Royal Exchange

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Royal Exchange. The first Royal Exchange building was erected by Sir Thomas Gresham in 1565–7 as a bourse where merchants and bankers could meet. Modelled on the Antwerp Bourse, it lay in the city of London between Threadneedle Street and Cornhill. Elizabeth I proclaimed it the Royal Exchange on her visit in 1570. In the 19th cent. it housed the foreign exchange market. It was twice destroyed by fire (1666 and 1838) and twice rebuilt. In 1982 its central glass-domed courtyard was refurbished and occupied by the financial futures market.

Margaret Wilkinson

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