Place name
Being so close to Smithfield meat market it would be easy to assume that this could be named after poultry and indeed it has been suggested that fighting cockerels were reared and sold here. But there is also the suggestion that this may have been the area where prostitution was legal in the City in medieval times. It was originally called Cockeslane sometime around 1200 and later Cokkeslane, or Cockes Lane.
