Places: Paul's Cross, London

In the centuries before telephones, television, cable news or social media, an important way of spreading needed messages to the public was at common meeting places, often in the open air.  One such was Paul's Cross, an outdoor cross and later pulpit located in the churchyard of Old St. Paul's Cathedral.  The practice of the folkmoot, an Anglo-Saxon tradition of calling a public assembly, usually to announce new laws or legal judgments, persisted into Plantagenet times.  One of these folkmoots was held in 1236, to announce to the people of London King Henry III's intention to govern in accordance with its liberties as a city.  Henry spent most of his reign in a turbulent power struggle with his barons, struggles which often saw London as a pawn amongst the various factions.  Assuring the people publicly of his good intentions was good PR on Henry's part.

The London citizenry gathered again in 1259, during de Montfort's first uprising, to swear allegiance to Henry in the presence of the Archbishop of Canterbury.  Later, at another folkmoot held at Paul's Cross, Londoners would be equally eager to swear allegiance to Simon de Montfort against the King.  Paul's Cross was often a venue for public announcement of judgments against offenders, and where men and women performed public penance, usually by standing near the pulpit clad only in a shirt or shift and bearing a lighted candle for a prescribed period of time.  In 1422, a chaplain who had pleaded guilty to sorcery was taken to Paul's Cross, where he might have expected to be burnt.  Instead, books of his that were alleged to be sorcerous in nature were burned and the man given a last minute reprieve.  Sermons against the Lollard movement, and the declaration of John Wycliffe as a posthumous heretic, took place at Paul's Cross.  Later, Elizabeth "Jane" Shore, former mistress of Edward IV, did penance at Paul's Cross for harlotry.

Paul's Cross continued to be an important public venue for announcements, sermons and even penance into Tudor times.  As the Reformation took hold, the open air pulpit was a popular place for Reform-leaning ministers to speak to the people.  Due to the contentious nature of the sermons, riots often took place at Paul's Cross.   During the Civil War, Puritan forces destroyed the cross and pulpit.  Later, Sir Christopher Wren reinvented St. Paul's Cathedral to its present form.  Today, a statue of St. Paul on a column stands near the Cathedral and a marker indicates the spot where the cross and pulpit stood.