plausible interpretation of saliendo, literally "leaping" (although a related term meant "tumblers").

"(by use of a strap) beyond a marker"
The relatively lengthy qualifications attached to javelin throw were presumably to make it clear that the purpose was to throw a distance, rather than hit a target.

"bucklers"
These were small, round shields intended for practice or lightly-armed combat; we may assume that swords of some kind were also used in the one-on-one combats.

"great marsh"
This lay in the area now remembered by the names Moorfields and Moorgate. It served as meadowland when it was kept drained, thanks in part to the Walbrook – a stream which divided the city into eastern and western halves – channelling water into the Thames. During the Middle Ages, the moor was not kept well-drained, and the Walbrook's course was encumbered with debris and garbage cast therein by the citizens; consequently, the area became boggy.

"slide along"
The run-and-slide recreation was still, in my schooldays, a favourite playground activity during the winter, done exactly as FitzStephen describes.

"shin-bone"
Numerous examples of such crude ice-skates have been found at archaeological sites, dating from the 8th century to the close of the Middle Ages. The Museum of London has a set of bone skates possibly contemporary with Fitz Stephen.

"hunting rights"
The extensive area of hunting rights probably owes much to the role of London as a centre of one of the early Saxon kingdoms. Compare with the clause in Henry I's charter.

"King Henry III"
Henry II, wishing to secure the succession of his heirs, had his eldest son Henry crowned in 1170; "the young king", however, did not outlive his father to take sole possession of the throne.

"city perspective"
A further known copy, made from the Liber Custumarum version in the late fourteenth century, is notable for several updates made to reflect the situation at that time. It was selective in what it copied, showing interest in passages on city administration and economy and ignoring those on social recreations. But it retained the reference to the supposed Trojan roots of London, showing a continuing interest in that legend. See Hannes Kleineke, "Carleton's book: William FitzStephen's 'Description of London' in a late fourteenth-century common-place book," Historical Research, vol.74 (2001), 117-26.

"allegorical dimension"
On this, see Keith Lilley, Urban Life in the Middle Ages 1000-1450, Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2002, 26-32.