The Mermaid Inn, Rye — claims 1156

The claim

Halfway up cobbled Mermaid Street, this timber-framed inn is one of the great sights of Rye. Rebuilt in 1420 over older vaulted cellars, it was notorious in the 1730s and 1740s as a haunt of the Hawkhurst smuggling gang. Guests can drink by the Giant's Fireplace, dine in the restaurant or sleep in a four-poster room.

What the records show

The 1156 date refers to the cellars, which Pevsner and English Heritage place in the 13th century. The timber-framed inn was rebuilt around 1420, and the house traded without a full licence for long periods and reopened with a bar in 1955. William Holloway's history of Rye, printed in 1847 from the town's records, carries it back further than this page could before. He prints the schedule of the king's bailiff's rents of assize at Rye, dated 1670, which charges 5s. a year - the heaviest rent in Middle Street ward - on the tenements, stable, close and garden of the heirs of William Gostrey, called the Mermaide, late of Thomas Higgins, jurat, some time of William Didsbury, jurat, and before Pedell's, abutting to the King's street, called the Middle street. Holloway identifies that property as the Mermaid Inn, and describing the town about 1700 he calls Mermaid Street the principal street and the Mermaid Inn there the first of its kind. Earlier still, Thomas Peacock's will of 1638 settled on his free school an annuity of £4 out of a messuage in Middle Street called the Mermaid. The word inn is Holloway's reading rather than the schedule's; 1670 is the date of the document he prints, and nothing naming this house earlier than Peacock's will of 1638 has been traced here.

Dated evidence for The Mermaid Inn, earliest first
Year	What	Source
1156	Claimed founding	The pub
c.1420	Present building	Pevsner
1670	First record of a drinking house here	Internet Archive

What to look for inside

Haunt of the Hawkhurst Gang smugglers in the 1730s-40s
Giant's Fireplace and carved Tudor woodwork
Featured on television's Most Haunted
CAMRA one-star historic interior

Visiting

The Mermaid Inn is in Rye, England, at Mermaid Street, Rye TN31 7EY. We do not list opening times, because they change; the pub’s own site is the place to check before you set out.

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