Old Dog and Duck: The Secret Meanings of Pub Names

This is a book for everyone who has ever wondered why pubs should be called The Cross Keys, Jack Straw's Castle or the Quiet Woman. You'll be glad to know that there are very good – strange and memorable – reasons behind them all.

After much research about (and in) pubs, Albert Jack brings together the stories behind pub names to reveal how they offer fascinating and subversive insights on our history, customs, attitudes and terrible jokes (Dew Drop Inn/Do Drop In, anyone?) in just the same way that nursery rhymes did in his bestselling Pop Goes the Weasel. Learn how The Royal Oak, for instance, commemorates the tree that hid Charles II from Cromwell's forces after his defeat at Worcester; that The Bag of Nails is a corruption of the Bacchanals, the crazed rites of the followers of the god of wine and drunkenness; and The Cat and Fiddle offered a dangerous gesture of support for Henry VIII's rejected Catholic wife Catherine of Aragon.

There are also surprising tales behind even the most ostensibly normal names: for instance Richard II tried to force every pub in England to carry his crest of The White Hart: any that chose the Red Lion instead were choosing his rival John of Gaunt and his son Bolingbroke and their long dead war still simmers away silently on high streets everywhere.

Find out why The Sand Boys were happy, the connection between goats and compasses and why calling a pub The Three Lords was such a macabre choice. The tales behind pub names cover everything from pirates to the Peasants Revolt, Robin Hood to royal mistresses and cricket to cholera and tell great stories of our own popular history. You'll never look at a pub sign in the same way again...