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Monday 24 August 2015

Inn

One of the by-products of William Tyndale's 1526 translation of the New Testament into English was that he introduced into everyday speech the usage of the word "inn" meaning a public house or a small hotel. This happened when translating the story in the Gospel of Luke of the pregnant Mary and Joseph's search for a shelter for a night, Tyndale described how Mary had to give birth to the infant Jesus in a stable because "there was no room... within the ynne".  Previously an inn had been merely an enclosed place inside a home.

The English term " bar" as in "going to a bar" was first used in the late 16th century. It refers to the "barrier" or counter across which drink was served.

A popular name for an English inn four hundred years ago was The Pig and Whistle. This originated from servants who were sent out to fetch a pig of ale. They were instructed to whistle as they walk to prevent them from taking some sips during their journey.

The tavern that was to become known as the Wayside Inn first opened as Howe's Tavern in Sudbury, Massachusetts in 1716. 300 years later it's the United States' oldest continuously operating inn.

Wayside Inn is also known as "Longfellow's Wayside Inn", a name given to capitalize on the popularity of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's Tales of a Wayside Inn, a book of poems published in 1863. The poet visited the Wayside Inn in 1862, when it was called the "How Tavern."

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