3rd February: Royal Borough of Greenwich

Greenwich became the fourth Royal Borough on this date in 2012, joining the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead. This was done to mark the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II. Here are some things you may not know about Greenwich:

1. The area was first named by Danish settlers, and means the green place of Cows on the bay.
2. The Danes kept a fleet anchored in Greenwich for about three years and an army camp on the hill above. From their base in Greenwich they attacked Kent and captured the town of Canterbury. They took Archbishop Alphege prisoner and held him at Greenwich for seven months before stoning him to death for refusing to allow a ransom to be paid.
3. In the 15th century, Greenwich was the site of a royal palace, the Palace of Placentia. Henry VIII was born there; he married Catherine of Aragon and Anne of Cleves there, and his daughters Mary and Elizabeth were also born there. The palace was a favourite summer residence for Elizabeth I, and Shakespeare performed plays for her there. The palace fell into disrepair during the English Civil War, but was rebuilt and eventually became the Royal Naval College in 1873. The building's more recent link with the world of entertainment was when the second wedding in the film Four Weddings and a Funeral was shot in the chapel.
4. Parts of the Royal Naval College are open to the public. Other tourist attractions in the borough include the Cutty Sark, the National Maritime Museum, the Observatory, Greenwich Park and the O2. A less well known attraction is the Fan Museum, which contains more than 3,500 fans with the oldest dating back to the 11th century.
5. Greenwich park started life as the hunting grounds for the Palace of Placentia. The park is 183 acres (0.7 km2) in area, and contains a statue of James Wolfe, commander of the British expedition to capture Quebec, and the former Royal Observatory.
6. The world’s first weather forecast was issued from Greenwich Royal Observatory in 1848 by James Glaisher. Although the Observatory is more of a museum now than a working observatory, there is still a ball which drops daily to mark the time at 1pm. The Royal Observatory cost £520 to build in 1675, and was over budget by the massive sum of £20.
7. Greenwich was the site of the first steam railway in London in 1838. It was the first to be built specifically for passengers, and the first elevated railway, having 878 arches over its four mile stretch from London Bridge.
8. In 1884 25 nations with 41 delegates met at a conference in Washington DC to vote on where the Prime Meridian would be - and Greenwich won. In parts of Greenwich there is a metal line on the ground and at night a laser beam in the sky which is visible from neighbouring boroughs - these both mark the meridian, which divides the world into the eastern and western hemispheres of the Earth. On the exact opposite side of the globe is the International Date Line. The actual meridian is aligned with the cross-hairs in the eyepiece of the Transit Circle telescope at the Royal Observatory.
9. There is an Asteroid named after it. Asteroid 2830 was named 'Greenwich' in honour of the area's astronomical links.
10. Greenwich has had a market since 1700 when a charter to run two markets, on Wednesdays and Saturdays for 1,000 years was assigned by Lord Romney to to the Commissioners of Greenwich Hospital. The market still belongs to the hospital, and they have been actively improving it since 2014.

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