2-699-106 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

'The Tower Menagerie about 1820', (c1872). Visitors at the menagerie in the Tower of London. Wild animals including lions were kept at the Tower from the 13th century. In the 18th century it was opened to the public; the admission price included the supply of a cat or dog to be fed to the lions. An inventory of 1800 listed a tiger, leopards, a hyena, a large baboon, various types of monkeys, and wolves. The menagerie closed in 1831 - there had been instances of visitors being bitten - and most of the animals were moved from their cramped conditions to the recently opened London Zoo. From Old and New London, Vol. II: A Narrative of Its History, Its People, and Its Places, by Walter Thornbury. [Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co., London, Paris & New York]