page_title: History of British newspapers
section_title: 18th century
hierarchical_section_title: History of British newspapers / 18th century
caption_attribution_description: Nrf: Pliaque à Londres
context_page_description: The history of British newspapers dates to the 17th century with the emergence of regular publications covering news and gossip. The relaxation of government censorship in the late 17th century led to a rise in publications, which in turn led to an increase in regulation throughout the 18th century. The Times began publication in 1785 and became the leading newspaper of the early 19th century, before the lifting of taxes on newspapers and technological innovations led to a boom in newspaper publishing in the late 19th century. Mass education and increasing affluence led to new papers such as the Daily Mail emerging at the end of the 19th century, aimed at lower middle-class readers.
  In the early 20th century the British press was dominated by a few wealthy press barons.Many papers published more popular and interesting stories in an attempt to boost circulation which includes sports and other features. In 1969 Rupert Murdoch bought and relaunched The Sun as a tabloid and soon added pictures of topless models on Page 3. Within a few years the Sun was the UK's most popular newspaper.
context_section_description: There were twelve London newspapers and 24 provincial papers by the 1720s (the Daily Courant was the first daily newspaper in London). The Public Advertiser was started by Henry Woodfall in the 18th century.
  The first English journalist to achieve national importance was Daniel Defoe. In February 1704, he began his weekly, The Review, which was eventually  printed three times a week and was a forerunner of The Tatler (started by Richard Steele in 1709) and The Spectator (started by Steele and Joseph Addison in 1711). Defoe's Review came to an end in 1713. Between 1716 and 1720 he published a monthly newspaper with old style title, Mercurius Politicus. The Examiner started in 1710 as the chief Conservative political mouthpiece, which enjoyed as its  most influential contributor, Jonathan Swift. Swift had control of the journal for 33 issues between November 1710 and June 1711, but once he became dean of  St. Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin, he gave up regular journalistic work.
  In 1702 Edward Lloyd, the virtual founder of the famous "Lloyd's" of commerce, started a thrice a week newspaper, Lloyd's News, which had  but a brief existence in its initial form, but was the precursor  of the modern Lloyd's List. The 76th issue of  the original paper contained a paragraph mentioning the House of Lords, for which the publisher was told he would have to pay a fine. He preferred to discontinue his publication instead. In 1726 he in part revived it, under the title of Lloyd's List, published at first weekly, it would later become a daily.
  The Edinburgh Courant was published out of Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland. Its first issue was dated 14-19 Feb 1705 and was sold for a penny. It was one of the country's first regional papers, second only to the Norwich Post (1701). The paper was produced twice weekly for five years, then continued as the Scots Courant until April 1720. Later that same year, the Edinburgh Evening Courant began publication, and it survived until the Evening News came into existence in 1873.
  The increasing popularity and influence of newspapers was problematic to the government of the day. The first bill in parliament  advocating a tax on newspapers was proposed in 1711. The duty eventually imposed in 1712 was a halfpenny on papers of half a sheet or less and a penny on newspapers that ranged from half a sheet to a single sheet in size. Jonathan Swift expressed in his  Journal to Stella on 7 August 1712, doubt in the ability of The Spectator to hold out against the tax. This doubt was proved justified in December 1712 by its discontinuance. However, some of the existing journals continued production and their numbers soon increased. Part of this increase was attributed to corruption and political connections of its owners. Later, toward the middle of the same century, the provisions and the penalties of the Stamp Act were made more stringent, yet the number of newspapers continued to rise. In 1753 the total number of copies of newspapers sold yearly in Britain amounted to 7,411,757. In 1760 it had risen to 9,464,790 and in 1767 to 11,300,980. In 1776 the number of newspapers published in London alone had increased to 53.
  The News Letter is one of Northern Ireland's main daily newspapers, published Monday to Saturday. It is the oldest English-language general daily newspaper still in publication in the world, having first been printed in 1737. Originally published three times weekly, it became daily in 1855.
  The 18th century saw the gradual development of the purely political journal side by side with those papers which were primarily  devoted to news, domestic and foreign, and commerce. It was left to Steele and Addison to develop the social side of journalism in their respective papers. In 1761 the North Briton came out and it was largely a result of its publisher, John Wilkes, and his campaign for increased freedom of the press that, in 1772 the right to publish parliamentary reports was established.
  The Observer, first published on 4 December 1791, was the world's first Sunday newspaper.
caption: This plaque in London marks the publication in 1702 of The Daily Courant as London's first daily newspaper
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