St Mary Axe was a medieval parish in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 whose name survives on the street it formerly occupied, St Mary Axe. The church itself

St Mary Axe, London

St Mary Axe, sometimes referred to as St Mary Pellipar, was a mediaeval church in the City of London whose full name was St Mary, St Ursula and her 11,000 virgins situated just north of Leadenhall Street. First mentioned as St Mary apud Ax, it belonged for a time to the nearby Priory of St Helen’s...

 was demolished in 1561 and its parish united with that of St Andrew Undershaft

St Andrew Undershaft

St Andrew Undershaft is a Church of England church located at St Mary Axe, in Aldgate ward of the City of London, near the Lloyd's Building. It is a rare example of a City church that has managed to escape both the Great Fire of London in 1666 and the Second World War bombing during the London...

, which is on the corner of St Mary Axe and Leadenhall Street

Leadenhall Street

Leadenhall Street is a street in the City of London, formerly part of the A11. It runs east from Cornhill to Aldgate, and west vice-versa. Aldgate Pump is at the junction with Aldgate...

. The name derives from the combination of the church dedicated to the Virgin Mary and a neighbouring tavern, which prominently displayed a sign with an axe image.

The street of St Mary Axe is famous for fronting the Baltic Exchange

Baltic Exchange

The Baltic Exchange is the world's only independent source of maritime market information for the trading and settlement of physical and derivative contracts...

. Nearby parishes include the medieval Great St Helen's

St Helen's Bishopsgate

St Helen's Bishopsgate is a large conservative evangelical Anglican church, in Lime Street ward, in the City of London, close to the Lloyd's building and the 'Gherkin'.-History:...

 (1210) and the St Ethelburga (14th Century).

'Number 70 St Mary Axe' appears in several novels by the British author Tom Holt

Tom Holt

Tom Holt is a British novelist.He was born in London, the son of novelist Hazel Holt, and was educated at Westminster School, Wadham College, Oxford, and The College of Law, London....

 as the address of a firm of sorcerers headed by J. W. Wells (The Portable Door (2003), In your dreams (2004), Earth, Air, Fire and Custard (2005), You Don't Have To Be Evil To Work Here, But It Helps (2006) ). This is itself a reference to Gilbert and Sullivan

Gilbert and Sullivan

Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...

's The Sorcerer

The Sorcerer

The Sorcerer is a two-act comic opera, with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Arthur Sullivan. It was the British duo's third operatic collaboration. The plot of The Sorcerer is based on a Christmas story, An Elixir of Love, that Gilbert wrote for The Graphic magazine in 1876...

. In the song "My Name Is John Wellington Wells", the lyric renders his address as "Number Seventy Simmery Axe": this reflects the fact that some Londoners have pronounced the street's name as "S'M'ry Axe" rather than enunciating it clearly.

30 St Mary Axe

30 St Mary Axe

30 St Mary Axe, the Swiss Re Building , is a skyscraper in London's main financial district, the City of London, completed in December 2003 and opened at the end of May 2004...

 ("The Gherkin") is a noted London landmark, built on the site of the bombed Baltic Exchange

Baltic Exchange

The Baltic Exchange is the world's only independent source of maritime market information for the trading and settlement of physical and derivative contracts...

.