Daily entries from the 17th century London diary
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Slightly surprisingly, Pepys refers to this as being a Tavern House (16/3/1660) but they were more often known as Rhenish Wine Houses.
Rhenish means the Rhineland, which is the home of most German wines, which were highly regarded.
John Taylor, in 1636 lists “foure houses in London that doe sell Rhennish Wine, inhabited only by Dutchmen namely: the Stilliyard (Steelyard, off Thames Street); the Swan in Thames Street; the Swan in Crooked Lane; The Sun at St Mary’s Hill”.
However, by the 1660s there was also the “old Rhenish Winehouse” somewhere in King Street which seems to have survived at least to the 1720s, and that is is probably the one.
Source: London Signs by B Lillywhite.
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The Steelyard was in actuality a Weights measure place, put to-gether by the Hanseatic Group for measure of Product from the Baltic neighbourhood, from St Petersburg[Leningrad] to Denmark, Timber fish and Tar etc.
“Steelyard, or ‘auncel’ weighing, was ‘wholly put out’ in favour of weighing by ‘even balance’ and the weight of the sack was fixed at 26 stones of 14lb, ie. 364lb. Examples of fourteenth century steelyard weights have been found in Winchester and the surrounding area. “
gleened from http://www.hants.gov.uk/regulatory/tradesta/weighhis.html
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N.B. also called prior’s on feb 3;sep 2; dec 9th: