Chapter Squeeze to Standard of S by Brewer's Readers Handbook

The Cheapside Standard. This Standard was in existence in the reign of Edward I. In the reign of Edward III. two fishmongers were beheaded at the Cheapside Standard, for aiding in a riot. Henry IV. caused “the blank charter of Richard II.” to be burnt at this place.

The Standard, Cornhill. This was a conduit with four spouts, made by Peter Morris, a German, in 1582, and supplied with Thames water, conveyed by leaden pipes over the steeple of St. Magnus’s Church. It stood at the east end of Cornhill, at its junction with Grace-church Street, Bishopsgate Street, and Leadenhall Street. The water ceased to run between 1598 and 1603, but the Standard itself remained long after. Distances from London were measured from this spot.

In the year 1775 there stood upon the borders of Epping Forest, at a distance of about twelve miles from London, measuring from the Standard in Cornhill, or rather from the spot on which the Standard used to be, a house of public entertainment called the Maypole.—Dickens: Barnaby Rudge, i. (1841).

Standard (The Battle of the), the battle of Luton Moor, near Northallerton, between the English and the Scotch, in 1138. So called from the “standard,” which was raised on a waggon, and placed in the centre of the English army. The pole displayed the standards of St. Cuthbert of Durham, St. Peter of York, St. John of Beverley, and St. Wilfred of Ripon, surmounted by a little silver casket containing a consecrated wafer.— Hailes: Annals of Scotland, i. 85 (1779).

The Battle of the Standard was so called from the banner of St. Cuthbert, which was thought always to secure success. It came forth at the battle of Nevil’s Cross, and was again victorious. It was preserved with great reverence till the Reformation, when, in 1549, Catharine Whittingham (a French lady), wife of the dean of Durham, burnt it out of zeal against popery.—Miss Yonge: Cameos of English History, 126–8 (1868).