First Modern Circus in London
- When
- 1768
- Where
- Open field in the Waterloo area of London; London riding-school site
- Episodes
- 2
In 1768 Philip Astley and his wife Patty Jones staged trick-riding displays in an open field near Waterloo in London, giving their first public show on Easter Monday, 4 April 1768. These performances, later augmented with acrobats, clowns, and musicians, are regarded as the origin of the modern circus.
Episodes
- Trick-riding displays of 1768
Astley and Patty Jones gave successful trick-riding displays in London in 1768, prompting the founding of his riding school.
- First public show by the Astleys
Philip Astley and his wife Patty staged their first public show in London on Easter Monday, 4 April 1768.
Background and detail
Background. Philip Astley (1742–1814) was an English equestrian regarded as the 'father of the modern circus'. In 1768 he and his wife Patty Jones gave trick-riding displays in London, performing in an open field in what is now the Waterloo area, behind the present site of St John's Church.
First Public Show. Astley and his wife Patty put on their first public show on Easter Monday, 4 April 1768, extending the equestrian performance with exhibitions of warlike sabre-work and sword-play. The legacy date of 9 January 1768 is not supported by the supplied passages.
Development into the Modern Circus. Following the success of the 1768 displays, Astley founded a riding school in London, leasing premises at Westminster Bridge from 1769. In 1770 he hired acrobats, tightrope walkers, jugglers and a clown to fill pauses between acts, initiating the format now known as a circus.
People involved
- Philip Astley · Equestrian performer and founder
- Patty Jones · Astley's wife and co-performer
Sources
- Philip Astley Wikipedia, revision of 2026-08-21
Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.