Place Name
Named after Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke (October 3, 1554 – September 30, 1628), who bought a property here in 1619. Greville was an Elizabethan man of letters, a poet, dramatist, and statesman who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1581 and 1621. Originally from Warwickshire he became a favourite of the Queen although he had to wait for her successor James I to be raised to be ennobled. The road was originally much shorter, Grevil Street (as it was then spelled) only running between Brooke Street and Leather Lane, the rest being Cross Street in Rocque’s 1746 map. Alas, Greville’s charmed life came to an abrupt halt in 1628 when an old servant stabbed his master to death on discovering he had been left out of his will. Brooke House was passed to Robert Greville. It was demolished soon after his death in 1676.
