A Pub is a Pub was a Wine Bar – Part Two

Visitors to Britain's shores frequently comment that there is nothing quite like the English pub to be found anywhere else in the world. 

However, the great British pub actually started life as a great Italian wine bar, and dates back almost 2,000 years. It was an invading Roman army that brought Roman roads, Roman towns and Roman pubs known as tabernae to these shores in 43 AD. Such tabernae, or huts that sold wine, were quickly built alongside Roman roads and in towns to help quench the thirst of the legionaries.

Ale however was the native British brew, and it appears that these tabernae quickly adapted to provide the locals with their favourite tipple, and the word tabernae became adapted to tavern. With the gradual spread of the road network and horse-drawn coaches our roadside taverns were transformed into coaching inns. 

Such establishments even now preserving the archways which lead to former stables and courtyards behind. In market towns it was not uncommon for prosperous inns to add function rooms, and private rooms where business could be discussed away from the bustling town marketplace outside. And so it was that hostelries created a social role for themselves. 

Strictly speaking, inns provided rooms for travellers, taverns provided food and drink, while alehouses simply sold beer.  The native British brew of ‘ale’ was originally made without hops. Ale brewed with hops was gradually introduced in the 14th and 15th centuries and this was known as beer. By 1550 most brewing included hops and the expression alehouse and beerhouse became synonymous. 

As I have already mentioned the introduction of The Duke of Wellington’s Beer Act in 1830 created a stampede for the new licences and over 20,000 Beer Houses suddenly appeared up and down the country. Within six years there were 46,000 beer shops or beer houses in the country. The opening hours could be from 4am to 10pm and many were shops and private dwellings selling beer in one room of their shop or house.


Beerhouses were also known by the name ''small beer' or 'Tom and Jerry' shops.

Since most of the population were illiterate it was quite common for each establishment to display a simplistic sign which depicted the name of the premise.

Many were named after the Duke of Wellington in celebration of his relaxing of the licensing laws.

The Wine and Beer House Act of 1869 and the licensing Acts of 1872, 1904 and 1910 brought back tighter controls on licensing and many beerhouses closed. Many of those that remained had already been bought by breweries and eventually evolved into Public Houses. Interestingly, under the 1872 Act which remains in force today, it is still illegal to be drunk in charge of a horse, a cow or a steam engine, with a possible penalty of a £200 fine or 51 weeks in prison.

My local, The Fox, in common with many public house throughout the country, was originally a pair of 19th century cottages, became one dwelling and a shop in 1859, then a shop/beer house before being taken over by a brewery in 1865.

The popularity of the British pub is down to its character and unique atmosphere, brilliantly described here in BOAK AND BAILEY’S BEER BLOG: THE ALCHEMY OF PUB ATMOSPHERE

For us, the pubs with the best atmosphere sit in a sweet spot between characterful and grotty. Some pubs are so clean, so perfumed, varnished, polished and ‘on-brand’ that they start to feel they’re made of plastic. Others (often, sadly, some of those with the greatest commitment to decent beer) have torn carpets, ripped seats, grimy walls and smell like stables. The pubs we’ve enjoyed most in the last year or so have been clean without being buffed to a shine. They’ve been lived-in but not soiled. They’ve shown evidence of being run by a human being — hand-written signs, personal mementoes– rather than by a Regional Quality and Brand Manager.

Robert Rankine in his Brentford trilogy novels includes a wonderful passage describing exactly how a pub should be:

"Not one hundred yards due North of Norman's shop, as fair flies the griffin, there stands a public house which is the very hub of the Brentonian universe. Solidly constructed of old London stocks and fondly embellished with all the Victorian twiddly bits, The Flying Swan gallantly withstood the slings and arrows of outrageous brewery management. Its’ patrons have never known the horrors of fizzy beer or pub grub that comes 'a-la-basket'. The Swan had grown old gracefully. The etched glass windows, tinted with nicotine and the exhalations of a million beery breaths, sustained that quality of light exclusive to elderly pubs. The burnished brass of the beer engines shone like gold and the bar top glowed with a deep patina. The heady perfumes of Brasso and beeswax blended with those of hops and barley, grape and grain to produce an enchanting fragrance all of its own. Only a man born without a soul would not pause a moment upon entering The Swan for the first time, breathe in the air, savour the atmosphere and say, 'This is a pub'. But of course, for all its ambience, redolence and Ridley Scottery, a pub is only as good as the beer it serves. And here it must be said that those on offer were of such a toothsome relish, so satisfying in body and flavour as might reasonably elicit bouts of incredulous head-shaking and murmurs of disbelief from the reader. Nevertheless the eight hand-drawn ales available were of a quality capable of raising eulogies from seasoned drinkers, their bar-side converse long hag-ridden by clichés of how much better beer tasted in the good old days."

Robert Rankine - The Sprouts of Wrath

Pubs have come a long way since they were “a house open to the public”. In my view much too far.

These Oxford Dictionary definitions are somewhat outdated: 

Pub

An establishment for the sale of beer and other drinks, and sometimes also food, to be consumed on the premises.

Restaurant

A place where people pay to sit and eat meals that are cooked and served on the premises.

Sadly the boundaries of a pub and a restaurant have all but disappeared.

No one objects to the pub serving simple traditional food, in fact as I have mentioned before, when I first entered the Fox, more than 40 years ago, food was served and there was a choice. As I was quick to point out to two young upwardly mobile Greene King representatives who had grand plans to turn The Fox into one of their “Meet and Eat” establishments, The Fox has always had a food menu:

And that, IMHO, is all that is necessary for a pub serve - apart from beer of course!

To Be Continued.

I'll leave you with this, the latest offering from Scott Bradlee and his Post Modern Jukebox:



God that girl can sing!