Stephen Fry's Key to the City - Exploring the Mysteries of the City of London

that's the city lord good lord left the square mile the City of London it's an extraordinary institution everything is so concentrated here it's just amazing I love you from drool-worthy quantities of cash in the bank of england vaults my so what I think it is is that door is to sharing an honor with the lovely Doris who is my life supply of lavatory paper I like two prisoners cries in the dead man's walk at the Old Bailey that's the cells being discharged oh really yeah we're processing prisoners not and the will during ceremonies I'm going to delve into the secrets of the city well I was often some months ago the Freedom of the City of London and I had no idea what that meant I didn't really know what the City of London is part of me knows it's a square mile filled with banks and banks well they're the enemies of society at the moment it seems but I also know that it's much older than that it goes back to Dick Whittington in the 12th century it's the corporation of the city of London it's liveries and Guilds and mansion houses and guild halls and I've no idea what the freedom means they say it means I can drive goats over Tower Bridge I'm sure that's nonsense but the whole thing set me out on the course of thinking if I'm going to accept this honor I want to penetrate the City of London it's it's one of those very British things it's like a little corner of the world that's completely hidden it's both ancient and modern and it's very exciting and Here I am outside the guild hall which is one of the great buildings and I dare say which of Britain's himself walked into it hello where am I supposed to be going especially I'll take it back oh thank you thank you huh I already I can see people in funny costumes that's why I was hoping for ladies and gentlemen would you please be upstanding to receive your distinguished guests I wonder what I'll be given a key a PIN number or maybe a swipe card Stephen Fry would you please approach this is the Declaration of the Freeman I'd like you to read it aloud beginning with your name I Stephen Fry do solemnly declare that I will be good and true to our lady sovereign Queen Elizabeth the second that I will be obedient to the mayor of this city now on behalf of the Chamberlain of this great and ancient city of London it is a particular pleasure tonight for me to extend the right hand of fellowship to you and to greet you all as citizens of London I'm free free I live only a couple of miles away in the West End of London but the city seems like a foreign country I intend to use my new freedom as a passport to explore its hidden mysteries tracing the outlines of the original Roman settlement the city is a small local authority that has vastly more wealth and power than any other borough in the UK yet is a mere square mile the reason London was founded as a trading port is this river with ships from all over the world coming to do business I'm hoping to get my hands on the levers of power at Tower Bridge that symbol of London that allowed trading ships into the heart of the city oh my goodness look at it there it is it's a sight that not everybody sees even Londoners tower bridge was built in 1886 and Eric's ovens as the splendid title of bridge master there was excited to see the white lines of the road that that angle is the warship coming through now they're flying in union Janek I've got a statutory duty to open a bridge to any vessel that gives me the required 24 hours notice so I can assure Chris all these staircases in different directions I asked Eric if I can see how this masterpiece of Victorian engineering actually works and that's known as the basket chain but this is the basket oh my god oh my goodness it's like it's a theater you could have rows of people on stage except presumably when it rises you're actually under the road under the South Pascal when we do a bridge leave that whole lot travels down and we'll go up so if we stood here we'd be killed not killed doesn't you'll have time to get it have another duck yes if it was a full one would I be safe against that wall a full lift you would be safe against the wall but it would touch you before it stopped so it would be rubbing up against your shoulders before it stopped tux tower bridge Christine we're about to start your bridge lift now originally operated by complicated mechanics it's now all controlled by one man and today Eric allows that one man to be me stand by brick stone stopping road traffic this noise is normal yes norm go to Klutch now we're now waiting for the traffic to clear the bridge now press those two now you can press the pedestrian gates this is just unbelievable look around just make sure anything safe and there's nobody on the bridge does yep okay right halfway back to creep speed just gently watch the bridge watch the center of bridge and you'll see it moving oh yeah heaven now all the way back oh my goodness I'm raising the bridge just watch your guide till he gets to 49 degrees 10 degrees 10 point 12 13 it is a miracle it's absolute hurdle but that's me 35 gently back into the center position now there we are there you can let that go so all the buttons that oppress need to be pressed the river light and here comes one thus fit sir Cecilia a Swiss boat I guessed it out of Grimsby surfing that's not varies with trade is what the city has always been about weather on the river or in its many markets and just a few minutes north of Durbridge I'm given the rare privilege of a seat with in something called phone real Oh No the cliche image of the greedy 80s is of men in bright colored blazers shouting all but one of those markets has gone to computerized heaven now just the one the London Metal Exchange remains a live throbbing market and I have to say is one of the most dramatic spectacles I've ever encountered apparently the guys sitting with me in the ring are dealers buying and selling metal futures say a thousand tons of zinc in three months time the one standing just outside are giving them instructions which they're getting from their colleagues in the Outer Ring were on the phones to the clients who might be say pojo cars wanted to buy aluminium for next year's production I'm told that over 80% of the world's industrial metal prices are set in this room and the urgency is because everyone waits to buy or sell till seconds with all the market closes ten you were just you were like everybody's stand the faces that veins bulging out on your for Adele jay-z loud language I'm you'd absolutely transformed animal I've lost all I can hear that so did you make money on that you don't know yet well you know have to do the computation we do selling or buying I was selling it so absolutely incomprehensible Jimmy but as theater it's one of the most remarkable things I've ever seen I'm glad you enjoy it whether you're trading metal futures already cash the city is the throbbing heart of world finance and at its center the Bank of England on the ground floor there may be marbled halls but in the basement the emphasis is not on show and security my so what I think it is good lord twenty pounds you of course you do lies you're quite mad Goldfinger I'm waiting to meet the chief cashier Chris salmon this is like a wholesale warehouse ready to supply the retailers in this case the high street banks when necessary and this is just one of the rooms full of cash there's apparently over twenty billion pounds in these vaults can't help thinking of Liza Minnelli and Joel Grey money a marker yen a buck or a pound so all that makes the world go round and look at it it's all here you think at the Bank of England you think of a noble edifice with columns in front of it and the old lady of Threadneedle Street in it here's all this raw cash they say in movies um the directors that audiences always follow the money so even if it's someone in a in a cafe pushing a twenty pound the twenty dollar bill across to someone else the human eye always follows it or obsessed with it it's kind of um breath comes in his short gasps when we see so much of it around us I don't know there's something about sheer physical presence of money that brings out something very puzzling dark within us well in each cage there's about four million pounds and in the room as a whole it's about two billion pounds for new banknotes which haven't yet been issued and one that runs that you as chief cashier have signed and not individually obviously not in just a warning signal which has been repeated a few times modern technology yes must be marvelous feeling your name is on every one of these he said it there yes Chester so you sat down with a piece of paper and you did a few versions of your signature and it was as unsophisticated as that you'll give in an a4 sheet three boxes you can do three attempts and then you take your best one Oh in my case you print off a second sheet did you really build your good think your best one on the second sheet and then it goes off to be a photocopied I guess and there it is then when you go to a cash machine and out comes this and you look at it new seal name that you get a little bit of a thrill um there's an element of that yes there it would be untrue to to pretend otherwise but but I mean there is a more serious point the reason why we have the signature to chief cashier on the note is to underscore the importance we place an institution in fact people can trust their banks notice and that's why we have the signature there it's a very elaborate IOU that's a promissory note there'll be a lot of people watching this thinking well the the weakest point the point where we can move in is when you're transporting it somebody orders a few of these crates somehow you've got to get them into a van onto the street without anybody following you cause you to crash against the wall coming out and doing all that Sweeny stuff and presumably you can't tell me anything about how you do that we move to cash safely Wow let's go is the top you could please I'll do my best group in your we're so close to the gherkin I can always smell the dill and vinegar in the City of London the square mile that is the financial district thrusting new towers jostle with the most ancient of strange rituals and I feel a bit like an anthropologist landing in a foreign country when outside the guild hall I come across a group of those ceremonial symbols of the City of London Corporation beetles handle it well I found an excellent dependin within or without within without oh this is like punching Judy you've got found him within and found without it so if you learn more beetles I've never seen so many beetles in my life wonderful to see you I must say there's an almost Dickensian Pickwickian sense of good English roast beef and your look sort of welfare do a load of that just now that'll be wise from the mayor sir yes we get your haircut you're quite right I'm very sorry I'm a shambles that's me told dear me The Beatles tell me they are here for something called the silent ceremony I don't quite know what they mean by silence aramony weather literally we go inside the guild hall and not a word is spoken III believe it is a solemn occasion and the whole thing is a mystery that's about to be unraveled hello this will be the inauguration of the new Lord Mayor that is the head of the City of London Corporation that's not Boris Johnson's job this one is chosen from among the aldermen of the city and this exact ceremony has apparently been held every year since around the time Dick Whittington became Lord Mayor over 600 years ago unlike any of the 32 boroughs in London the City of London Corporation is elected by both residents and business votes and has unique powers even its own police force nice hats it's an extraordinary mysterious 35 minutes of silent ceremony with the only word spoken those of the new Lord mayors I saw way sylia truly declare faking perform duties of the office of the rest done it's all done by symbol and this is the moment when power passes you put on the funny hat the jobs yours this year's man in the Hat is a city solicitor how'd you do congratulations long man was infected oh she's really wonderful I was thinking one of the one of the conditions are being able to be a lawman congratulations to be able to wear that hat without looking ridiculous and you put it off oh those genuine dignity in it it's a wonderful ceremony is it oh my goodness you've been holding out all afternoon and doing the picking yes and one final hidden ritual involving a hat the passing of the key to power one year ago you asked me to keep the key to the city and Christ's Hospital seal under my hat I have done so I now return to you that key please keep this key under your hat my lord now I will do so that's it that's it because I have say started disappointing key is do wrong key here we go the Lord Mayor is in office for just a year the job is unpaid and the mayor and his family traditionally move into the flat at the top of the mansion house it's about as ground a shot to live above as you can get a few months since his inauguration on a day of special ceremonial a visit from the Queen less I've been invited into the inner sanctum by the Lady Mayoress the front door says Lady Mayoress prizes yes see oh my goodness double that's a big grand is this what you're wearing today that is what I'm oh very you would look the belle of the ball that's why so different the handbags and you know yep gonna try accessorizing is over exactly but of course what I really want to see is the closet this is Davis dressing good lord it was cool South Gallery so what should I wear today so he has this this beautiful lace piece of his Velvets and he's that what he's going to do that's what he's wearing today that's absolutely gorgeous and his visit was the dawn to the Egyptian Hall and now is full of Oh perfect art from a million times he's won a few husbands he's got more more frocks in you know 100 his britches britches and tights and that's the Merrill chain Lord leaders or directors then yeah this is the back door right the proper Green Bay's doors have another the breakfast going on are we gonna do of it goodness me Wow the many women here are in view yes so these are the people who essentially run the corporation of the city of London the aldermen and common councilmen are breakfasting on the day the Queen is due to visit the city that is the Lord Mayor dressed yet back into the closet these are $70 times area Shire do you mind if I finger your Omid no please have never actually done this I've never understood why a member to the village is even nicer wow it's so beautiful and the rosettes on the shoulder I wonder because I saw them by the mirror and I wonder where they very go good luck everybody goodbye hey thank you precision timing now go and they're off oh look at the LMO limo alone lord mayor's office and their offices in Paul's Cathedral meet the Queen in fact the Lord Mayor isn't just off to meet the Queen as a result of strife and altercation under King John nine hundred years ago the city which financed the king's army gained in return the right to govern themselves with vast powers given to the mayor but still the Monarchs overlordship should be acknowledged when she visits the city and it is the Lord mayors job along with that ceremonial sword to do just that the city of London Corporation is a powerful self-financing fiefdom the Lord Mayor at its head is also nominally the chief magistrate the Old Bailey a stone's throw away is where he would sit in fact the Lord Mayor's judicial powers are not used but the corporation owned and run the place it's so impressive so awe-inspiring truth learning art labor variable of course you've got the city's crest at all yes the man who has all the keys here is Charles Henty the undersheriff an officer of the City of London Corporation this day is probably the dullest underneath the present day courts there used to be the infamous Newgate Prison your last night may well we have spent spent here at the Bailey although we stopped executing publicly in 1868 1902 from inside and then we stopped the condemned man and persons will be in here last night's given and then usually they would be them taken out this way having chosen their own meal I don't think we went that far it's nice for the films but incarcerated here was everyone from Dick Turpin to Casanova now it's the fifty people on trial today what is this this is what we call dead man's walk now what was here dead man ten man's walk cause you're only going to go one way as you came that and as I said doors each way so one that'll lower the narrower each time narrow narrower it's very Alice in Wonderland yeah the cries of London that like badness that's the cells being discharged oh really yeah we're processing prisoners now it gets tiny you're only going to go one way by the time the door got smaller and smaller and smaller see you know mentally it's focusing you in a very nasty way God how absurd you cables and on and on and you're gone to the end turn right and then find yourself outside any fear its front of all the public and it X key and you said it in 1868 which was the last public hanging yeah twenty thousand people went by to like that sort of mixes the two ages quite extraordinary age of the London Underground and the age of public hangings don't mix and ones mind all it was an entertainment for some people but above us now there is presumably there's a judge banging gavel and hopefully dispensing justice even rather more merciful nature keep your voice down little bit cuz there's our cells yes what cells on this floor apply of slightly over that and that war and war bar they'll never get there gradually being moved out now check the timing I'm going down even further into the Bailey my goodness oh don't worry it's deep it is certainly very deep down here the undersheriff now has a further secret to reveal in the bowels of the Bailey I want you to go over that side right and watch your toes because using that key what I gained a dig is to bring it to your left okay listen I can't do that up there hop on to the wood now you can hear something oh my goodness there's a ladder down at bottom there is one x with a pleat that's the sling complete with a famous underground river yeah all those cliches about London being levels of history I me at the bottom of it you have this and at the top you've got a 22 tongue figure injustice is that I watch you watch yeah serious way problem justice has a weight problem my life in my exploration of the hidden nooks and crannies of the city I've experienced modern markets and medieval ritual but I've yet to penetrate the ancient roots buried beneath this trading metropolis on lower Thames Street I've now got an appointment with museum curator Caroline McDonald why don't you bid me yeah because I'm going to tell you what's in room 101 Casey ready absolutely so where's the stairs so actually this is the 1970s office block I can say it's all breezeblocks and decay it's not or is it curiouser and curiouser dallas caroline has obtained special permission for me to descend to a site close to the river right under the road Owen we're now yes we are right oh yeah the old Billingsgate Oh what we're looking at is a Roman house with a bathhouse in it's kind of full court so yes in this basement of a 1970s office block here is an absolute treasure the house here was built sometime in the second century and the bath house is an addition in the third century when was all this some just unearthed in modern times well it was discovered in 1848 this is actually the site of the coal exchange in London it was it yes and they were demolishing the building in the Victorian period when the workmen unearthed this the Victorians were very taken with it and the first kind of scheduling of ancient monuments came in in 1882 and this was one of the very first monuments to make it onto the list so this is the flue looks like a pizza oven yes it really does isn't it exactly it is like this is the hot room because it's the one nearest the furnace and so the floor was laid on these piles of tiles yes so they raised the floor up to get the underfloor heating absolutely London only exists the city today only exists because of kind of DNA that the Romans put down for us 2,000 years ago it was initially a river crossing for the army but the army supply route meant merchants from all over the Empire flocked into this new market and that trading that the procurator the the person who is in control of all the finances of Britannia was here it's all about money it's all about trade it's all about that movement of people it has been ever since absolutely circles being on the river right behind me is the Thames and the old Billingsgate market and I suppose people would come off boats and this if this was a public baths they would come in here - to that retreat after a long voyage the Romans liked to have their baths before their main meal of the day and so if you came to this in if it wasn't in indeed um you had the luxury of just taking a few steps from your rooms straight into your private bathhouse fantastic at the center of Londinium stood an impressive amphitheater on the site of the present guild hall today I'm sure some people would want to see a few bankers thrown to the Lions unlike the hidden bathhouse the amphitheaters remains are open to the public and its outline is marked in gray on the guild halls courtyard the city's boundaries follow the shape of the Roman wall built to protect Londinium and its 30,000 inhabitants today 400,000 people work in the city but only 8,000 actually live here I want to know what it's like to have spent your life in the City of London not a financier not a fancy mayor or member of a livery company and I've been told about this lady called Doris so I want to meet her she's in her eighties and she's kindly invited me for a cup of good old Rosalie Doris McGovern was born in the city and has lived here all her life Doris Oh goodnight meet you really nice just another gorgeous day as well well could do with a period shot so we could do with another Spencer's haha they do deliver you I know they do here but that's the problem it's who is my life supply of lavatory paper I like you can never have too much loo roll that's my view oh my goodness buns ha ha ha ha ha I've never been able to help myself from helping myself lunk I think these are called fondant fancies only I'm a bit of a sucker for a fondant fancy um now Doris well I've noticed on your wall ISM something that I happen to possess as well which is the Freedom of the City of London mm-hmm when did you get that 6 or 7 years ago I used to do a lot of phone to in at one time oh really no shelter helping people so that but being in the city Maura thing and what does it mean being a freeman of the city did good have an awful lot as far as I'm concerned only its trappings cheap across London free try oh well as I'm a Freeman as well shall we shall we drive sheep along London Bridge should we do that I mean someone told me that that was actually a myth but then I discovered it isn't really a myth because you're allowed to train at him across London Bridge so for selling oh we can take them over London Bridge at someone would buy them dating that would be the best pumpkin from the Middle Ages to Victorian times it was a right that really meant something the city has always been about trade and one of the most important markets is insurance Lloyd's of London in Shaw almost anything no doubt including sheep it's an extraordinary place started when people got together in Edward Lloyd's coffee shop over three hundred years ago to share the risks of ships journeys and the brokers still have little stools as if in a coffee house for passing customers to pull up and chat about business we underwrite satellites over the biggest one that we've had a loss one was four hundred and six million i had a loss of 406 million this earlier this year what we just crashed to earth does rocket failed and it returned back to earth yes that's it insurers have to pay out that's what we're here for at the end of course I mean the higher the risk the higher the reward was in groups Lily and for a typical four hundred million dollar satellite premiums would be something of the order of 40 million dollars or so so forty million dollars that's ten percent yes right now there's nearly amenities yes I've got its eye watering summers and modulus we're not just writing space here we write marine we write energy we write aircraft we were an aviation wall we write lots of different risks and the idea is that across all of those lines of business you wouldn't expect all of them to fail in any one year or have bad right so one of sets the other ah John my particular speciality is insuring people we do the body parts insurance certain athletes excluded parts from other insurers so you might be whether it was David Beckham's tones or feet or something like that but the other things are actresses breasts foot models you'll take the left one and a partner with it it's quite serious in as much as if but big pop star insurance you have to consider the multiples of present earnings that can be dependent upon a voice can get into some enormous numbers when you're talking about highly paid entertainers what do you specialize in underwriting or looking into I'm a cyber and writer the latest statistics were that the cyber crime market generates more revenue for the criminals than the drug trafficking market worldwide which is pretty scary stuff and we wouldn't insure anyone who wasn't investing enough into their IT security saying that if a hacker really wants to get in and they're good the likelihood is they will so that's the risk that we take on it's not just personal data that's a target its corporate confidential data its mergers and acquisitions information it is medical research data so they're all under attack I had to find a space to check my own cybersecurity hello hi I'm Stephen what's your name yeah what's your name let's see you up top what can i film you fabulous hi guys the 42 stories of tower 42 housed the UK headquarters of over 60 companies a good 20 of which are major players in the finance industry Jimmy Laurence has been cleaning windows here for three years how do you discover that you are the kind of person who can do this without screaming in agony and fear that's all I really wanna try it out yeah just give it a go don't look down presumably you have to do this all the time yeah I mean it's just constant all year round like I heard in the fourth grade that's it yeah maurois just a bucket in a squeegee the old fashioned way crack sightseer so nothing falls off you must look in the windows and see people who not only get paid in the millions a year they get paid millions in bonuses does that make you think what the hell it does a bit yeah considering they're nice and warm and it's ugly we're the ones doing all the whole graph here up here I'm feeling a bit queasy feeling perhaps that many people share about the financial steadiness of the city every day my heart hello look down one should be or what do you think yeah look I'm an only asset you're safe and I know I'm safe now but sometimes when there's a gust of wind Oh if the city is the honeypot of the UK right at its heart as it happens on the roof of the Lord Mayor's residence some workers are very busy I dare appear to get into me which I shouldn't say that the roof of mansion housing what I can see there is the Bank of England and the top of the Gherkin I'm right in the most urban environment we've probably got a population of about 30,000 in here 30,000 about half of which would be out working half will being here bring up slowly straight vertically that's a high level up to eye level holy moly I must not drop you I won't you're blowing bees at me don't use your finger just question that way you really are brave and you can enjoy there is whole evening I can see the honey goes oh it's beautiful she wins there's the waggle dance goodness me now this lady here is vibrating yes aunty this is the waggle dance the famous waggle dance and what is it communicating it's been getting a good source of honey yes the angle in which they are waggling yes is the angle in which the bees the other bees need to navigate yes in relation to the Sun well as to the bees go and how can they survive in such an alien environment well first of all bees will travel the long distance to get what they need they'll go three miles oh right maybe five at a pinch but three so if you're a banker and you're watching and you're not in at our blog and you've got a windowsill then them very well put up some flowers because because we got some very hungry bees here hungry bees aren't the only ones relying on bankers to help them survive I need to get something off my chest so I find a city grandi former Lord Mayor former chairman of Lloyd's Insurance Lord Levene now runs an investment bank it's an extraordinary institution that the further I try and penetrate its mystery that the darker and deeper this it sometimes seems but let's face it we live in a time when probably the word banker the word hedge there were derivatives the word short seller all these phrases that most people don't understand and I cut myself as one of those but what we do think is that these words are contaminated and the in fact the city itself is contaminated to make which people are richer that's one interpretation I know it's a very common one that you must be aware of there are millions and millions of customers of banks who use them in a perfectly normal way there are hundreds of thousands of people who work in banks who didn't get paid any more than the average of the rest of the year and it's very easy to pick out those who've got it wrong those who did things were really bad there is very little remote amongst the top echelon the bankers are you hear them talking on the radio they don't seem to be the least bit where I depends are you taught yes it depends who you talk to and it's very easy to correct everyone did a number of people do a lot of very stupid and greedy things yes are there no mechanisms in place that will stop that from happening again saving you will now have a perfect system anybody answers that yes to that question and we'll know that somehow it'll get this proof but it's very different now but who's got it right you know which country's got it right which system is right the answer is that everybody's trying they're trying different methods and it's very tough at the moment the city is a controversial place that everyone including me wags their finger at but the thing that drew me to the city in the first place is the apparent contrast between the cutting edges of modern existence and the roots in ancient ritual my final engagement is to accept an invitation from one of the most striking examples of that contrasts a city livery company so time for a quick change in the gents of the mansion house the Society of apothecaries have invited me to dinner and when they have dinner they don't wear black tie oh no siree they have white tile that means that means a waistcoat which I've got to get the right rain right way on which is like hang on hang on come on Steven don't you're not that stupid that's the front that's the back so much oh I see what sort of step step into it that over me there put my arm in Mike's hang on that can't be right yes there we do it there we go tada and then I do it up and I think I made you faced with the humiliation of having to loosen the elastic at the back because of my enormous gut you know what's what half tongue up my white tie dancing in my tails and there we are I mean look at that that is all wrong look at you I see I didn't know you had one of those bibs as well like to shake us and let us you let my doilies that's fantastic even in white tie I'm feeling a little underdressed I'm joining the mayoral party in all their finery for a trip to the apothecaries Hall wherever that is hello I refer Creeper old women decoy good lord I have to look it up the Society of apothecaries is one of the city's livery companies who got their name because of their distinctive uniform or livery they began in medieval times as early clothes shops for different trades in this case pharmacists they still have powers in the election of the city's aldermen apparently I'm going to have to take part in some ritual involving Rome because one died in so well that they needed some stimulus to help their intestines to empty ice master wardens my lord mayor sheriff's ladies and gentlemen dinner is now served in the Great Hall no idea what the right thing to do is here one of the things that astonishes me about this whole things that people looking will see the Latin they'll see portraits of ancient figures and so on and then I discovered that people like you are doing absolutely up-to-the-minute work in in medicine around the world I know I mean the thing about the society is that it gives the impression that it's full old Sonia's the stillness young white men age but your examine your glamorous doctor but I'm not the only one but I know but your your field is something called catastrophe yeah we we deal with conflict and catastrophe medicine and and behind all the cloaks and the ceremony we're actually training doctors and nurses to work and adapt all their medical knowledge and skills working in conflict zones in disaster zones the master would like you to join with him with a Loving Cup and bid you all a hearty welcome and you protect my back you stand up we bow you take lid in your right hand I'll take it this week this take the silver plate off the cup you know this come yesterday put the lid back on did I just said we bow I give it to you you turn around and ask protect your babies don't have too much that's all right just not down in one thank you let's do two very now sit back yes all right so you might get of course after protection stays out with happen to present shame on me shame on me run oh my goodness thank goodness you have a deep yes I did I did my best I knew you could look after yourself you're getting war zone please be upstanding for two toasts the Queen the Lord Mayor the City of London Corporation and the sheriff's sure I like a drink but I can see how the word liver got in delivery art a mystery of the apothecaries of the City of London may it flourish bringing help to all till time ceases course you can mock of course you can say it's just a load of old fogies enjoying themselves in wine and stupid rituals but all these people are professionals in the health world and some of them are initiating new ways of taking medicine and healthcare into the world which are the absolute cutting edge but they're doing it in an old frock and to me that sums I'm not just the City of London but Britain itself behind strange layers of silk and tassels there can be some very modern cutting-edge brains and I think it's absolutely wonderful because I'm an on sentimentalist an art and I'm also someone who embraces the modern world so for me this is kind of home so do enjoy exercising your freedom - hello play this is we should do this we good exercise for us good exercise for fun to be free yes yeah she's got big long flight London Bridge tomorrow at AIDS more celebrities faces before they were famous and you sell them here first then at 9:00 fighting on the home front and the people in place to stop it neighborhood force is at night

Channel: Jonathan Thomas

Views: 1,198,631

Rating: 4.8546395 out of 5

Keywords: london, city of london, stephen fry, england

Id: e_gMGnAR9Ng

Length: 46min 33sec (2793 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 06 2014

Reddit Comments

[u/NeilJHopwood]

CGP Grey did a couple of interesting videos on the City of London:

Part 1: http://youtu.be/LrObZ_HZZUc Part 2: http://youtu.be/z1ROpIKZe-c

[u/jester456]

That old lady made me so happy

[u/[deleted]]

[removed]

[u/Braai]

Stephen Fry, he just exudes this warmth. I love the man. Interesting documentary. So many weird traditions.

[u/Jim808]

Good stuff. Thanks.

[u/radioactiveplatypus]

My favourite bit is at 19:10 where the mayor's wife shows the back door. When they open the door, there are three men energetically discussing something in what they consider a secret area, but as soon as the door opens, the third man immediately ushers them away from the camera. I wonder what secrets are discussed in the hidden areas!

[u/[deleted]]

4

[u/alky-holic]

Sounds interesting. Thanks for sharing.

[u/woodenboatguy]

Great stuff and I only wish there were enough time to delve deeper into the background on all that he visited so quickly.