Silverun, a silverer or silversmith. The name is not so common as Goldsmith, but John Silver was one of the Town Chamberlains in 1500, and in the 13th century several Silveruns are mentioned, who, as might be expected, inter-married with the Aurifabers, or Goldsmiths.
In the 15th century there was a street leading out of, or close to, the Sheepmarket, which was known as Gentil Lane.
Saint Francis Lane was described in the Coroner's Pleas for the year 1300 as "the lane which leads to St. Martin's Church and towards the Church of the Friars Minors." A house conveyed in 1368, which had once belonged to the well-known Leicester merchant, Henry Costeyn, was said to be in the High Street, "at the corner of the lane leading to the Church of the Friars Minors," and the property extended from the High Street to the garden of the Friars Minors. This lane must be the "St. Francis Lane" referred to by Mr. Carte, the 18th century antiquarian Vicar of St. Martin's, as lying between Wigston Hospital and the Grey Friars. It was afterwards called Peacock Lane, taking its name probably from the piece of land known as the "Peacock," which lay "at the Red Cross," west of the old High Street. There was a Peacock Inn in Southgate Street, from which it might have taken its name, but it seems more likely that both Inn and Lane were christened after the old Peacock ground.
The Cank, or Cank Street, which still bears its old name, was named after the public well, the Cank well, which lay there. An apple-orchard (pomerium), which was situated in the "Cank," is mentioned in 1352. On the division of the Wards in 1484, the ninth Ward was to begin "in the Cank at Thomas Phelips on both sides the Saturday Market unto the East Gate." At the division into ten Wards in 1557, the eighth Ward comprised "all the market-place, Cank-well, and to the East Gate." A yearly payment was given in 1563 to St. Martin's Church "out of an house at the Cankwell." The site of the old well is still marked on the roadway at the junction of Cank Street and Hotel Street. The name might possibly be derived from
10
