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Department of History

E-resources

NB: only the most relevant general sites are listed below. More specific resources appear under individual seminar sessions

 

 

 

Pod- & Videocasts

 

 

Electronic library resources

 

Adam Matthew's 'Food and Drink in History' platform, featuring primary source material documenting the relationships between food and identity, politics and power, gender, race and socio-economic status, as well as charting key issues around agriculture, nutrition and food production. With introductory essays, cookbooks and illustrations.

Bloomsbury Food LibraryLink opens in a new window, offering cross-searchable access to a wide and interdisciplinary range of encyclopedias, references works, e-books, images, and more. Global coverage including Ken Albala’s Food Cultures of the World Encyclopedia and the Cambridge World History of Food. Several major reference works including Bloomsbury’s 6-volume Cultural History of Food and key chapters from Food History: Critical and Primary Sources.

E-books and e-documents accessible through Warwick University LibraryLink opens in a new window includes e.g.:

E-journal databases accessible through Warwick UL include JStor, Cambridge Journals online etc)

 

 

Starting-points for historical information on English public houses

 

'Coaching inns', section of British Heritage website dedicated to hostelries along the old North road.

'Coaching routes' in the early 18thC: 'An exact and compleat List of the Flying Coaches, Stage Coaches, Waggons, and Carriers, with the Inns they come to, and Days of the Week they go out of London; collated this present Year 1721', from: W. Stow, Remarks on London (1722)

'Coffee Houses', part of the 'Waes Hael Poetry & Tobacco Club'

'Digital Encyclopedia of British Sociability in the Long Eighteenth Century': features e.g. articles on coffeehouses & taverns

'A Feast for the Eye', collection of medieval and Renaissance images compiled by James L. Matterer

'Good Pub Guide for the 1500sLink opens in a new window': Telegraph article about a 'popular' public house publication

'Historic Pub InteriorsLink opens in a new window', pub heritage inventory managed by the Campaign for Real Ale.

'Images of England', English Heritage picture database (search for 'inn' etc)

'Inn Sign Society'

'John's Pub Pictures': featuring public houses from all over England (Pics by John Law)

'London Corresponding Society Meeting Places'Link opens in a new window: a list and documentation of public houses associated with this radical group in the 1790s compiled by Ian D. Newman at UCLA

'London Pubs': locations, histories and images of public houses past and present (as part of the 'Layers of London' project)

National Brewery Centre Archive (online access to historical collections such as ledgers, books, plans, photographs and film from the breweries around the UK from the late 18thC, including information on the development of public houses & photographs of public houses) and National Brewing Library (for books / journals and objects that include paintings, ceramics, glass, bottles, cans, beer mats and Inn-signs located at Oxford Brookes)

'Proceedings of the Old Bailey, 1674-1834', a database of court records compiled by Tim Hitchcock and Robert Shoemaker

'Pub Histories': a bibliographical guide (check section on 'pub histories')

'Pub History', links listed by historian-writer Simon Fowler on behalf of the Family and Community Historical Research Society.

'Pub History Project - Leicester': a collaboration between Barry Lount & Stephen Bunker aiming to document Leicester establishments from the medieval beginnings to the present and to embed these into wider research developments

'Pub History Society', founded to encourage and co-ordinate research on public houses.

'Pub in Literature' website compiled by Steven Earnshaw (Sheffield Hallam University), also with information on signs.

'Researching Historic Buildings in the British IslesLink opens in a new window': by Jean Manco; see esp. links to 'building types', esp. 'cafés' and 'pubs, inns and hotels'

Vernacular Architecture GroupLink opens in a new window: searchable bibliography including works on inns

Viae Regiae: a public history project working with volunteers to trace England's industrial development, not least its evolving transport network. Apart from specifically local sources, researchers also examine Quarter Sessions records of highways and the licensing of inns, together with probate material covering the wills and inventories of individuals involved in manufacture, trade, and transport.

A Vision of Britain through Time - Travellers: online database of travel writing

Volumes of signs of taverns in England and Wales. 1628 - 1858Link opens in a new window: dataset comprising 14 digitised volumes (as PDFs) of tavern signs in England and Wales collected by Mr G. Creed; organised in alphabetical order, with printed and manuscript descriptions (access provided by British Library)

 

 

norton_bbc.jpg

 

Old sign of the Saracen's Head at Kings Norton (Birmingham, featured on the BBC's Restoration programme)

 

 

Historic public houses in the area

 

Countless 'ancient' public houses now have their own websites, often with information on their history. Examples include:

 

Banbury (Oxfordshire): Reindeer 

Berkswell (Warwickshire): Bear

Birmingham (City of): Lost PubsLink opens in a new window, compiled by Birmingham Library; Bromford/Erdington: Lad in the Lane, a house dating to 1400 and a pub since the 1780s; Deritend (Birmingham): Crown; Kings Norton (Birmingham): Saracen's Head

Broadway (Worcestershire): Lygon Arms, documented as the White Hart in 1532

Burford (Oxfordshire): Lamb Inn, documented as a public house from the mid-18thC and see materials for our Field Trip

Cotswold: guided Pub ToursLink opens in a new window around the North Cotswolds, Stroud Valleys and Bath area

Coventry: Golden Cross, built in the 1580s

Gloucester: New Inn, with surving galleried courtyard

Grantham (Lincolnshire): Angel & Royal, a classic 'block-/gatehouse'-type inn (reputedly) from the 13thC

London (Southwark): George Inn, the best-preseverd early modern inn in the capital (National Trust)

London (Fleet St): Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, provides the best impression of an early modern tavern

London (Central): 'Best Historical PubsLink opens in a new window' (incl. the 'Seven Stars' in Carey St), as selected by the Daily Telegraph

Ludlow (Shropshire): Feathers Hotel, claiming to be the world's 'most handsome inn'

Stow-in-the-Wold (Cotswolds): The Porch House, reputedly in a house dating from 947 AD

Stowe (Buckinghamshire): New InnLink opens in a new window, built in 1717 and recently restored (by the National Trust; cf. GuardianLink opens in a new window article)

Thame (Oxfordshire): Historic inns

Warwick: Warwick Arms

 

 

Historic public houses further afield

 

Austria: Golden Eagle, Innsbruck/Tyrol - accommodated hosts of early modern celebrities

Europe: The Grand TourLink opens in a new window, documents and artworks associated with the history of travel c. 1550-1850

Europe: Hidden Cities, collaborative research project on the 5 case studies of Exeter, Deventer, Hamburg, Valencia and Trento (some of which with public house information & even phone apps guiding you around old taverns, e.g. one led by Ursula - an innkeeper at Trento in 1520)

France: La Tour d'Argent, Paris - claiming to be 'the most celebrated restaurant' in the world

Germany: BadenLink opens in a new window - historic public houses in south-western Germany

Germany: BarbarossaLink opens in a new window, Constance - documented from 1419

Germany: Zum roten BärenLink opens in a new window, Freiburg im Breisgau - one of several claiming to be the 'oldest' inn in Germany

Germany: RöhrlLink opens in a new window, Eilsberg/Upper Palatinate - documented from 1658 and operated by the Röhrl family since

Germany: Hotel zur PostLink opens in a new window, Fürstenfeldbruck/Bavaria - a former postal inn operated by the Weiss family since the 1620s

Germany: RiesenLink opens in a new window, Miltenberg/Franconia - another claiming to be the oldest inn in Germany

Germany: HofbräuhausLink opens in a new window Munich/Bavaria, on the site of the ducal wheat beer brewery founded in 1607

India / Global: The Drinking Archive - Instagram site curated by Tarangini Sriraman, showcasing examples of drinking cultures from across the world, with special attention to India / South Asia.

Ireland: Brazen HeadLink opens in a new window, Dublin - claiming descent from a tavern dating back to 1198 (first license record 1653)

Italy: Elephant, Brixen/Bressanone (South Tyrol) - a sixteenth-century inn with its own history written by Hans Heiss (2003)

Italy: Al BrindisiLink opens in a new window, Ferrara - claiming to be the oldest 'osteria' in the world

Switzerland: BärenLink opens in a new window, Münsingen/Bern - 14th-century inn in 16thC premises

Switzerland: BärenLink opens in a new window, Reichenbach/Bern - 16thC Alpine inn

Switzerland: Hotel Interlaken, Interlaken/Bern - originally a monastic inn founded in the thirteenth century

 

 

Virtual pub and brewery crawls

 

GoCotswold's offer of a Cotswold pub tours

Historic Pub Walks - curated by Historic England and covering Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, London, Manchester & Newcastle

Historical beer tasting at 'the world's oldest brewery', the Weihenstephan Brauerei, Freising (Bavaria)

Pub crawl routes for BirminghamLink opens in a new window and other British cities

Pre-modern fantasy: the 'Blackmoor InnLink opens in a new window' in the world of two 'Skyrim' gamers (runs from 25:10-27:15 in the video)

 

 

Research projects and networks

 

Alcohol and Drugs History Society

Drinking Studies Network: an interdisciplinary and international research group that connects scholars working on drink and drinking culture across different societies and time periods.

Institut Européen d'Histoire et des Cultures de l'Alimentation (IEHCA)Link opens in a new window: European Institute for the History and Cultures of Food (in Tours/France), which organizes annual conventions, thematic colloquies and a summer university in food & drink studies

International Commission for Research into European Food HistoryLink opens in a new window

Intoxicants and Early Modernity 1580-1740, esp. their DatabaseLink opens in a new window of Alcohol, Nicotine, Caffeine, and Opium in England, 1580-1740

SOAS Food Studies CentreLink opens in a new window

Taverns, Locals and Street Corners Link opens in a new window(AHRC research project)

Viabundus: a freely accessible online street map of late medieval and early modern northern Europe (1350-1650)