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The Boar's Head Inn is the name of several former and currenttaverns inLondon, most famously atavern in Eastcheap that is supposedly the meeting place ofSir John Falstaff,Prince Hal and other characters inShakespeare'sHenry IV plays. Anearlier tavern in Southwark used the same name, and an inn of the name in Whitechapel wasused as a theatre.
A number of other taverns and inns have since used the name, typically with reference to Shakespeare.
The Boar's Head Tavern onEastcheap is featured in historical plays byShakespeare, particularlyHenry IV, Part 1, as a favourite resort of the fictional characterFalstaff and his friends in the early 15th century. The landlady isMistress Quickly. It was the subject of essays byOliver Goldsmith andWashington Irving. Though there is no evidence of a Boar's Head inn existing at the time the play is set, Shakespeare was referring to a real inn that existed in his own day. Established before 1537, but destroyed in 1666 in theGreat Fire of London, it was soon rebuilt and continued operation until some point in the late 18th century, when the building was used by retail outlets. What remained of the building was demolished in 1831.[1] The boar's head sign was kept, and is now installed in theShakespeare's Globe theatre.[2]
The site of the original inn is now part of the approach toLondon Bridge inCannon Street. Near the site on modernEastcheap, architectRobert Lewis Roumieu created a neo-Gothic building in 1868; this makes references to the Boar's Head Inn in its design and exterior decorations, which include a boar's head peeping out from grass, and portrait heads ofHenry IV andHenry V. Roumieu's building originally functioned as a vinegar warehouse, though it has since been converted into offices.[3]Nicholas Pevsner described it as "one of the maddest displays in London of gabled Gothic brick."Ian Nairn called it "the scream you wake on at the end of a nightmare."[4]
There was anotherBoar's Head Inn, atWhitechapel, the courtyard of which was used from 1557 onwards as aninn-yard theatre to stage plays, known as the Boar's Head Theatre. It was refurbished in 1598–1599.[5]
There was yet anotherBoar's Head Inn, atSouthwark, owned bySir John Fastolf, who is the source for the character-name of Falstaff.[6] While the Eastcheap Boar's Head Inn is not known to have existed during the reign of Henry IV, this inn may have.
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TheBoar's Head Inn inBishop's Stortford,Hertfordshire,England, is a historic building dating to the 16th or 17th century.[7]
TheBoar's Head Resort ofCharlottesville, Virginia, US, ahotel andresort owned by theUniversity of Virginia, is also known as the "Boar's Head Inn".
There is aBoar's Head Pub inStratford, Ontario, Canada, where an annualShakespeare Festival is held.
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