The really famous but ugly UK bridge that hundreds of years ago looked totally different
London Bridge has had many previous incarnations - but the bridge thousands of people walk over daily is now somewhat unremarkable.
London Bridge is one of the more modest offerings when it comes to the capital’s river crossings. Some people undoubtedly love it, but for most, it is a fairly bleak splurge of concrete that does the job.
But many people don’t realise that, like Doctor Who, it has come in various shapes and sizes over the years - and one of its previous incarnations now stands in a random American city with about 60,000 people.
The most stunning version of London Bridge, plucked straight out of a fairytale, is the medieval version which was commissioned by King Henry II in 1209. The 282m long bridge was packed to the brim with houses, parapets and towers.
King Henry had recently murdered the Archbishop of Canterbury, and built the bridge in an attempt to make up for his wrongdoing. There was a chapel on the bridge which he named after Thomas Becket, the man he just killed, and was thought to be the starting point of a pilgrimage to Becket’s tomb in Canterbury.
The heads of traitors, such as William Wallace, Thomas More and Thomas Cromwell were all stuck on stakes over the wooden drawbridge. With houses lining both sides of the road, the bridge was its own mini city ecosystem, thriving with life and businesses.
Sadly though, a fire burnt down much of it in 1212, killing many.
By the late 14th Century, 140 houses were squeezed on, each eventually about four or five storeys high. Public toilets were stationed at either end of the bridge - allegedly in 1481, one of them fell into the Thames, and five men drowned.
Various fires later, including the 1666 Great Fire, left it in a delirious state. Drivers had to stay on one side of the road - possibly where the British custom of driving on the left came from - and eventually the buildings came down.
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Sadly though, it was decided a new one was needed, and architect John Rennie won a 1799 competition for its design - the new bridge was built with five stone arches without the extra buildings.
This went in 1968, when the stonework was sold to an American entrepreneur who installed it as a tourist attraction in Lake Havasu City in Arizona, where it currently looks horrendously out of place.
The blander bridge which we trudge across now was built between 1967 and 1972, and is yet to experience any fires which threaten its existence.