In the first edition of Pigot’s Commercial Directory, published in 1823, is a list of the inns in the principal Essex towns at that day, which has proved very useful. An asterisk placed before the sign of any particular existing inn, or the name of the place at which it is situated, indicates that the inn in question is mentioned in the above Directory, and that it is therefore at least 64 years old.
It is much to be regretted that, although the inns are, as a rule, among the oldest and most interesting houses in any small town or country village, our Essex historians have, almost without exception, been too fully occupied in tracing the descent of manors and estates, even to notice them.
The list given in the London Directory for 1885 enumerates no less than 1,742 distinct signs or devices, as appearing in the metropolis alone. Some of these are, of course, repeated as many as fifty times.
CHAPTER II.
HERALDIC SIGNS.
... “a coat of arms, ... and wild beasts on their hind legs,
showing it, as if it was a copy they had done, with mouths from ear
to ear,—good gracious!”
Dickens: Little Dorrit, book ii., chap. ix.
