BREAD STREET

   South out of Cheapside at No. 46 to Queen Victoria Street (P.O. Directory). In Bread Street Ward.

   Earliest mention: "Bredstte, 1 Rich. I. (Cott. MS. Vesp. B. IX). "Bredestret," 5 John (Cal. Ch. Rolls, I. 269).

   Other forms : "Bredstrete," 14 H. III. (Anc. Deeds, B. 1971). "Bradstrete," 1538 (L. and P. H. VIII. XIII. (1), p. 141). "Breadestrete," 1587 (Ct. H.W. II. 713).

   So called, Stow says, of bread in olde time there sold, for it appeareth by recordes, that in the yeare 1302, 30 Ed. I., the bakers of London were bounden to sell no bread in their shops or houses, but in the market (S. 346).

   May be alluded to as "Brestrete" in 1281 (Cal. L. Bk. B. p. 11).

   times Bread Street probably included the whole of the street now called Bread Street Hill, as there is no early record of a street of this name, and Bread Street certainly extended at one time into the parish of St Nicholas Olave, into Queenhithe Ward.

   It has been further curtailed in modern times at its southern end by the formation of Queen Victoria Street, so that it is now considerably smaller in extent than it was originally.