Radcliffe Camera Square and environs

This isn't an especially great photo, but what makes it interesting is the cobbled stripe you can see running down the middle of the street. This is a medieval sewage drain, and Brasenose Lane is one of the only streets in Oxford where you can still find one. I suppose the way it worked was that you tossed your sewage into the street, where it ran into the drainage channel and subsequently into … well, in this case, right into the Radcliffe Camera Square, which doesn't seem like somewhere you'd want a lot of sewage accumulating. There's a well-worn Oxford anecdote that has numerous eighteenth-century residents coming across Dr Johnson relieving himself in this drain, unconcerned with hygiene or passersby.