Gray's Inn Road

Gray's Inn Road, formerly Gray's Inn Lane, also spelt without the apostrophe, is a major road in central London, in the London Borough of Camden. It is named after Gray's Inn, one of the four Inns of Court. The road starts in Holborn, near Chancery Lane tube station and the boundaries of the City of London and the London Borough of Islington. From here it goes north and slightly west, forming the boundary between Clerkenwell to the east and Holborn, Bloomsbury and finally St Pancras to the west.

Along its course the road passes the Eastman Dental Hospital and the UCL Eastman Dental Institute, Gray's Inn, ITN, ITV and the London Welsh Centre. Near the north end of the road, where it meets Cromer Street and Acton Street, it turns into a one-way system heading towards Kings Cross station.

Throughout its route the road keeps to the higher ground, above the valley of the River Fleet to the east. In earlier times it was the principal route from London to Hampstead.

History

The area of Gray's Inn Road was clearly populated from palaeolithic times and a gravel bed off Gray's Inn Lane (see below) was the find spot for the c. 350,000-year-old Gray's Inn Lane Hand Axe in 1679, one of the important artefacts in the emerging consciousness of human antiquity, now in the British Museum. Given the road's height above the Fleet valley, it may have formed part of an ancient trackway.

Gray's Inn

The Honourable Society of Gray's Inn, commonly known as Gray's Inn, is one of the four Inns of Court (professional associations for barristers and judges) in London. To be Called to the Bar and practise as a barrister in England and Wales, an individual must belong to one of these Inns. Located at the intersection of High Holborn and Gray's Inn Road in Central London, the Inn is both a professional body and a provider of office accommodation (chambers) for many barristers. It is ruled by a governing council called "Pension", made up of the Masters of the Bench (or "Benchers"), and led by the Treasurer, who is elected to serve a three-year term. The Inn is known for its gardens, or Walks, which have existed since at least 1597.

Gray's Inn does not claim a specific foundation date; there is a tradition that none of the Inns of Court claims to be any older than the others. Law clerks and their apprentices have been established on the present site since at least 1370, with records dating from 1391. During the 15th and 16th centuries, the Inn grew steadily with great prestige, reaching its pinnacle during the reign of Elizabeth I. The Inn was home to many important barristers and politicians, most notably Francis Bacon, and counted Elizabeth herself as a patron. Thanks to the efforts of prominent members such as William Cecil and Gilbert Gerard, Gray's Inn became the largest of the four by number, with over 200 barristers recorded as members. During this period, the Inn became noted for the masques and revels that it threw, and William Shakespeare is believed to have performed there at least once.

Gray's Anatomy

Gray's Anatomy is an English-language textbook of human anatomy originally written by Henry Gray and illustrated by Henry Vandyke Carter. Earlier editions were called Anatomy: Descriptive and Surgical and Gray's Anatomy: Descriptive and Applied, but the book's name is commonly shortened to, and later editions are titled, Gray's Anatomy. The book is widely regarded as an extremely influential work on the subject, and has continued to be revised and republished from its initial publication in 1858 to the present day. The latest edition of the book, the 41st, was published in September 2015.

Publication history

Origins