Marble Arch
Marble Arch
The name Marble Arch denotes both the traffic whirlpool where Bayswater Road merges into Oxford Street and the gateway designed by John Nash after the Arch of Constantine in Rome. Nash's arch stood from 1828 until 1851 in front of Buckingham Palace. Royal carriages could not comfortably negotiate the narrow opening, so it was removed to its present position at the northeast corner of Hyde Park.
Set into the pavement on the traffic island opposite the cinema at Marble Arch is the stone plaque that marks (roughly) the place where the Tyburn Tree stood for four centuries, until 1783. This was London's central gallows, a huge wooden structure with hanging accommodation for 21. Hanging days were holidays, the spectacle supposedly functioning as a crime deterrent for the masses. It didn't work, alas. Oranges, gingerbread, and gin were sold, alongside "personal favours," to vast, rowdy crowds, and the condemned, dressed in finery for his special moment, was treated more as hero than as villain.
