Place name
Formerly Kent Street or, as it would have been known to Geoffrey Chaucer author of the Canterbury Tales which he started in 1387, Kentstret, as it had first been called for around half a century. The name later mutated to become Kentisshestrete in 1482, that is the street leading to and from Kent… and so to Canterbury Cathedral. The name was changed in 1877 to note the proximity to the site of the former Tabard Inn, from whence Chaucer’s merry band of pilgrims departed on their homage to Thomas a Becket’s resting place. The inn’s proprietor was a man named Harry Bailey:
Bifel that in that season on a day,
In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay
Redy to wenden on my pilgrymage
To Caunterbury with ful devout corage,
At nyght was come into that hostelrye
Wel nyne and twenty in a compaignye
Of sondry folk, by aventure yfalle
In felaweshipe, and pilgrimes were they alle,
That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde;
The chambres and the stables weren wyde,
And well we weren esed atte beste;
This tavern, named after a sleeveless coat, open on both sides, with a square collar, winged at the shoulders, which commonly worn by noblemen in wars as their coat-of-arms, was already ancient by the time “father of English literature” started writing. The original pub itself burnt down on May 26, 1676 when a great blaze spread through Southwark. The Tabard was among many buildings that were either burned down or pulled down to create fire breaks. In the early 18thCentury, the new inn was profiting from the growth in stagecoach traffic between London and the channel ports because of the growth in turnpikes. By the early 19thCentury, the Tabard remained a well-renowned coaching inn. However, with the advent of the railways, it eventually closed. The building was then converted into stores. It was demolished in 1873.
