Chapter I: General Survey of Signboard History (1)

In the cities of the East all trades are confined to certain streets, or to certain rows in the various bazars and wekalehs. Jewellers, silk-embroiderers, pipe-dealers, traders in drugs,--each of these classes has its own quarter, where, in little open shops, the merchants sit enthroned upon a kind of low counter, enjoying their pipes and their coffee with the _otium cum dignitate_ characteristic of the Mussulman. The purchaser knows the row to go to; sees at a glance what each shop contains; and, if he be an _habitué_, will know the face of each particular shopkeeper, so that under these circumstances, signboards would be of no use.

With the ancient Egyptians it was much the same. As a rule, no picture or description affixed to the shop announced the trade of the owner; the goods exposed for sale were thought sufficient to attract attention. Occasionally, however, there were inscriptions denoting the trade, with the emblem which indicated it;[1] whence we may assume that this ancient nation was the first to appreciate the benefit that might be derived from signboards.

What we know of the Greek signs is very meagre and indefinite. Aristophanes, Lucian, and other writers, make frequent allusions, which seem to prove that signboards were in use with the Greeks. Thus Aristotle says: ὡσπερ επι των καπηλιων γραφομενοι, μικροι μεν εισι, φαινονται δε εχοντες πλατη και βαθη.[2] And Athenæus: εν προτεροις θηκη διδασκαλιην.[3] But what their signs were, and whether carved, painted, or the natural object, is entirely unknown.

With the Romans only we begin to have distinct data. In the Eternal City, some streets, as in our mediæval towns, derived their names from signs. Such, for instance, was the vicus Ursi Pileati, (the street of “The Bear with the Hat on,”) in the Esquiliæ. The nature of their signs, also, is well known. The BUSH, their tavern-sign, gave rise to the proverb, “Vino vendibili suspensa hedera non opus est;” and hence we derive our sign of the Bush, and our proverb, “Good Wine needs no Bush.” An _ansa_, or handle of a pitcher, was the sign of their post-houses, (_stathmoi_ or _allagæ_,) and hence these establishments were afterwards denominated _ansæ_.[4] That they also had painted signs, or exterior decorations which served their purpose, is clearly evident from various authors:--

“Quum victi Mures Mustelarum exercitu
(Historia quorum in tabernis pingitur.)”[5]

PHÆDRUS, lib. iv. fab. vi.

These Roman street pictures were occasionally no mean works of art, as we may learn from a passage in Horace:--

“Contento poplite miror
Proelia, rubrico picta aut carbone; velut si
Re vera pugnent, feriant vitentque moventes
Arma viri.”[6]

Cicero also is supposed by some scholars to allude to a sign when he says:--

“Jam ostendamcujus modi sis: quum ille ‘ostende quæso’ demonstravi
digito pictum Gallum in Mariano scuto Cimbrico, sub Novis, distortum
ejectâ linguâ, buccis fluentibus, risus est commotus.”[7]

Pliny, after saying that Lucius Mummius was the first in Rome who affixed a picture to the outside of a house, continues:--

“Deinde video et in foro positas vulgo. Hinc enim Crassi oratoris
lepos, [here follows the anecdote of the Cock of Marius the Cimberian]
. . . In foro fuit et illa pastoris senis cum baculo, de qua
Teutonorum legatus respondit, interrogatus quanti eum æstimaret, sibi
donari nolle talem vivum verumque.”[8]

Fabius also, according to some, relates the story of the cock, and his explanation is cited:--“Taberna autem erant circa Forum, ac scutum illud signi gratia positum.”[9]

But we can judge even better from an inspection of the Roman signs themselves, as they have come down to us amongst the ruins of Herculaneum and Pompeii. A few were painted; but, as a rule, they appear to have been made of stone, or terra-cotta relievo, and let into the pilasters at the side of the open shop-fronts. Thus there have been found a _goat_, the sign of a dairy; a _mule_ driving a mill, the sign of a baker, (plate 1.) At the door of a schoolmaster was the not very tempting sign of a boy receiving a good birching. Very similar to our Two Jolly Brewers, carrying a tun slung on a long pole, a Pompeian public-house keeper had two slaves represented above his door, carrying an amphora; and another wine-merchant had a painting of Bacchus pressing a bunch of grapes. At a perfumer’s shop, in the street of Mercury, were represented various items of that profession--viz., four men carrying a box with vases of perfume, men occupied in laying out and perfuming a corpse, &c. There was also a sign similar to the one mentioned by Horace, the Two Gladiators, under which, in the usual Pompeian cacography, was the following imprecation:--ABIAT VENEREM POMPEIIANAMA IRADAM QUI HOC LÆSERIT, _i.e._, _Habeat Venerem Pompeianam iratam_, &c. Besides these there were the signs of the Anchor, the Ship, (perhaps a ship-chandler’s,) a sort of a Cross, the Chequers, the Phallus on a baker’s shop, with the words, HIC HABITAT FELICITAS; whilst in Herculaneum there was a very cleverly painted Amorino, or Cupid, carrying a pair of ladies’ shoes, one on his head and the other in his hand.

It is also probable that, at a later period at all events, the various artificers of Rome had their tools as the sign of their house, to indicate their profession. We find that they sculptured them on their tombs in the catacombs, and may safely conclude that they would do the same on their houses in the land of the living. Thus on the tomb of Diogenes, the grave-digger, there is a pick-axe and a lamp; Bauto and Maxima have the tools of carpenters, a saw, an adze, and a chisel; Veneria, a tire-woman, has a mirror and a comb:--then there are others who have wool-combers’ implements; a physician, who has a cupping-glass; a poulterer, a case of poultry; a surveyor, a measuring rule; a baker, a bushel, a millstone, and ears of corn; in fact, almost every trade had its symbolic implements. Even that cockney custom of punning on the name, so common on signboards, finds its precedent in those mansions of the dead. Owing to this fancy, the grave of Dracontius bore a dragon; Onager, a wild ass; Umbricius, a shady tree; Leo, a lion; Doleus, father and son, two casks; Herbacia, two baskets of herbs; and Porcula, a pig. Now it seems most probable that, since these emblems were used to indicate where a baker, a carpenter, or a tire-woman was buried, they would adopt similar symbols above ground, to acquaint the public where a baker, a carpenter, or a tire-woman lived.

We may thus conclude that our forefathers adopted the signboard from the Romans; and though at first there were certainly not so many shops as to require a picture for distinction,--as the open shop-front did not necessitate any emblem to indicate the trade carried on within,--yet the inns by the road-side, and in the towns, would undoubtedly have them. There was the Roman bush of evergreens to indicate the sale of wine;[10] and certain devices would doubtless be adopted to attract the attention of the different classes of wayfarers, as the Cross for the Christian customer,[11] and the Sun or the Moon for the pagan. Then we find various emblems, or standards, to court respectively the custom of the Saxon, the Dane, or the Briton. He that desired the patronage of soldiers might put up some weapon; or, if he sought his customers among the more quiet artificers, there were the various implements of trade with which he could appeal to the different mechanics that frequented his neighbourhood.

Along with these very simple signs, at a later period, coats of arms, crests, and badges, would gradually make their appearance at the doors of shops and inns. The reasons which dictated the choice of such subjects were various. One of the principal was this. In the Middle Ages, the houses of the nobility, both in town and country, when the family was absent, were used as hostelries for travellers. The family arms always hung in front of the house, and the most conspicuous object in those arms gave a name to the establishment amongst travellers, who, unacquainted with the mysteries of heraldry, called a lion gules or azure by the vernacular name of the _Red_ or _Blue Lion_.[12] Such coats of arms gradually became a very popular intimation that there was--

“Good entertainment for all that passes,--
Horses, mares, men, and asses;”

and innkeepers began to adopt them, hanging out red lions and green dragons as the best way to acquaint the public that they offered food and shelter.

Still, as long as civilisation was only at a low ebb, the so-called open-houses few, and competition trifling, signs were of but little use. A few objects, typical of the trade carried on, would suffice; a knife for the cutler, a stocking for the hosier, a hand for the glover, a pair of scissors for the tailor, a bunch of grapes for the vintner, fully answered public requirements. But as luxury increased, and the number of houses or shops dealing in the same article multiplied, something more was wanted. Particular trades continued to be confined to particular streets; the desideratum then was, to give to each shop a name or token by which it might be mentioned in conversation, so that it could be recommended and customers sent to it. Reading was still a scarce acquirement; consequently, to write up the owner’s name would have been of little use. Those that could, advertised their name by a rebus; thus, a hare and a bottle stood for Harebottle, and two cocks for Cox. Others, whose names no rebus could represent, adopted pictorial objects; and, as the quantity of these augmented, new subjects were continually required. The animal kingdom was ransacked, from the mighty elephant to the humble bee, from the eagle to the sparrow; the vegetable kingdom, from the palm-tree and cedar to the marigold and daisy; everything on the earth, and in the firmament above it, was put under contribution. Portraits of the great men of all ages, and views of towns, both painted with a great deal more of fancy than of truth; articles of dress, implements of trades, domestic utensils, things visible and invisible, _ea quæ sunt tamquam ea quæ non sunt_, everything was attempted in order to attract attention and to obtain publicity. Finally, as all signs in a town were painted by the same small number of individuals, whose talents and imagination were limited, it followed that the same subjects were naturally often repeated, introducing only a change in the colour for a difference.

Since all the pictorial representations were, then, of much the same quality, rival tradesmen tried to outvie each other in the size of their signs, each one striving to obtrude his picture into public notice by putting it out further in the street than his neighbour’s. The “Liber Albus,” compiled in 1419, names this subject amongst the Inquisitions at the Wardmotes: “Item, if the ale-stake of any tavern is longer or extends further than ordinary.” And in book iii. part iii. p. 389, is said:--

“Also, it was ordained that, whereas the ale-stakes projecting in
front of taverns in Chepe, and elsewhere in the said city, extend too
far over the King’s highways, to the impeding of riders and others,
and, by reason of their excessive weight, to the great deterioration
of the houses in which they are fixed;--to the end that opportune
remedy might be made thereof, it was by the Mayor and Aldermen granted
and ordained, and, upon summons of all the taverners of the said city,
it was enjoined upon them, under pain of paying forty pence[13] unto
the Chamber of the Guildhall, on every occasion upon which they should
transgress such ordinance, that no one of them in future should have a
stake, bearing either his sign, or leaves, extending or lying over the
King’s highway, of greater length than seven feet at most, and that
this ordinance should begin to take effect at the Feast of Saint
Michael, then next ensuing, always thereafter to be valid and of full
effect.”

The booksellers generally had a woodcut of their signs for the colophon of their books, so that their shops might get known by the inspection of these cuts. For this reason, Benedict Hector, one of the early Bolognese printers, gives this advice to the buyers in his “Justinus et Florus:”--

“Emptor, attende quando vis emere libros formatos in officina mea
excussoria, inspice signum quod in liminari pagina est, ita numquam
falleris. Nam quidam malevoli Impressores libris suis inemendatis et
maculosis apponunt nomen meum ut fiant vendibiliores.”[14]

Jodocus Badius of Paris, gives a similar caution:--

“Oratum facimus lectorem ut signum inspiciat, nam sunt qui titulum
nomenque Badianum mentiantur et laborem suffurentur.”[15]

Aldus, the great Venetian printer, exposes a similar fraud, and points out how the pirate had copied the sign also in his colophon; but, by inadvertency, making a slight alteration:--

“Extremum est ut admoneamus studiosissimum quemque, Florentinos
quosdam impressores, cum viderint se diligentiam nostram in castigando
et imprimendo non posse assequi, ad artes confugisse solitas; hoc est
Grammaticis Institutionibus Aldi in sua officina formatis, notam
Delphini Anchoræ Involuti nostram apposuisse; sed ita egerunt ut
quivis mediocriter versatus in libris impressionis nostræ animadvertit
illos impudenter fecisse. Nam rostrum Delphini in partem sinistram
vergit, cum tamen nostrum in dexteram totum demittatur.”[16]

No wonder, then, that a sign was considered an heirloom, and descended from father to son, like the coat of arms of the nobility, which was the case with the Brazen Serpent, the sign of Reynold Wolfe. “His trade was continued a good while after his demise by his wife Joan, who made her will the 1st of July 1574, whereby she desires to be buried near her husband, in St Faith’s Church, and bequeathed to her son, Robert Wolfe, the chapel-house, [their printing-office,] the Brazen Serpent, and all the prints, letters, furniture,” etc.--DIBDIN’S _Typ. Ant._, vol. iv. p. 6.

As we observed above, directly signboards were generally adopted, quaintness became one of the desiderata, and costliness another. This last could be obtained by the quality of the picture, but, for two reasons, was not much aimed at--firstly, because good artists were scarce in those days; and even had they obtained a good picture, the ignorant crowd that daily passed underneath the sign would, in all probability, have thought the harsh and glaring daub a finer production of art than a Holy Virgin by Rafaelle himself. The other reason was the instability of such a work, exposed to sun, wind, rain, frost, and the nightly attacks of revellers and roisters. Greater care, therefore, was bestowed upon the ornamentation of the ironwork by which it was suspended; and this was perfectly in keeping with the taste of the times, when even the simplest lock or hinges could not be launched into the world without its scrolls and strapwork.

The signs then were suspended from an iron bar, fixed either in the wall of the house, or in a post or obelisk standing in front of it; in both cases the ironwork was shaped and ornamented with that taste so conspicuous in the metal-work of the Renaissance period, of which many churches, and other buildings of that period, still bear witness. In provincial towns and villages, where there was sufficient room in the streets, the sign was generally suspended from a kind of small triumphal arch, standing out in the road, partly wood, partly iron, and ornamented with all that carving, gilding, and colouring could bestow upon it, (_see_ description of White-Hart Inn at Scole.) Some of the designs of this class of ironwork have come down to us in the works of the old masters, and are indeed exquisite.

Painted signs then, suspended in the way we have just pointed out, were more common than those of any other kind; yet not a few shops simply suspended at their doors some prominent article in their trade, which custom has outlived the more elegant signboards, and may be daily witnessed in our streets, where the ironmonger’s frying-pan, or dust-pan, the hardware-dealer’s teapot, the grocer’s tea-canister, the shoemaker’s last or clog, with the Golden Boot, and many similar objects, bear witness to this old custom.

Lastly, there was in London another class of houses that had a peculiar way of placing their signs--viz., the Stews upon the Bankside, which were, by a proclamation of 37 Hen. VIII., “whited and painted with signs on the front, for a token of the said houses.” Stow enumerates some of these symbols, such as the Cross-Keys, the Gun, the Castle, the Crane, the Cardinal’s Hat, the Bell, the Swan, &c.

Still greater variety in the construction of the signs existed in France; for besides the painted signs in the iron frames, the shopkeepers in Paris, according to H. Sauval, (“Antiquités de la Ville de Paris,”) had anciently banners hanging above their doors, or from their windows, with the sign of the shop painted on them; whilst in the sixteenth century carved wooden signs were very common. These, however, were not suspended, but formed part of the wooden construction of the house; some of them were really _chefs-d’œuvres_, and as careful in design as a carved cathedral stall. Several of them are still remaining in Rouen and other old towns; many also have been removed and placed in various local museums of antiquities. The most general rule, however, on the Continent, as in England, was to have the painted signboard suspended across the streets.

An observer of James I.’s time has jotted down the names of all the inns, taverns, and side streets in the line of road between Charing Cross and the old Tower of London, which document lies now embalmed amongst the Harl. MS., 6850, fol. 31. In imagination we can walk with him through the metropolis:--

“On the way from Whitehall to Charing Cross we pass: the White Hart,
the Red Lion, the Mairmade, iij. Tuns, Salutation, the Graihound, the
Bell, the Golden Lyon. In sight of Charing Crosse: the Garter, the
Crown, the Bear and Ragged Staffe, the Angel, the King Harry Head.
Then from Charing Cross towards ye cittie: another White Hart, the
Eagle and Child, the Helmet, the Swan, the Bell, King Harry Head, the
Flower-de-luce, Angel, the Holy Lambe, the Bear and Harroe, the
Plough, the Shippe, the Black Bell, another King Harry Head, the Bull
Head, the Golden Bull, ‘a sixpenny ordinarye,’ another Flower-de-luce,
the Red Lyon, the Horns, the White Hors, the Prince’s Arms, Bell
Savadge’s In, the S. John the Baptist, the Talbot, the Shipp of War,
the S. Dunstan, the Hercules or the Owld Man Tavern, the Mitar,
another iij. Tunnes Inn, and a iij. Tunnes Tavern, and a Graihound,
another Mitar, another King Harry Head, iij. Tunnes, and the iij.
Cranes.”

Having walked from Whitechapel “straight forward to the Tower,” the good citizen got tired, and so we hear no more of him.

In the next reign we find the following enumerated by Taylor the water-poet, in one of his facetious pamphlets:--5 Angels, 4 Anchors, 6 Bells, 5 Bullsheads, 4 Black Bulls, 4 Bears, 5 Bears and Dolphins, 10 Castles, 4 Crosses, (red or white,) 7 Three Crowns, 7 Green Dragons, 6 Dogs, 5 Fountains, 3 Fleeces, 8 Globes, 5 Greyhounds, 9 White Harts, 4 White Horses, 5 Harrows, 20 King’s Heads, 7 King’s Arms, 1 Queen’s Head, 8 Golden Lyons, 6 Red Lyons, 7 Halfmoons, 10 Mitres, 33 Maidenheads, 10 Mermaids, 2 Mouths, 8 Nagsheads, 8 Prince’s Arms, 4 Pope’s Heads, 13 Suns, 8 Stars, &c. Besides these he mentions an Adam and Eve, an Antwerp Tavern, a Cat, a Christopher, a Cooper’s Hoop, a Goat, a Garter, a Hart’s Horn, a Mitre, &c. These were all taverns in London; and it will be observed that their signs were very similar to those seen at the present day--a remark applicable to the taverns not only of England, but of Europe generally, at this period. In another work Taylor gives us the signs of the taverns[17] and alehouses in ten shires and counties about London, all similar to those we have just enumerated; but amongst the number, it may be noted, there is not one combination of two objects, except the Eagle and Child, and the Bear and Ragged Staff. In a black-letter tract entitled “Newes from Bartholomew Fayre,” the following are named:--

“There has been great sale and utterance of Wine,
Besides Beer, Ale, and Hippocrass fine,
In every Country, Region, and Nation,
Chiefly at Billingsgate, at the Salutation;
And Boreshead near London Stone,
The Swan at Dowgate, a tavern well knowne;
The Mitre in Cheap, and the Bullhead,
And many like places that make noses red;
The Boreshead in Old Fish Street, Three Cranes in the Vintree,
And now, of late, Saint Martin’s in the Sentree;
The Windmill in Lothbury, the Ship at the Exchange,
King’s Head in New Fish Street, where Roysters do range;
The Mermaid in Cornhill, Red Lion in the Strand,
Three Tuns in Newgate Market, in Old Fish Street the Swan.”

Drunken Barnaby, (1634,) in his travels, called at several of the London taverns, which he has recorded in his vinous flights:--

“Country left I in a fury,
To the Axe in Aldermanbury
First arrived, that place slighted,
I at the Rose in Holborn lighted.
From the Rose in Flaggons sail I
To the Griffin i’ th’ Old Bailey,
Where no sooner do I waken,
Than to Three Cranes I am taken,
Where I lodge and am no starter.

* * * * *

Yea, my merry mates and I, too,
Oft the Cardinal’s Hat do fly to.
There at Hart’s Horns we carouse,” &c.

Already, in very early times, publicans were compelled by law to have a sign; for we find that in the 16 Richard II., (1393,) Florence North, a brewer of Chelsea, was “presented” “for not putting up the usual sign.”[18] In Cambridge the regulations were equally severe; by an Act of Parliament, 9 Henry VI., it was enacted: “Quicunq; de villa Cantebrigg ‘braciaverit ad vendend’ exponat signum suum, alioquin omittat cervisiam.”--_Rolls of Parliament_, vol. v. fol. 426 a.[19] But with the other trades it was always optional. Hence Charles I., on his accession to the throne, gave the inhabitants of London a charter by which, amongst other favours, he granted them the right to hang out signboards:--

“And further, we do give and grant to the said Mayor, and Commonalty,
and Citizens of the said city, and their successors, that it may and
shall be lawful to the Citizens of the same city and any of them, for
the time being, to expose and hang in and over the streets, and ways,
and alleys of the said city and suburbs of the same, signs, and posts
of signs, affixed to their houses and shops, for the better finding
out such citizens’ dwellings, shops, arts, or occupations, without
impediment, molestation, or interruption of his heirs or successors.”

In France, the innkeepers were under the same regulations as in England; for there also, by the edict of Moulins, in 1567, all innkeepers were ordered to acquaint the magistrates with their name and address, and their “affectes et enseignes;” and Henri III., by an edict of March 1577, ordered that all innkeepers should place a sign on the most conspicuous part of their houses, “aux lieux les plus apparents;” so that everybody, even those that could not read, should be aware of their profession. Louis XIV., by an ordnance of 1693, again ordered signs to be put up, and also the price of the articles they were entitled to sell:--

“Art. XXIII.--Taverniers metront enseignes et bouchons. . . . Nul ne
pourra tenir taverne en cette dite ville et faubourgs, sans mettre
enseigne et bouchon.”[20]

Hence, the taking away of a publican’s licence was accompanied by the taking away of his sign:--

“For this gross fault I here do damn thy licence,
Forbidding thee ever to tap or draw;
For instantly I will in mine own person,
Command the constables to pull down thy sign.”

MASSINGER, _A New Way to Pay Old Debts_, iv. 2.

At the time of the great Civil War, house-signs played no inconsiderable part in the changes and convulsions of the state, and took a prominent place in the politics of the day. We may cite an earlier example, where a sign was made a matter of high treason--namely, in the case of that unfortunate fellow in Cheapside, who, in the reign of Edward IV., kept the sign of the Crown, and lost his head for saying he would “make his son heir to the Crown.” But more general examples are to be met with in the history of the Commonwealth troubles. At the death of Charles I., John Taylor the water-poet, a Royalist to the backbone, boldly shewed his opinion of that act, by taking as a sign for his alehouse in Phœnix Alley, Long Acre, the Mourning Crown; but he was soon compelled to take it down. Richard Flecknoe, in his “Ænigmatical Characters,” (1665,) tells us how many of the severe Puritans were shocked at anything smelling of Popery:--“As for the signs, they have pretty well begun their reformation already, changing the sign of the Salutation of Our Lady into the Souldier and Citizen, and the Catherine Wheel into the Cat and Wheel; such ridiculous work they make of this reformation, and so jealous they are against all mirth and jollity, as they would pluck down the Cat and Fiddle too, if it durst but play so loud as they might hear it.” No doubt they invented very godly signs, but these have not come down to us.

At that time, also, a fashion prevailed which continued, indeed, as long as the signboard was an important institution--of using house-signs to typify political ideas. Imaginary signs, as a part of secret imprints, conveying most unmistakably the sentiments of the book, were often used in the old days of political plots and violent lampoons. Instance the following:--

“VOX BOREALIS, or a Northerne Discoverie, by Way of Dialogue, between
Jamie and Willie. Amidst the Babylonians--printed by Margery
Marprelate, in Thwack Coat Lane, at the sign of the _Crab-Tree
Cudgell_, without any privilege of the Catercaps. 1641.”

“ARTICLES OF HIGH TREASON made and enacted by the late Halfquarter
usurping Convention, and now presented to the publick view for a
general satisfaction of all true Englishmen. Imprinted for Erasmus
Thorogood, and to be sold at the signe of the _Roasted Rump_. 1659.”

“A CATALOGUE OF BOOKS of the Newest Fashion, to be sold by auction at
the Whigs’ Coffeehouse, at the sign of the _Jackanapes_ in Prating
Alley, near the Deanery of Saint Paul’s.”

“THE CENSURE OF THE ROTA upon Mr Milton’s book, entitled ‘The Ready
and Easy Way to Establish a Free Commonwealth,’ &c. Printed at London
by Paul Giddy, Printer to the Rota, at the sign of the _Windmill_, in
Turn-again Lane. 1660.”

“AN ADDRESS from the Ladies of the Provinces of Munster and Leinster
to their Graces the Duke and Duchess of D----t, Lord G----, and
Caiaphas the High Priest, with sixty original toasts, drank by the
Ladies at their last Assembly, with Love-letters added. London:
Printed for John Pro Patria, at the sign of _Vivat Rex_. 1754.”

“CHIVALRY no Trifle, or the Knight and his Lady: a Tale. To which is
added the Hue and Cry after Touzer and Spitfire, the Lady’s two
lapdogs. Dublin: Printed at the sign of _Sir Tady’s Press_, etc.
1754.”

“AN ADDRESS from the Influential Electors of the County and City of
Galway, with a Collection of 60 Original Patriot Toasts and 48 Munster
Toasts, with Intelligence from the Kingdom of Eutopia. Printed at the
sign of the _Pirate’s Sword in the Captain’s Scabbard_. London, 1754.”

“THE C----T’S APOLOGY to the Freeholders of this Kingdom for their
conduct, containing some Pieces of Humour, to which is added a Bill of
C----t Morality. London: Printed at the sign of _Betty Ireland, d----d
of a Tyrant in Purple, a Monster in Black_, etc.”

In the newspapers of the eighteenth century, we find that signs were constantly used as emblems of, or as sharp hits at, the politics of the day; thus, in the _Weekly Journal_ for August 17, 1718, allusions are made to the sign of the Salutation, in Newgate Street, by the opposition party, to which the _Original Weekly Journal_, the week after, retaliates by a description and explanation of an indelicate sign said to be in King Street, Westminster. In 1763, the following pasquinade went the round of the newspapers, said to have been sent over from Holland:--

“HÔTELS POUR LES MINISTRES DES COURS ETRANGÈRES AU FUTUR CONGRESS.

De l’Empereur,
À la Bonne Volonté; rue d’Impuissance.
De Russie,
Au Chimère; rue des Caprices.
De France,
Au Coq déplumé; rue de Canada.
D’Autriche,
À la Mauvaise Alliance, rue des Invalides.
D’Angleterre,
À la Fortune, Place des Victoires, rue des Subsides.
De Prusse,
Aux Quatre vents, rue des Renards, près la Place des Guinées.
De Suede,
Au Passage des Courtisans, rue des Visionaires.
De Pologne,
Au Sacrifice d’Abraham, rue des Innocents, près la Place des Devôts.
Des Princes de l’Empire,
Au Roitelêt, près de l’Hôpital des Incurables, rue des Charlatans.
De Wirtemberg,
Au Don Quichotte, rue des Fantômes près de la Montagne en Couche.
D’Hollande,
À la Baleine, sur le Marché aux Fromages, près du Grand Observatoire.”

On the morning of September 28, 1736, all the tavern-signs in London were in deep mourning; and no wonder, their dearly beloved patron and friend Gin was defunct,--killed by the new Act against spirituous liquors! But they soon dropped their mourning, for Gin had only been in a lethargic fit, and woke up much refreshed by his sleep. Fifteen years after, when Hogarth painted his “Gin Lane,” royal gin was to be had cheap enough, if we may believe the signboard in that picture, which informs us that “gentlemen and others” could get “drunk for a penny,” and “dead drunk for twopence,” in which last emergency, “clean straw for nothing” was provided.

Of the signs which were to be seen in London at the period of the Restoration,--to return to the subject we were originally considering,--we find a goodly collection of them in one of the “Roxburghe Ballads,” (vol. i. 212,) entitled:--

“LONDON’S ORDINARIE, OR EVERY MAN IN HIS HUMOUR

THROUGH the Royal Exchange as I walked,
Where Gallants in sattin doe shine,
At midst of the day, they parted away,
To seaverall places to dine.

The Gentrie went to the _King’s Head_,
The Nobles unto the _Crowne_:
The Knights went to the _Golden Fleece_,
And the Ploughmen to the _Clowne_.

The Cleargie will dine at the _Miter_,
The Vintners at the _Three Tunnes_,
The Usurers to the _Devill_ will goe,
And the Fryers to the _Nunnes_.

The Ladyes will dine at the _Feathers_,
The _Globe_ no Captaine will scorne,
The Huntsmen will goe to the _Grayhound_ below,
And some Townes-men to the _Horne_.

The Plummers will dine at the _Fountaine_,
The Cookes at the _Holly Lambe_,
The Drunkerds by noone, to the _Man in the Moone_,
And the Cuckholdes to the _Ramme_.

The Roarers will dine at the _Lyon_,
The Watermen at the _Old Swan_;
And Bawdes will to the _Negro_ goe,
And Whores to the _Naked Man_.

The Keepers will to the _White Hart_,
The Marchants unto the _Shippe_,
The Beggars they must take their way
To the _Egge-shell_ and the _Whippe_.

The Farryers will to the _Horse_,
The Blackesmith unto the _Locke_,
The Butchers unto the _Bull_ will goe,
And the Carmen to Bridewell _Clocke_.

The Fishmongers unto the _Dolphin_,
The Barbers to the _Cheat Loafe_,[21]
The Turners unto the _Ladle_ will goe,
Where they may merrylie quaffe.

The Taylors will dine at the _Sheeres_,
The Shooemakers will to the _Boote_,
The Welshmen they will take their way,
And dine at the signe of the _Gote_.

The Hosiers will dine at the _Legge_,
The Drapers at the signe of the _Brush_.
The Fletchers to _Robin Hood_ will goe,
And the Spendthrift to _Begger’s Bush_.

The Pewterers to the _Quarte Pot_,
The Coopers will dine at the _Hoope_,
The Coblers to the _Last_ will goe,
And the Bargemen to the _Sloope_.

The Carpenters will to the _Axe_,
The Colliers will dine at the _Sacke_,
Your Fruterer he to the _Cherry-Tree_,
Good fellowes no liquor will lacke.

The Goldsmith will to the _Three Cups_,
For money they hold it as drosse;
Your Puritan to the _Pewter Canne_,
And your Papists to the _Crosse_.

The Weavers will dine at the _Shuttle_,
The Glovers will unto the _Glove_,
The Maydens all to the _Mayden Head_,
And true Louers unto the _Doue_.

The Sadlers will dine at the _Saddle_,
The Painters will to the _Greene Dragon_,
The Dutchmen will go to the _Froe_,[22]
Where each man will drinke his Flagon.

The Chandlers will dine at the _Skales_,
The Salters at the signe of the _Bagge_;
The Porters take pain at the _Labour in Vaine_,
And the Horse-Courser to the _White Nagge_.

Thus every Man in his humour,
That comes from the North or the South,
But he that has no money in his purse,
May dine at the signe of the _Mouth_.

The Swaggerers will dine at the _Fencers_,
But those that have lost their wits:
With _Bedlam Tom_ let that be their home,
And the _Drumme_ the Drummers best fits.

The Cheter will dine at the _Checker_,
The Picke-pockets in a blind alehouse,
Tel on and tride then up Holborne they ride,
And they there end at the Gallowes.”

Thomas Heywood introduced a similar song in his “Rape of Lucrece.” This, the first of the kind we have met with, is in all probability the original, unless the ballad be a reprint from an older one; but the term Puritan used in it, seems to fix its date to the seventeenth century.

“THE Gintry to the _Kings Head_,
The Nobles to the _Crown_,
The Knights unto the _Golden Fleece_,
And to the _Plough_ the Clowne.

The Churchmen to the _Mitre_,
The Shepheard to the _Star_,
The Gardener hies him to the _Rose_,
To the _Drum_ the Man of War.

The Huntsmen to the _White Hart_,
To the _Ship_ the Merchants goe,
But you that doe the Muses love,
The sign called _River Po_.

The Banquerout to the _World’s End_,
The Fool to the _Fortune_ his,
Unto the _Mouth_ the Oyster-wife,
The Fiddler to the _Pie_.

The Punk unto the _Cockatrice_,[23]
The Drunkard to the _Vine_,
The Begger to the _Bush_, there meet,
And with Duke Humphrey dine.”[24]

After the great fire of 1666, many of the houses that were rebuilt, instead of the former wooden signboards projecting in the streets, adopted signs carved in stone, and generally painted or gilt, let into the front of the house, beneath the first floor windows. Many of these signs are still to be seen, and will be noticed in their respective places. But in those streets not visited by the fire, things continued on the old footing, each shopkeeper being fired with a noble ambition to project his sign a few inches farther than his neighbour. The consequence was that, what with the narrow streets, the penthouses, and the signboards, the air and light of the heavens were well-nigh intercepted from the luckless wayfarers through the streets of London. We can picture to ourselves the unfortunate plumed, feathered, silken gallant of the period walking, in his low shoes and silk stockings, through the ill-paved dirty streets, on a stormy November day, when the honours were equally divided between fog, sleet, snow, and rain, (and no umbrellas, be it remembered,) with flower-pots blown from the penthouses, spouts sending down shower-baths from almost every house, and the streaming signs swinging overhead on their rusty, creaking hinges. Certainly the evil was great, and demanded that redress which Charles II. gave in the seventh year of his reign, when a new Act “ordered that in all the streets no signboard shall hang across, but that the sign shall be fixed against the balconies, or some convenient part of the side of the house.”

The Parisians, also, were suffering from the same enormities; everything was of Brobdignagian proportions. “J’ai vu,” says an essayist of the middle of the seventeenth century, “suspendu aux boutiques des volants de six pieds de hauteur, des perles grosses comme des tonneaux, des plumes qui allaient au troisième étage.”[25] There, also, the scalpel of the law was at last applied to the evil; for, in 1669, a royal order was issued to prohibit these monstrous signs, and the practice of advancing them too far into the streets, “which made the thoroughfares close in the daytime, and prevented the lights of the lamps from spreading properly at night.”

BUSH.

(MS. of the 14th century.)

BUSH.

(Bayeux tapestry, 11th cent.)

CROSS.

(Luttrell Psalter, 11th century.)

ALE-POLE.

(Picture of Wouwverman, 17th cent.)

BLACK JACK AND PEWTER PLATTER.

(Print by Schavelin, 1480.)

NAG’S HEAD.

(Cheapside. 1640.)

BUSH.

(MS. of the 15th cent.)]

Still, with all their faults, the signs had some advantages for the wayfarer; even their dissonant creaking, according to the old weather proverb, was not without its use:--

“But when the swinging signs your ears offend
With creaking noise, then rainy floods impend.”

GAY’S _Trivia_, canto i.

This indeed, from the various allusions made to it in the literature of the last century, was regarded as a very general hint to the lounger, either to hurry home, or hail a sedan-chair or coach. Gay, in his didactic--_flâneur_--poem, points out another benefit to be derived from the signboards:--

“If drawn by Bus’ness to a street unknown,
Let the sworn Porter point thee through the town;
Be sure observe the Signs, for Signs remain
Like faithful Landmarks to the walking Train.”

Besides, they offered constant matter of thought, speculation, and amusement to the curious observer. Even Dean Swift, and the Lord High Treasurer Harley,

“Would try to read the lines
Writ underneath the country signs.”

And certainly these productions of the country muse are often highly amusing. Unfortunately for the compilers of the present work, they have never been collected and preserved; although they would form a not unimportant and characteristic contribution to our popular literature. Our Dutch neighbours have paid more attention to this subject, and a great number of their signboard inscriptions were, towards the close of the seventeenth century, gathered in a curious little 12mo volume,[26] to which we shall often refer. Nay, so much attention was devoted to this branch of literature in that country, that a certain H. van den Berg, in 1693, wrote a little volume,[27] which he entitled a “Banquet,” giving verses adapted for all manner of shops and signboards; so that a shopkeeper at a loss for an inscription had only to open the book and make his selection; for there were rhymes in it both serious and jocular, suitable to everybody’s taste. The majority of the Dutch signboard inscriptions of that day seem to have been eminently characteristic of the spirit of the nation. No such inscriptions could be brought before “a discerning public,” without the patronage of some holy man mentioned in the Scriptures, whose name was to stand there for no other purpose than to give the Dutch poet an opportunity of making a jingling rhyme; thus, for instance,--

“Jacob was David’s neef maar ’t waren geen Zwagers.
Hier slypt men allerhande Barbiers gereedschappen, ook voor vischwyven
en slagers.”[28]

Or another example:--

“Men vischte Moses uit de Biezen,
Hier trekt men tanden en Kiezen.”[29]

In the beginning of the eighteenth century, we find the following signs named, which puzzled a person of an inquisitive turn of mind, who wrote to the _British Apollo_,[30] (the meagre _Notes and Queries_ of those days,) in the hope of eliciting an explanation of their quaint combination:--

“I’m amazed at the Signs
As I pass through the Town,
To see the odd mixture:
A Magpie and Crown,
The Whale and the Crow,
The Razor and Hen,
The Leg and Seven Stars,
The Axe and the Bottle,
The Tun and the Lute,
The Eagle and Child,
The Shovel and Boot.”

All these signs are also named by Tom Brown:[31]--“The first amusements we encountered were the variety and contradictory language of the signs, enough to persuade a man there were no rules of concord among the citizens. Here we saw Joseph’s Dream, the Bull and Mouth, the Whale and Crow, the Shovel and Boot, the Leg and Star, the Bible and Swan, the Frying-pan and Drum, the Lute and Tun, the Hog in Armour, and a thousand others that the wise men that put them there can give no reason for.”

From this enumeration, we see that a century had worked great changes in the signs. Those of the beginning of the seventeenth century were all simple, and had no combinations. But now we meet very heterogeneous objects joined together. Various reasons can be found to account for this. First, it must be borne in mind that most of the London signs had no inscription to tell the public “this is a lion,” or, “this is a bear;” hence the vulgar could easily make mistakes, and call an object by a wrong name, which might give rise to an absurd combination, as in the case of the Leg and Star; which, perhaps, was nothing else but the two insignia of the order of the Garter; the garter being represented in its natural place, on the leg, and the star of the order beside it. Secondly, the name might be corrupted through faulty pronunciation; and when the sign was to be repainted, or imitated in another street, those objects would be represented by which it was best known. Thus the Shovel and Boot might have been a corruption of the Shovel and Boat, since the Shovel and Ship is still a very common sign in places where grain is carried by canal boats; whilst the Bull and Mouth is said to be a corruption of the Boulogne Mouth--the Mouth of Boulogne Harbour. Finally, whimsical shopkeepers would frequently aim at the most odd combination they could imagine, for no other reason but to attract attention. Taking these premises into consideration, some of the signs which so puzzled Tom Brown might be easily accounted for; the Axe and Bottle, in this way, might have been a corruption of the Battle-axe. The Bible and Swan, a sign in honour of Luther, who is generally represented by the symbol of a swan, a figure of which many Lutheran Churches have on their steeple instead of a weathercock; whilst the Lute and Tun was clearly a pun on the name of Luton, similar to the Bolt and Tun of Prior Bolton, who adopted this device as his rebus.

Other causes of combinations, and many very amusing and instructive remarks about signs, are given in the following from the _Spectator_, No. 28, April 2, 1710:--

“There is nothing like sound literature and good sense to be met with in those objects, that are everywhere thrusting themselves out to the eye and endeavouring to become visible. Our streets are filled with _blue boars_, _black swans_, and _red lions_, not to mention _flying-pigs_ and _hogs in armour_, with many creatures more extraordinary than any in the deserts of Africa. Strange that one, who has all the birds and beasts in nature to choose out of, should live at the sign of an _ens rationis_.

“My first task, therefore, should be like that of Hercules, to clear the city from monsters. In the second place, I should forbid that creatures of jarring and incongruous natures should be joined together in the same sign; such as the _Bell and the Neat’s Tongue_, the _Dog and the Gridiron_. The _Fox and the Goose_ may be supposed to have met, but what has the _Fox and the Seven Stars_ to do together? And when did the _Lamb and Dolphin_ ever meet except upon a signpost? As for the _Cat and Fiddle_, there is a conceit in it, and therefore I do not intend that anything I have here said should affect it. I must, however, observe to you upon this subject, that it is usual for a young tradesman, at his first setting up, to add to his own sign that of the master whom he served, as the husband, after marriage, gives a place to his mistress’s arms in his own coat. This I take to have given rise to many of those absurdities which are committed over our heads; and, as I am informed, first occasioned the _Three Nuns and a Hare_, which we see so frequently joined together. I would therefore establish certain rules for the determining how far one tradesman may give the sign of another, and in what case he may be allowed to quarter it with his own.

“In the third place, I would enjoin every shop to make use of a sign which bears some affinity to the wares in which it deals. What can be more inconsistent than to see a bawd at the sign of the _Angel_, or a tailor at the _Lion_? A cook should not live at the _Boot_, nor a shoemaker at the _Roasted Pig_; and yet, for want of this regulation, I have seen a _Goat_ set up before the door of a perfumer, and the _French King’s Head_ at a sword-cutler’s.

“An ingenious foreigner observes that several of those gentlemen who value themselves upon their families, and overlook such as are bred to trades, bear the tools of their forefathers in their coats of arms. I will not examine how true this is in fact; but though it may not be necessary for posterity thus to set up the sign of their forefathers, I think it highly proper that those who actually profess the trade should shew some such mark of it before their doors.

“When the name gives an occasion for an ingenious signpost, I would likewise advise the owner to take that opportunity of letting the world know who he is. It would have been ridiculous for the ingenious Mrs Salmon to have lived at the sign of the trout, for which reason she has erected before her house the figure of the fish that is her namesake. Mr Bell has likewise distinguished himself by a device of the same nature. And here, sir, I must beg leave to observe to you, that this particular figure of a Bell has given occasion to several pieces of wit in this head. A man of your reading must know that Abel Drugger gained great applause by it in the time of Ben Jonson. Our Apocryphal heathen god is also represented by this figure, which, in conjunction with the Dragon,[32] makes a very handsome picture in several of our streets. As for the _Bell Savage_, which is the sign of a savage man standing by a bell, I was formerly very much puzzled upon the conceit of it, till I accidentally fell into the reading of an old romance translated out of the French, which gives an account of a very beautiful woman, who was found in a wilderness, and is called _la Belle Sauvage_, and is everywhere translated by our countrymen _the Bell Savage_.[33] This piece of philology will, I hope, convince you that I have made signposts my study, and consequently qualified myself for the employment which I solicit at your hands. But before I conclude my letter, I must communicate to you another remark which I have made upon the subject with which I am now entertaining you--namely, that I can give a shrewd guess at the humour of the inhabitant by the sign that hangs before his door. A surly, choleric fellow generally makes choice of a _Bear_, as men of milder dispositions frequently live at the _Lamb_. Seeing _a Punchbowl_ painted upon a sign near Charing Cross, and very curiously garnished, with a couple of angels hovering over it and squeezing a lemon into it, I had the curiosity to ask after the master of the house, and found upon inquiry, as I had guessed by the little _agrémens_ upon his sign, that he was a Frenchman.”

Another reason for “quartering” signs was on removing from one shop to another, when it was customary to add the sign of the old shop to that of the new one.

“WHEREAS Anthony Wilton, who lived at the GREEN CROSS publick-house
against the new Turnpike on New Cross Hill, has been removed for two
years past to the new boarded house now the sign of the GREEN CROSS
AND KROSS KEYES on the same hill,” &c.--_Weekly Journal_, November 22,
1718.

“THOMAS BLACKALL and Francis Ives, Mercers, are removed from the SEVEN
STARS on Ludgate Hill to the BLACK LION AND SEVEN STARS over the
way.”--_Daily Courant_, November 17, 1718.

“PETER DUNCOMBE and Saunders Dancer, who lived at the NAKED BOY in
Great Russell Street, Covent Garden, removed to the NAKED BOY AND
MITRE, near Sommerset House, Strand,” &c.--_Postboy_, January 2-4,
1711.

“RICHARD MEARES, Musical Instrument maker, is removed from y’ GOLDEN
VIOL in Leaden Hall Street to y’ North side of St Paul’s Churchyard,
at y’ GOLDEN VIOL AND HAUTBOY, where he sells all sorts of musical
instruments,” &c.--[Bagford bills.]

To increase this complexity still more, came the corruption of names arising from pronunciation; thus Mr Burn, in his introduction to the “Beaufoy Tokens,” mentions the sign of Pique and Carreau, on a gambling-house at Newport, Isle of Wight, which was Englished into the Pig and Carrot; again, the same sign at Godmanchester was still more obliterated into the Pig and Checkers. The sign of the Island Queen I have frequently heard, either in jest or in ignorance, called the Iceland Queen. The editor of the recently-published “Slang Dictionary” remarks that he has seen the name of the once popular premier, George Canning, metamorphosed on an alehouse-sign into the George and Cannon; so the GOLDEN FARMER became the Jolly Farmer; whilst the Four Alls, in Whitechapel, were altered into the Four Awls. Along with this practice, there is a tendency to translate a sign into a sort of jocular slang phrase; thus, in the seventeenth century, the BLACKMOORSHEAD AND WOOLPACK, in Pimlico, was called the DEVIL AND BAG OF NAILS by those that frequented that tavern, and by the last part of that name the house is still called at the present day. Thus the Elephant and Castle is vulgarly rendered as the _Pig and Tinderbox_; the Bear and Ragged Staff, the _Angel and Flute_; the Eagle and Child, the _Bird and Bantling_; the Hog in Armour, the Pig in Misery; the Pig in the Pound, the _Gentleman in Trouble_, &c.

Some further information, in illustration of the different signboards, is to be obtained from the _Adventurer_, No. 9, (1752:)--

“It cannot be doubted but that signs were intended originally to express the several occupations of their owners, and to bear some affinity in their external designations with the wares to be disposed of, or the business carried on within. Hence the Hand and Shears is justly appropriated to tailors, and the Hand and Pen to writing-masters; though the very reverend and right worthy order of my neighbours, the Fleet-parsons, have assumed it to themselves as a mark of ‘marriages performed without imposition.’ The Woolpack plainly points out to us a woollen draper; the Naked Boy elegantly reminds us of the necessity of clothing; and the Golden Fleece figuratively denotes the riches of our staple commodity; but are not the Hen and Chickens and the Three Pigeons the unquestionable right of the poulterer, and not to be usurped by the vender of silk or linen?

“It would be useless to enumerate the gross blunders committed in this point by almost every branch of trade. I shall therefore confine myself chiefly to the numerous fraternity of publicans, whose extravagance in this affair calls aloud for reprehension and restraint. Their modest ancestors were contented with a plain Bough stuck up before their doors, whence arose the wise proverb, ‘Good Wine needs no Bush;’ but how have they since deviated from their ancient simplicity! They have ransacked earth, air, and seas, called down sun, moon, and stars to their assistance, and exhibited all the monsters that ever teemed from fantastic imagination. Their Hogs in Armour, their Blue Boars, Black Bears, Green Dragons, and Golden Lions, have already been sufficiently exposed by your brother essay-writers:--

‘Sus horridus, atraque Tigris,
Squamosusque Draco, et fulva cervice Leæna.

VIRGIL.

‘With foamy tusks to seem a bristly boar,
Or imitate the lion’s angry roar;
Or kiss a dragon, or a tiger stare.’--DRYDEN.

“It is no wonder that these gentlemen who indulged themselves in such unwarrantable liberties, should have so little regard to the choice of signs adapted to their mystery. There can be no objection made to the Bunch of Grapes, the Rummer, or the Tuns; but would not any one inquire for a hosier at the Leg, or for a locksmith at the Cross Keys? and who would expect anything but water to be sold at the Fountain? The Turkshead may fairly intimate that a seraglio is kept within; the Rose may be strained to some propriety of meaning, as the business transacted there may be said to be done ‘under the rose;’ but why must the Angel, the Lamb, and the Mitre be the designations of the seats of drunkenness or prostitution?