The Belle Savage

   On the north side of Ludgate Hill in "la belle Sauvage" yard. In Farringdon Ward Without.

   Forms of name : "the belle Savage," 20 H. VIII. (Lond. I. p.m. I. 78). "la Bell Savage," otherwise "le Bell Savoy," 2 and 3 P. and M. (Cal. L. and M. Ft. of Fines, II. 93).

   A famous coaching inn, until the advent of the railways undermined its trade. Removed 1873 and the site occupied by Cassell's publishing offices, except one corner, No.68, occupied by Messrs. Treloar and Sons' establishment.

   Burn, in his Tradesmen's Tokens, says that the original name of the inn was "The Bell," and he quotes a deed enrolled in the Close Rolls, 31 H. VI. 1453, in support of his statement (p.131). By this deed John Frensh confirmed to his mother Joan Freush "all that tenement or inn with its appurtenances called Savagesynn, alias vocat 'le Belle on the Hope,' in the parish of St. Bridget in Fleet Street." In course of time the two names seem to have been united into one as the appellation of the inn, though when this actually took place does not appear.

   Pegge suggests that the name was derived from a former hostess, Isabella Savage, whose name as tenant a friend of his had seen in a lease of the house, but this is only second-hand evidence, and cannot be entirely relied on.