SoHo - Quarter shopping and entertainment in the center of London. It takes about a square mile, and clearly limited from the south - Piccadilly Circus, in the north - Oxford Street, in the west - Regent Street, in the east - Charing Cross Road.

By the XVII century it was already an established neighborhood. At various times there lived Haydn, Mozart, Casanova, Canaletto, Blake, Newton Johnson, Marx. History of the quarter was uneven, but it is in any case, the road to its residents. Therefore, in the 1970s, when Soho gathered completely demolished to build up again, the residents formed a "Society of Soho." It convinced the government to leave the quarter as a reserve. There are no skyscrapers, these cozy streets recall the last century.

It is believed that the name "Soho" was the cry, which encourages hunters huntsman. In 1536 on the orders of Henry III is defeated Royal Park - probably, and went hunting. Later, these lands belonged to the Earl of Leicester and Portland. They built up the quarter, hoping for rich residents, but nothing came of it - in Soho settled mostly by immigrants. By the middle of the XIX century respectable family went here, but open brothels, music halls and cheap eateries.

In 1854, cholera broke out in Soho. While they suspected cholera and plague sick because of the miasma of "bad air." English physician John Snow carefully studied all cases of cholera in Soho. Talking to the locals, he identified the source of the outbreak - not the bad air and the public pump, which pollute the water gets there sinks. Snow persuaded the authorities to turn off the pump (simply remove the handle), and cholera began to decline. Who is on the corner Brodvik Street and Lexington Street installed copy of the pump without handle, but on the contrary, in the pub, "John Snow" can be enjoyed as one of the fathers of epidemiology.

In XX century, Soho has become a bohemian place. According to folklore, the local pubs were packed every night with drunken writers and artists, many of whom visited sober so rarely that it is not time to become famous. But someone still managed to SoHo is the birthplace of British jazz, it also started to those whose names are now famous for - Eric Clapton, Rolling Stones, Sex Pistols.

Soho is now full of bars, restaurants, nightclubs and sex shopami. Quarter was chosen by the London gay community. In 1999 tragedy struck - the neo-Nazis blew a gay pub "Admiral Duncan" on Old Compton Street, three people died. The Soho to London Chinatown, theaters, cinemas, music stores, and a small street market on Berwick Street.

However, here there are some Christian churches (including the Anglican St. Anne and St. Patrick's Catholic), Hare Krishna temple and a small mosque.