13 November 2023
In the charming south Gloucestershire market town of Wotton-under-Edge there is a quaint, timber and stone, building known as the Ancient Ram Inn. It has become well known online due to being a hotspot for ghost hunters. The building also has several rather curious claims made about its history which will be considered in this edition of the Mediaeval Myth-busting Blog.
The Ancient Ram Inn is a former public house which closed during the 1960s. It was then bought by a colourful character by the name of John Humphries who opened his doors to visitors craving paranormal experiences. The business is now run by John’s daughter, Caroline, and people who hope to encounter the supernatural pay a fee to spend time at the property.
Ancient and Macabre Claims
Ghost stories aside, there are many accompanying claims which are made about the history of the building. During a 2002 interview with John Humphries, for Cotswold Edge, it was noted that: “There is a continual stream of visitors, both young and old whom John willingly welcomes and regails [sic] with tales of ‘ghostly going on’… He knows that highwaymen regularly stayed there and plotted their next attack and believes that a secret passage runs from the house to the church which was used in the days when the pub was a Church house where the priest lived.”
Sign within the Ancient Ram Inn claiming it as a hideout of highwaymen (Picture Source: Brian Robert Marshall / Wikimedia Commons)
Elsewhere, during recent interviews with Caroline Humphries, in the Stroud Times and The Metro, it has been claimed that the building dates to the eleventh or twelfth century. Travel websites, such as Travel Awaits, The Blog of Travel, and Visit Stroud have noted that the building dates to 1145. Meanwhile, mainstream media outlets including The Mirror and The Daily Mail, and the BBC have repeated the story that the property is constructed directly over a pagan burial ground.
The various claims about the Ancient Ram Inn can be summed up in a section on, the paranormal investigations website, Haunted Rooms which asserts that: “The inn was built in 1145. Priests used the inn years ago to keep slaves and workers who helped construct the St. Mary Church… Furthermore, an ancient Pagan burial ground is reported to have resided on the site over 5,000 years ago.” Similar information can also be found on other paranormal webpages including Haunted Britain and Ireland, The Little House of Horrors, and Haunted Happenings.
These ideas are repeated across the internet and have bled through onto reference sites such as Wikipedia. Currently, the entry for the Ancient Ram Inn notes that: “The inn’s original use was to house the masons and other builders employed to construct the neighbouring church. It was later – 1154 – taken up as the dwelling of the first recorded vicar”. The citation which allegedly backs this information up is an archived version of John Humphries interview with Cotswold Edge. Yet, it is notable that the latter article does not refer to the building’s dates of use or its connection with stonemasons.
St Mary’s parish church, Wotton-under-Edge, looking south-east (Picture Source: Tim Heaton / Geograph)
Across the web, the sources of many of the claims are largely unreferenced and the foundations for the assertions are rarely revealed. The articles either completely omit mention of the sources or the writers refer back to similar websites making similar claims. Even the greenest of history students must admit that there might be a certain cause for concern over the provenance of such information.
The purpose of this blog will be to try and answer the following questions:
- What was the date of construction for the Ancient Ram Inn?
- Was the building ever used to house either stonemasons or the vicar of St Mary’s parish church? Has it ever had any other uses?
- Is the property constructed on the site of a pagan burial ground?
The Date of the Ancient Ram Inn
The official website for the property claims that: “The Ancient Ram Inn is an 800-year-old Grade II* listed former Inn… The Deeds to The Ram Inn, are mostly in Norman French and are held at Gloucester Records Office. They read: “The Ancient Ram Inn dates to Time Immemorial,” so it could have been in existence much earlier than 800 years ago.”
It is certainly true to say that the building is a “Grade II* listed former inn”. The information can be verified by viewing the listing entry which is available online via the National Heritage List for England. However, the listing description is somewhat at odds with the claim that the building is at least 800 years old. Instead, the detailed information notes that the earliest fabric present at the Ancient Ram Inn is: “Late medieval, remodelled in mid/late C16”. It then goes on to indicate various additions and alterations made between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries.
Ground floor plan of the Ancient Ram Inn (Picture Source: Hall 2014, 60)
The property was included as a location during the 2014 Vernacular Architecture Group Spring Conference. The expert author of the symposium guide, Linda Hall, noted that the Ancient Ram Inn was: “A complete small but high quality medieval house” and included plans and sectional elevations of the building (Hall 2014, 60-62). The entry indicates that the building was originally a single-storey, three-bay house featuring services, hall, and parlour with a later outbuilding. Hall’s text also refers to tree-ring dating for the building. Dendrochronology sampling has confirmed that the primary phase of construction took place immediately after timbers were felled during the winter of 1495-96 (Miles & Bridge 2014, 118).
The scientific data corroborates the stylistic dating by Historic England and the Vernacular Architecture Group. It confirms that the earliest fabric present at the Ancient Ram Inn dates to the last decade of the fifteenth century, rather than the twelfth century.
The Use of the Building
Haunted Rooms have claimed that the building was first used to house the “slaves” and stonemasons who built the parish church of St Mary in the twelfth century. Elsewhere, it has been mooted on Wikipedia that the property was inhabited by the local vicar from 1154. Logically, neither of these claims seem to be supported by the evidence.
The earliest fabric at St Mary’s dates to the thirteenth century. This post-dates the claim that the Ancient Ram Inn was built in twelfth century in connection to the construction of the church. Of course, it is possible that there may have been an earlier church but there is no documentary or archaeological evidence to indicate when this may have been built and nothing to link it with the Ancient Ram Inn. Furthermore, it has been established that the present structure of the Ancient Ram Inn dates to 1495-96, a point in time long after any putative twelfth century builders or vicars could have inhabited it.
Nave arcade of St Mary’s parish church, Wotton-under-Edge, looking east (Picture Source: John Salmon / Geograph)
As an aside, Haunted Rooms’ claim that the church was built using slave labour is unlikely. Slavery seems to have been largely absent from England by the opening of the twelfth century (Gillingham 2014, 8-9). Instead, major construction projects would have required monetary payment for the services of exceptionally skilled stonemasons (Hislop 2012, 8-15).
It is possible to construct something of the known of the history of the building through transcriptions of property deeds held by Gloucestershire Archives (Archive reference: D1193/16/1). The earliest of these, dated 1350, has revealed that a tenement was transferred from Maurice de Bathe to Peter le Couk. This is a reference to a previous building on the site as we know that the present structure dates to the late fifteenth century. It should be noted that there is no information given as to the professions of either man so it cannot be said that they were masons or vicars.
Subsequently, there are records of the transference of the extant building between various owners in 1521, 1532, and 1538. The deed for 1532 indicates that the building had formerly been in the possession of clothmakers. This connection with the textile industry has also been raised through reference to tenterhooks found in the service bay during archaeological surveys (Hall 2014, 61; NHLE 1088885). It may be that the building was originally the domestic house and workshop of those involved in the lucrative late mediaeval Gloucestershire wool trade.
Ancient Ram Inn, Wotton-under-Edge, looking north (Picture Source: Ray Bird / Geograph)
Curiously, the building was held by multiple individuals in 1532 and 1538. For example, in 1532, Thomas Hycks of Tortworth granted the property to: “John Gower, George Simondes, Thomas Byshuppe, John Hewes, William Coldwell, Richard Smyth, Thomas Colman and Galfred Bruton, all of Wotton-under-Edge, yeomen, on behalf of and in the name of all the parishioners”. It is possible that the named individuals may have been trustees who operated the building as a church house for the parish at this period, a factor which was raised in the listing description (NHLE: 1088885).
Church houses became an increasingly popular feature of parish life during the late mediaeval period. They were used for a variety of secular purposes including venues for legal courts, schools, markets, and business meetings. Church houses also provided locations for entertainments such as mystery plays and social gatherings which included the serving of food and drink after feast days, baptisms, weddings, the annual reading of the churchwardens accounts, and during parish fundraising events known as church ales. In many respects these buildings acted as a forerunner of our modern church or village halls, and the early sixteenth century example at Crowcombe in Somerset is still used as such (Friar 1996, 109). In other cases, the bibulous events held within such buildings led to their transformation into public houses. This occurred at the church house for the parish of St Thomas’ in Salisbury, constructed during the mid-fifteenth century, which is now the Haunch of Venison pub (NHLE: 1273531).
Haunch of Venison, Salisbury, looking north-west (Picture Source: Colin Smith / Wikimedia Commons)
The Ancient Ram Inn was in clear use as a public house by at least 1820 (NHLE: 1088885). Although there was a considerable passage of time between the 1530s and the early nineteenth century, it is an intriguing prospect that the use of the building as a pub could potentially have developed from its former use as a church house. Subsequently, the transcribed title deeds reveal that, in 1905, the building was transferred to the Coombe Valley Brewery by the Trustees of Wotton-under-Edge General Charities. Is it possible that the latter was a descendant organisation of the group who may have run a sixteenth century church house? In 1912, the property passed to Arnold Perrett and Co. Ltd., who became a subsidiary of Cheltenham and Hereford Breweries, later known as West Country Breweries. It was this company who sold the building to John Humphries in 1968.
It may be concluded that this is a property for which we have a reasonably clear idea of its form, dating, development, and history. The Ancient Ram Inn was probably built as a domestic house and textile workshop in 1495-96. It may have been acquired as a church house by 1532. By c 1820 it was a public house, and it only closed its doors in the 1960s. Since then, the Humphries family have hosted paranormal events at the building. Significantly, there does not seem to be any evidence for its use in the twelfth century as a mason’s lodge or vicarage.
Pagan Burial Ground
It has been demonstrated above that there is a widespread belief that the Ancient Ram Inn was built directly on top of a pagan burial ground. The claims vary, with some stating that the cemetery dates to the Neolithic period, whilst others assert that it is early mediaeval in date.
Whilst there are known burial sites from both periods across Gloucestershire, there does not seem to be anything in the archaeological record for a cemetery in in the locale of the Ancient Ram Inn. Such a discovery would ultimately make its way into the catalogues of repositories such as the Archaeology Data Service, National Heritage List for England, National Monument Record Excavation Index, Historic England Research Records, and the Gloucestershire County Council Historic Environment Record. However, none of these databases refers to the discovery of a pagan burial ground in the vicinity. Quite how and why this claim came to be made can only be speculated on.
Toad Hall (left) and the Old Medicine House at Blackden, Cheshire, looking south-east
Should anyone feel a little deflated by this revelation, I’d like to draw your attention to a mediaeval house which is genuinely built on top of a prehistoric burial mound. Toad Hall at Blackden in Cheshire is such a property. It is owned by the author Alan Garner and is the spot where he has completed all his novels from The Weirdstone of Brisingamen onwards. The interconnected property, known as the Old Medicine House, is occasionally open to the public, via The Blackden Trust, on select dates. Genuine archaeological artefacts which have been discovered at the site, dating from the Mesolithic onwards, are on display.
Conclusions
It is widely claimed that the Ancient Ram Inn dates to the twelfth century, was built as a stonemason’s lodge or a vicarage, and was constructed on the site of a pagan burial ground.
The evidence presented here indicates that the standing building dates to 1495-96 and was built as a domestic house with connections to the wool trade. By the early sixteenth century it may have become a church house. Latterly it was a public house and is now run as a paranormal events venue.
There does not seem to be any evidence to back up claims for a twelfth century date, use as a mason’s lodge or vicarage, and the archaeological data for a pagan cemetery on the site is absent.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Linda Hall and Martin Toms for their assistance in helping to compile data for this article.
The header image is by Steve H / Tripadvisor.
References
Friar, S., 1996 (1998 edition), A Companion to the English Parish Church. Sutton Publishing. Stroud.
Gillingham, J., 2014, ‘French Chivalry in Twelfth-century Britain’ in The Historian. Phi Alpha Theta History Honor Society.
Gloucestershire Archives D1193/16/1 – Deeds of a messuage in Sinwell, near the Cloud Mill, later called the Tan House and subsequently the Ram Inn, 1350-1724
(Accessed 12/11/2023)
Hall, L., 2014, Vernacular Architecture Group Spring Conference 2014 – Gloucestershire: Gloucester and the Vale. Vernacular Architecture Group.
Hislop, M., 2012, Medieval Masons. Shire. Botley.
Miles, D. & Bridge, M., 2014, ‘Tree-ring Dates from the Oxford Dendrochronology Laboratory List 263: General List’ in Vernacular Architecture Vol. 45. Vernacular Architecture Group.
[NHLE] National Heritage List for England: Ancient Ram Inn
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1088885?section=official-list-entry
(Accessed 12/11/2023)
About the author
James Wright (Triskele Heritage) is an award-winning buildings archaeologist who frequently writes and lectures on the subject of mediaeval building myths. He has over two decades professional experience of ferreting around in people’s cellars, hunting through their attics and digging up their gardens. He hopes to find meaningful truths about how ordinary and extraordinary folk lived their lives in the mediaeval period.
He welcomes contact through Twitter or email.
The Mediaeval Mythbusting Blog blog is the basis of a forthcoming book – Historic Building Mythbusting – Uncovering Folklore, History and Archaeology which will be released via The History Press on 6 June 2024. More information can be found here:
