SE1 Bankside, Bermondsey, Borough, The, Newington, North Lambeth, South Bank, Southwark, Waterloo

This iron property marker is for St Olave's grammar school in Southwark. It shows a schoolmaster seated at a desk with five schoolboys standing in front of him. The boys are holding out their hands to be smacked with the birch rod the schoolmaster holds.

Don't get this wrong

The smacking would have been punishment for misbehaving or sometimes just for getting the answers wrong. Pupils would also get 'four stripes' for missing church and 'three stripes' for being late for school.

St Olave's school

St Olave's was in Churchyard Alley, on the south side of Tooley Street near London Bridge until 1829. The school was started in 1561 when Henry Leke, a local brewer, left money in his will to build a free school for local boys. At first they taught reading, writing and accounts. After 1571 - when Elizabeth I granted St Olave's a charter establishing it as a grammar school - they taught Latin as well.