18th Century Merchant Booths
Last updated: Jan 5, 2024
The illustrations on this page provide examples of the temporary structures that were built and used for selling goods at fairs, etc. For 14th-17th century examples of fair booths, see Merchants’ Booths in the Middle Ages and Renaissance.
In addition to the research articles in the Additional Resources section, look over An Account Of the Laſt Bartholomew-Fair, And the Late City Order for Regulating the Same, With Two Letters to a Citizen of London on that Occaſion (1702) along with Reasons Formerly publiſhed for the Punctual Limiting of Bartholomew Fair To thoſe Three Days to which it is determined by the Royal Grant of it to the City of London, Now Reprinted with Additions, to prevent a Deſign ſet on Foot to procure an Eſtablishment ofthe ſaid Fair for Fourteen Days (1711). (There are no relevant passages on the construction of booths for fairs, but they’re an interesting glimpse at what was going on at an 18th century fair in England.)
- An Exact and Lively Mapp or Representation of Booths and all the varieties of showes and humours upon the Ice on the River of Thames by London, 1683
- Frost Fair on the Thames, c. 1685
- Village fair by Pieter Angellis, c. 1685-1734
- Bartholomew Fair, c. 1721
- Covent Garden by Pieter Angillis, c. 1726
- Southwark Fair by William Hogarth, 1733
- Les marchands de chevaux, c. 1733-1734
- View of a Frost Fair on the Thames, 1740
- A Prospect of Frost Fair, 1740
- Piazza San Marco, Venice by Bernardo Bellotto, c. 1740
- The Chevaliers Market, or Highland Fair, 1745 (also here)
- Horse Fair on Bruntsfield Links, Edinburgh by Paul Sandby, 1750
- Non liber arque [argument at a a produce stall], c. 1760-1800
- View of the daily market in The Hague by Paulus Constantijn la Fargue, 1764
- Winter landscape by Rienk Jelgerhuis, 1765
- The Humours of a Fair, c. 1770
- The King’s Shilling, c. 1770
- The Village Fair by Hendrik de Meyer, 1774
- The Fair at Cheltenham by Edward Eyre, 1775
- La Fête à Saint-Cloud by Jean-Honoré Fragonard, c. 1775-1780
- Pot Fair, 1777
- A horse fair, by Philibert Benoît de La Rue, before 1780
- Market Day, Roseau, Dominica and A Linen Market with a Linen-stall and Vegetable Seller in the West Indies by Agostino Brunias, c. 1780
- Donnybrook Fair by Francis Wheatley, 1782
- Donnybrook Fair by Francis Wheatley, 1788
- Frost on the Thames by Samuel Collings, 1788-1789
- Flemish Characters, 1793
- The Village Fair by Hendrik Tavernier
- Entrance to Pidcock's Exhibition Tent at a Fair by Henry William Bunbury
- A Fair in the Country by Thomas Rowlandson
- Oliebollenkraam by Christiaan Meijer, c. 1803-1808
- May Day by William Collins, c. 1811-1812
- The Fair Grounds by Frederick Christian Lewis the Elder