Cock and Pye

The Cock and Pye is a public house in Ipswich, Suffolk, England, located in Upper Brook Street. It appears in the 1689 list of pubs in Ipswich, where it was recorded as being in St Margaret's Parish. The pub was formerly a large coaching inn, but by the late nineteenth century it had become much smaller. As the name might suggest, the pub was a setting for frequent cockfights and traditionally had a distinctive pub sign featuring a large pie upon which a cock was perched. When cockfighting was banned in 1835 with the Cruelty to Animals Act 1835, a Mr Birch, the proprietor at the time, endeavoured to sell the premises. The modern sign reproduces a design discussed by Charles Harold Evelyn-White in 1886. In his account, the sign was once very common but had become rarely met with. The Ipswich house formerly had a rude representation placed over the chief entrance of a huge pie upon which a cock was perched. At houses bearing this sign it would almost follow as a matter of course that cockfighting was one of the attractions offered. This sport was at its height in the eighteenth century, and advertisements relating to such exhibitions at Ipswich houses may be found in old files of the Ipswich Journal. The Cock and Pye therefore represents a long-standing English inn and tavern tradition, with a name and sign tied to a now-illegal blood sport, and a history that spans from the late seventeenth century to the present day as a public house in central Ipswich.

The Cock and Pye is a public house in Ipswich, Suffolk, England, located in Upper Brook Street. It was included in the 1689 list of pubs in Ipswich, where it was stated to be in St Margaret's Parish, Ipswich. The pub was formerly a large coaching inn, but by the late nineteenth century it was much smaller. As the name might suggest, the pub was a setting for frequent cockfights and traditionally had a distinctive pub sign featuring a large pie upon which a cock was perched. When cockfighting was banned in 1835 with the Cruelty to Animals Act 1835, a Mr Birch, the proprietor at the time, endeavoured to sell the premises. The modern sign reproduces a design discussed by Charles Harold Evelyn-White in 1886. Evelyn-White wrote that the sign was once very common but was rarely to be met with by his time. The Ipswich house formerly had a rude representation placed over the chief entrance of a huge pie upon which a cock was perched. At houses bearing this sign, it would almost follow as a matter of course that cockfighting was one of the attractions offered. This vulgar and brutal sport was at its height in the eighteenth century, and during this time, to the discredit of the town, it was indulged in to a very large extent, not only at the Cock and Pye but at several other taverns and such like places. The houses known as the King's Head and the Fighting Cocks, in St Helen's, kept by one Joseph Clarke, were conspicuous among the number for catering to the depraved taste of a not over-sensitive public by affording opportunities of witnessing such inhuman spectacles. Advertisements relating to these exhibitions held at Ipswich houses may be found in old files of the Ipswich Journal, couched in words which leave little doubt that feelings of horror, such as would now be almost universally felt, were then exceedingly rare. The pub's history thus reflects the changing social and legal landscape of England, from the era when blood sports were a common tavern attraction to the nineteenth-century reforms that banned them, and the subsequent reinvention of the premises as a smaller, conventional public house.

• Included in the 1689 list of pubs in Ipswich, recorded as being in St Margaret's Parish.

• Cockfighting banned in 1835 by the Cruelty to Animals Act 1835; proprietor Mr Birch endeavoured to sell the premises.

• By the late nineteenth century, the former large coaching inn had become much smaller.

• In 1886, Charles Harold Evelyn-White discussed the design of the pub sign.

Historic English public house with a distinctive traditional sign and a history dating to at least 1689.

• Public house services

  The Cock and Pye operates as a public house in Ipswich.

1. 1Cock and Pye, Ipswich - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org
2. 2Cock and Pye - Wikidatawikidata.org