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Glite Dictionary
📰 British press 🗺️ A London street
Fleet Street

Fleet Street

5.3
A street in central London once where many newspapers had their offices
  • proper noun
  • Literature
translation icon : Fleet Street
  • Fleet Street has long been recognized as the heart of British journalism.

Examples

  • Many famous newspapers were originally published on Fleet Street in London.

  • It's Fleet Street sensationalism in an impious age.

    Blog text (8)

  • The phrase 'Fleet Street' symbolizes the entire British press in discussions about media influence.

Surface Forms

Fleet Street main

Morphology

Fleet + street

This is a metonymic place name: the meaning 'the British national press' arises from historical association with a particular street, not from composing 'fleet' (a group) + 'street' (a road). Even a learner who knows the constituent words would not predict the industry-wide meaning without cultural/historical knowledge, so the expression is opaque.

Etymology

Fleet Street is the real street in central London that took its name from the small River Fleet that runs under the city, and for a long time many newspaper offices and printing presses were located there. So today the name still refers to that street.