Street cries are the short, often lyrical calls of merchants/vendors hawking their products and services in city streets and open-air markets.The "Cries of London" was a re-occurring theme in English printmaking for over three centuries. These colourful prints form a visual record of London's "lower orders", the pedlars, charlatans, street hawkers, milkmaids, and grocers who made their living on the city streets. They give us a glimpse of a long forgotten London where tradesmen would advertise their wares with a musical shout or a melodic rhyme. Different versions of the "Cries" vary in tone from idealistic visions of happy street vendors to satirical caricatures. One of the most famous series of "London Cries" is the group of somewhat sentimental pictures executed by Francis Wheatley. Wheatley's series was immensely popular and enjoyed a long period of success in the English print shops.
This popularity undoubtedly inspired Rowlandson to execute his satirical versions of the "Cries". In a set of eight prints, (number seven is missing and not recorded), Rowlandson created a group of witty images mimicking Wheatley's more earnest criers. Under his biting pen the "Cries" metamorphose into lascivious caricatures, Rowlandsonesque versions of London's street people.
According to Andrew Tuer,the earliest mention of street cries in London is found in an old ballad entitled " London Lyckpenny," or Lack penny, by John Lydgate, a Benedictine monk of Bury St. Edmunds, who flourished about the middle of the fifteenth century.
"Then unto London I dyd me hye,
Of all the land it beareth the pryse:
Hot pescodes, one began to crye,
Strabery rype, and cherryes in the ryse ; *(On the bough)
One bad me come nere and by some spyce,
Peper and safforne they gan me bede,
But for lack of money I myght not spede.
Then to the Chepe I began me drawne,
Where mutch people I saw for to stande;
One spred me velvet, sylke, and lawne,
Another he taketh me by the hande,
'Here is Parys thred, the fynest in the land;'
I never was used to such thyngs indede,
And wantyng money I myght not spede.
Then went I forth by London stone,
Throughout all Canwyke *(Candlewick) Streete;
Drapers mutch cloth me offred anone,
Then comes me one cryed hot shepes feete;
One cryde makerell, ryster* (Rushes green) grene, an other gan greete;
On bad me by a hood to cover my head,
But for want of mony I myght not be sped.
Then I hyed me into Est-Chepe;
One cryes rybbs of befe, and many a pye;"
Two free ebooks, digitized by Google, by Tuer on London Cries are listed Here.
In addition, an imperative source may also found in The Gentle Author's Cries of London. Details Here.
