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            [Illustration: CHELMSFORD HIGH STREET IN 1762.

  (_Reduced by Photography from the Larger Engraving by J. Ryland._)]




                                  THE

                         TRADE SIGNS OF ESSEX:

                           A Popular Account

                                  OF

                        THE ORIGIN AND MEANINGS

                                OF THE

                      Public House & Other Signs

                            NOW OR FORMERLY

                     Found in the County of Essex.

                                  BY
                            MILLER CHRISTY,

                   _Author of “Manitoba Described,”
           “The Genus Primula in Essex,” “Our Empire,” &c._

                          WITH ILLUSTRATIONS.

                              Chelmsford:
         EDMUND DURRANT & CO., 90, HIGH STREET.

                                London:
          GRIFFITH, FARRAN, OKEDEN, AND WELSH,
                  WEST CORNER ST. PAUL’S CHURCHYARD.

                             MDCCCLXXXVII.

[Illustration]




PREFACE.

     “Prefaces to books [says a learned author] are like signs to
     public-houses. They are intended to give one an idea of the kind of
     entertainment to be found within.”


A student of the ancient and peculiarly interesting Art of Heraldry can
hardly fail, at an early period in his researches, to be struck with the
idea that some connection obviously exists between the various
“charges,” “crests,” “badges,” and “supporters” with which he is
familiar, and the curious designs now to be seen upon the sign-boards of
many of our roadside inns, and which were formerly displayed by most
other houses of business.

On first noticing this relationship when commencing the study of
Heraldry, somewhere about the year 1879, it occurred to me that the
subject was well worth following up. It seemed to me that much
interesting information would probably be brought to light by a careful
examination of the numerous signs of my native county of Essex. Still
more desirable did this appear when, after careful inquiry, I found that
(so far as I was able to discover) no more than three systematic
treatises upon the subject had ever been published. First and foremost
among these stands Messrs. Larwood and Hotten’s _History of
Sign-boards_,[1] a standard work which is evidently the result of a
very large amount of labour and research. I do not wish to conceal the
extent to which I am indebted to it. It is, however, to be regretted
that the authors should have paid so much attention to London signs, to
the partial neglect of those in other parts of the country, and that
they should not have provided a more complete index; but it is
significant of the completeness of their work that the other two writers
upon the subject have been able to add very little that is new, beside
mere local details. A second dissertation upon the origin and use of
trade-signs is to be found in a most interesting series of articles upon
the signs of the Town of Derby, contributed to the _Reliquary_[2] in
1867 by the late Mr. Llewellyn Jewitt, F.S.A., the editor of that
magazine; while the third and last source of information is to be found
in a lengthy pamphlet by Mr. Wm. Pengelly, F.R.S., treating in detail of
the Devonshire signs.[3]

On the Continent the literature of signs is much more voluminous. Among
the chief works may be mentioned Mons. J. D. Blavignac’s _Histoire des
Enseignes d’Hôtelleries, d’Auberges, et de Cabarets_;[4] Mons. Edouard
Fournier’s _Histoire des Enseignes de Paris_;[5] and Mons. Eustache de
La Quérière’s _Recherches Historiques sur les Enseignes des Maisons
Particulières_.[6]

It should be pointed out here that, although in what follows a good deal
has been said as to the age and past history of many of the best-known
Essex inns, this is, strictly speaking, a treatise on Signs and
Sign-boards only. The two subjects are, however, so closely connected
that I have found it best to treat them as one.

There will, doubtless, be many who will say that much of what I have
hereafter advanced is of too speculative a nature to be of real value.
They will declare, too, that I have shown far too great a readiness to
ascribe to an heraldic origin, signs which are at least as likely to
have been derived from some other source. To these objections I may
fairly reply that as, in most cases, no means now exist of discovering
the precise mode of origination, centuries ago, of many of our modern
signs, it is impossible to do much more than speculate as to their
derivation; and the fact that it has been found possible to ascribe such
large numbers to a probable heraldic origin affords, to my thinking, all
the excuse that is needed for so many attempts having been made to show
that others have been derived from the same source.

No one is more fully aware than I am of the incompleteness of my work.
Many very interesting facts relating to Essex inns and their signs have
unquestionably been omitted. But the search after all such facts is
practically an endless one. If, for instance, I had been able to state
the history of all the inns and their signs in every town and village in
the county with the completeness with which (thanks to Mr. H. W. King) I
have been enabled to treat those of Leigh, I should have swelled my book
to encyclopædic dimensions, and should have had to