266 MR. T. SOUTHWELL ON THE ST. HELEN’S SWAN-PIT. 
the researches of any of our archaeological friends, and which has 
been only superficially treated by Mr. Stevenson in the third 
volume of his ‘Birds of Norfolk’; nor can I pretend to say much 
with regard to the history of the ancient Swan-pit at St. Helen’s, 
about which, indeed, very little is known, but that it is of 
considerable antiquity there can be no doubt. Blomfield in his 
‘History of Norwich’ (8vo. vol. ii. pp. 376-391), as quoted by 
Mr. Stevenson, states that “ St. Helen’s Hospital, or Almshouse, for 
aged men and women, in Bishopsgate street, known also as the 
Great, St. Giles’, and the Old Men’s Hospital, occupies the site of 
the dissolved hospital of St. Giles’, founded by Walter Suffield, 
alias Calthrop, Bishop of Norwich, in 1249, but which, in 1547, 
was granted by Edward VI., in accordance with the will of his 
late father, to ‘ the mayor, sheriffs, citizens, and commonalty,’ with 
all the revenues belonging thereto, ‘ to be henceforward a place and 
house for the relief of poor people, and to be called God’s House, 
or the house of the poor in Holm street,’ ” and to this pious 
purpose it has continued to the present time to be devoted, 
soothing the latter days of many generations of the deserving 
poor of both sexes, and altogether one of the most excellent and 
carefully managed charities of our city. In the meadow attached 
to this institution is situated the Swan-pit. Mr. Stevenson was of 
opinion that a swannery, in some form or other, existed in the 
Hospital meadows prior to the grant already mentioned, by 
Edward VI. to the Mayor, &c., of “all the site, circuit, compas, 
and precinct of the late Hospital of St. Gyles’, withyn the Cytie 
of Norwych, in the Paryshe of St. Elyn, next Bushope Gate, &c.” 
— since indirectly, the antiquity of this swannery may be inferred 
from the allusions of the same author, to local swan-rights and 
marks (‘Birds of Norfolk,’ vol. iii. p. 102); but the only direct 
evidence obtainable is an entry discovered by Mr. Simpson, the 
late governor, in the books of the Hospital, of a minute to the 
elfect that “about May, 1793, the late Mr. Thomas Ivory constructed 
a new Swan-yard, and made other improvements on the premises 
. . . . this entry, therefore, not only marks the date of the present 
Swan-pit, but establishes the existence of a previous one, near the 
same spot,” probably it was of monastic origin. By the Municipal 
Reform Act of 1835 the management of the Hospital was vested 
in the Corporation. 
