[1][2] Little is recorded of the origins of the settlement, though there was Roman activity around Ermine Street, which ran to the east of the area from the first century.

[3] It achieved independent ecclesiastical status in 1826 with the founding of its own parish church[4] dedicated to St John the Baptist, though civil jurisdiction was still invested in the Shoreditch vestry.

[5] In 1415, the Lord Mayor of London "caused the wall of the City to be broken towards Moorfields, and built the postern called Moorgate, for the ease of the citizens to walk that way upon causeways towards Islington and Hoxton"[citation needed] – at that time, still marshy areas.

[citation needed] By Tudor times many moated manor houses existed to provide ambassadors and courtiers country air nearby the city.

This included many Catholics, attracted by the house of the Portuguese Ambassador,[6] who, in his private chapel,[7] celebrated the masses forbidden in a Protestant country.

William Parker accompanied Thomas Howard, the Lord Chamberlain, at his visit to the undercroft of Parliament, where Guy Fawkes was found in the early hours of 5 November.

[12] Most of the conspirators fled on the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, but Francis Tresham was arrested a few days later at his house in Hoxton.

[16] Here fee-paying 'gentle and middle class' people took their exercise in the extensive grounds between Pitfield Street and Kingsland Road;[17] including the poet Charles Lamb.

[16] The asylum closed in 1911; the only remains are by Hackney Community College, where a part of the house was incorporated into the school that replaced it in 1921.

[citation needed] In the Victorian era the railways made travelling to distant suburbs easier, and this combined with infill building and industrialisation to drive away the wealthier classes, leaving Hoxton a concentration of the poor with many slums.

[20] Charles Booth in Life and Labour of the People in London of 1902 gave the following description: The character of the whole locality is working-class.

Poverty is everywhere, with a considerable admixture of the very poor and vicious ... Large numbers have been and are still being displaced by the encroachment of warehouses and factories ... Hoxton is known for its costers and Curtain criminals, for its furniture trade ... No servants are kept except in the main Road shopping streets and in a few remaining middle class squares in the west.

[clarification needed] The National Centre for Circus Arts is based in the former vestry of St Leonard Shoreditch Electric Light Station, just to the north of Hoxton Market.

This was incorporated into the newly created London Borough of Hackney in 1965, but old street signs bearing the name are still to be found throughout the area.

[23][24] Manufacturing developments in the years after the Second World War meant that many of the small industries that characterised Hoxton moved out.

During this time Joshua Compston established his Factual Nonsense gallery on Charlotte Road in Shoreditch and organised art fetes in Hoxton Square.

This fashionable area centres around Hoxton Square, a small park bordered mainly by former industrial buildings, as well as the elegant 19th century parish church of St John's.

Residents are typically older and the unemployment and crime rates, with the exceptions of drug offences, robbery and theft, are relatively high compared to some parts of the borough.

The market sells a wide range of household goods during the week and specialises in independent fashion, art and design products on Saturdays.

Some galleries have, as a result, moved to nearby Shoreditch, or have relocated further afield to cheaper districts such as London Fields or Bethnal Green.