The White Hart
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The White Hart ("hart" is an old word for stag) was the personal badge of Richard II, who derived it from the arms of his mother, Joan "The Fair Maid of Kent", heiress of Edmund of Woodstock. In the Wilton Diptych (National Gallery, London), which is the earliest authentic contemporary portait of an English king, Richard II wears a gold and enamelled white hart jewel, and even the angels surrounding the Virgin Mary all wear white hart badges.
There are still many inns and pubs in England that sport a sign of the White Hart.
Arthur C. Clarke wrote a collection of science fictional tall tales under the title of Tales from the White Hart.
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Inns
Southwark
An inn at the sign of the White Hart was established in the medieval period on Borough High Street in Southwark. It is mentioned by William Shakespeare in Henry VI, part 1 as the headquarters of the rebels in Jack Cade's 1450 Kentish rebellion. It became one of the many famous coaching inns in the days of Charles Dickens, and it was here that Sam Weller met Mr Pickwick in the famous scene from the Pickwick Papers. The Inn was pulled down in the 19th Century.
It is next door to the George,_Southwark and near the site of the Tabard.
Edinburgh
In Scotland, The White Hart is an inn in the Grassmarket, established early in the 1500s. It stood a few hundred steps from the place where public hangings were held, and was popular among spectators. Robert Burns and William Wordsworth were among its notable visitors, and resurrectionists Burke and Hare found some of the victims of their murder-for-body-parts scheme there.
External links
- Heraldic symbols: the White Hart (http://www.briantimms.com/pubsigns/photographs/heraldicsymbolswhitehart.htm)
- The White Hart and other royal badges on a roll of Edward IV (http://libwww.library.phila.gov/medieval/lewis_e201/badges.html)