LONDON

LONDON

London   is the capital city of England and the United Kingdom, and the largest city, urban zone and metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and    located on the River Thames. London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its founding by the Romans, who named it Londinium . Since at least the 19th century, the name London has also referred to the metropolis developed around this core. The bulk of this conurbation forms the London region   and the Greater London administrative area, governed by the elected Mayor of London and the London Assembly. 

London is a leading global city, with strengths in the arts, commerce, education, entertainment, fashion, finance, healthcare, media, professional services, research and development, tourism and transport all contributing to its prominence.  It is the world's leading financial centre . London has been described as a world cultural capital.  It is the world's most-visited city measured by international arrivals and has the world's largest city airport system measured by passenger traffic. London's 43 universities form the largest concentration of higher education in Europe.  In 2012, London became the first city to host the modern Summer Olympic Games three times. 

London has a diverse range of peoples and cultures.   London contains four World Heritage Sites: the Tower of London; Kew Gardens; the site comprising the Palace of Westminster, Westminster Abbey, and St Margaret's Church; and the historic settlement of Greenwich (in which the Royal Observatory marks the Prime Meridian, 0° longitude, and GMT). Other famous landmarks include Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, Piccadilly Circus, St Paul's Cathedral, Tower Bridge  etc.  London is home to numerous museums, galleries, libraries, sporting events and other cultural institutions, including the British Museum, National Gallery, Tate Modern, British Library and 40 West End theatres.  The London Underground is the oldest underground railway network in the world and completed 150 years of operations on 10 January 2013. 

ATTRACTION

London is a popular centre for tourism, one of its prime industries, employing the equivalent of 350,000 full-time workers in 2003,  while annual expenditure by tourists is around £15 billion. London attracts over 14 million international visitors per year, making it Europe's most visited city.  London attracts 27 million overnight-stay visitors every year.  The ten most-visited attractions in London are:

• Buckingham Palace 

• Tower Bridge 

• Big Ben 

• St Paul's Cathedral

• The British Museum 

• The Natural History Museum 

• The London Eye 

• Madame Tussauds  

• Greenwich

• Piccadilly Circus 

Buckingham Palace is the official London residence and principal workplace of the British monarch.  Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is a setting for state occasions and royal hospitality. It has been a focus for the British people at times of national rejoicing and crisis.

Originally known as Buckingham House, the building which forms the core of today's palace was a large townhouse built for the Duke of Buckingham in 1705 on a site which had been in private ownership for at least 150 years. It was subsequently acquired by George III in 1761  as a private residence for Queen Charlotte, and known as "The Queen's House". During the 19th century it was enlarged, principally by architects John Nash and Edward Blore, forming three wings around a central courtyard. Buckingham Palace finally became the official royal palace of the British monarch on the accession of Queen Victoria in 1837. The last major structural additions were made in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including the East front which contains the well-known balcony on which the royal family traditionally congregates to greet crowds outside. However, the palace chapel was destroyed by a German bomb in World War II; the Queen's Gallery was built on the site and opened to the public in 1962 to exhibit works of art from the Royal Collection.

  Many smaller reception rooms are furnished in the Chinese regency style with furniture and fittings brought from the Royal Pavilion at Brighton and from Carlton House. The Buckingham Palace Garden is the largest private garden in London.

The state rooms, used for official and state entertaining, are open to the public each year for most of August and September, as part of the Palace's Summer Opening.

Tower Bridge (built 1886–1894) is a combined bascule and suspension bridge in London, over the River Thames. It is close to the Tower of London, from which it takes its name.  It has become an iconic symbol of London.

The bridge consists of two towers tied together at the upper level by means of two horizontal walkways, designed to withstand the horizontal forces exerted by the suspended sections of the bridge on the landward sides of the towers. The vertical component of the forces in the suspended sections and the vertical reactions of the two walkways are carried by the two robust towers. The bascule pivots and operating machinery are housed in the base of each tower. The bridge's present colour scheme dates from 1977, when it was painted red, white and blue for the Queen Elizabeth II's silver jubilee. Originally it was painted a mid greenish-blue colour. 

Tower Bridge is sometimes mistakenly referred to as London Bridge, which is the next bridge upstream.

The nearest London Underground station is Tower Hill on the Circle and District lines, and the nearest Docklands Light Railway station is Tower Gateway. 

Big Ben is the nickname for the great bell of the clock at the north end of the Palace of Westminster in London, and often extended to refer to the clock and the clock tower,  officially named the Elizabeth Tower, as well. Elizabeth Tower holds the largest four-aced chiming clock in the world and is the third-tallest free-standing clock tower. It celebrated its 150th anniversary on 31 May 2009, during which celebratory events took place.  The tower was completed in 1858 and has become one of the most prominent symbols of both London and England, often in the establishing shot of films set in the city.

St Paul's Cathedral, London, is a Church of England cathedral and seat of the Bishop of London. Its dedication to Paul the Apostle dates back to the original church on this site, founded in AD 604.   The cathedral is one of the most famous and most recognisable sights of London, with its dome, framed by the spires of Wren's City churches, dominating the skyline for 300 years.  St Paul's Cathedral occupies a significant place in the national identity of the English population.     Important services held at St Paul's include the funerals of Lord Nelson, the Duke of Wellington and Sir Winston Churchill; Jubilee celebrations for Queen Victoria; peace services marking the end of the First and Second World Wars; the wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Lady Diana Spencer, the launch of the Festival of Britain and the thanksgiving services for the Golden Jubilee, the 80th Birthday and the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II. St Paul's Cathedral is a busy working church, with hourly prayer and daily services.

The British Museum is a museum in London dedicated to human history and culture. Its permanent collection, numbering some eight million works,  is amongst the largest and most comprehensive in existence  and originates from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present. 

The British Museum was established in 1753, largely based on the collections of the physician and scientist Sir Hans Sloane . Its expansion over the following two and a half centuries was largely a result of an expanding British colonial footprint and has resulted in the creation of several branch institutions, the first being the British Museum (Natural History) in South Kensington in 1887. Some objects in the collection, most notably the Elgin Marbles from the Parthenon, are the objects of intense controversy and of calls for restitution to their countries of origin.

Until 1997, when the British Library (previously centred on the Round Reading Room) moved to a new site, the British Museum was unique in that it housed both a national museum of antiquities and a national library in the same building. The museum is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and as with all other national museums in the United Kingdom it charges no admission fee, except for loan exhibitions. 

The Natural History Museum is one of three large museums on Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London, England (the others are the Science Museum, and the Victoria and Albert Museum). Its main frontage is on Cromwell Road. The museum is an exempt charity, and a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. 

Although commonly referred to as the Natural History Museum, it was officially known as British Museum (Natural History) until 1992, despite legal separation from the British Museum in 1963.

The museum is home to life and earth science specimens comprising some 70 million items within five main collections:

Botany, Entomology,Mineralogy, Palaeontology and Zoology. The museum is a world-renowned centre of research, specialising in taxonomy, identification and conservation. Given the age of the institution, many of the collections have great historical as well as scientific value, such as specimens collected by Darwin. The Natural History Museum Library contains extensive books, journals, manuscripts, and artwork collections linked to the work and research of the scientific departments. Access to the library is by appointment only.

The museum is particularly famous for its exhibition of dinosaur skeletons, and ornate architecture — sometimes dubbed a cathedral of nature— both exemplified by the large 

Like other publicly funded national museums in the United Kingdom, the Natural History Museum does not charge an admission fee.

The London Eye is a giant Ferris wheel situated on the banks of the River Thames in London, England. The entire structure is 135 metres tall and the wheel has a diameter of 120 metres .

It is the tallest Ferris wheel in Europe, and the most popular paid tourist attraction in the United Kingdom, visited by over 3.5 million people annually.  It is the 20th tallest structure in London and offers the highest public viewing point in the city, although this will be superseded by The Shard skyscraper viewing deck when it opens to the public in February 2013.

The London Eye, or Millennium Wheel, was officially called the British Airways London Eye and then the Merlin Entertainments London Eye. Since 20 January 2011, its official name is the EDF Energy London Eye  following a three-year sponsorship deal.

Madame Tussauds  The family themselves pronounce it   is a wax museum in London with branches in a number of major cities. It was founded by wax sculptor Marie Tussaud and was formerly known as "Madame Tussaud's", but the apostrophe is no longer used.  Madame Tussauds is a major tourist attraction in London, displaying waxworks of historical and royal figures, film stars, sports stars and infamous murderers.

Greenwich  is a district of south-east London, England, located in the Royal Borough of Greenwich .Greenwich is notable for its maritime history and for giving its name to the Greenwich Meridian (0° longitude) and Greenwich Mean Time. The town became the site of a royal palace, the Palace of Placentia from the 15th century, and was the birthplace of many in the House of Tudor, including Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. The palace fell into disrepair during the English Civil War and was rebuilt as the Royal Naval Hospital for Sailors by Sir Christopher Wren and his assistant Nicholas Hawksmoor. These buildings became the Royal Naval College in 1873, and they remained an establishment for military education until 1998 when they passed into the hands of the Greenwich Foundation.  

Piccadilly Circus is a road junction and public space of London's West End in the City of Westminster, built in 1819 to connect Regent Street with the major shopping street of Piccadilly. In this context, a circus, from the Latin word meaning "circle", is a round open space at a street junction.  

 Its status as a major traffic intersection has made Piccadilly Circus a busy meeting place and a tourist attraction in its own right. The Circus is particularly known for its video display and neon signs mounted on the corner building on the northern side, as well as the Shaftesbury memorial fountain and statue of the Greek god Anteros   . It is surrounded by several noted buildings, including the London Pavilion and Criterion Theatre. Directly underneath the plaza is Piccadilly Circus tube station, part of the London Underground system.