Note 11 — Chapter II · THE MOUND, THE CASTLE AND SOME CHURCHES

The Vintnery, the quarter of taverns and wine cellars, which was at the north end of S. Aldate’s, flourished mightily. The students, for all their lust of knowledge, were ever good samplers of what Rabelais calls the holy water of the cellar. You might deduce that from the magnificent cellars of the Mitre Inn or Bulkley Hall (corner of S. Edward’s Street) and above all from those of the old Vintnery. For the houses north of the Town Hall have some splendid cellars, which connect with another under the street, and so with others under the first house on the west side of S. Aldgate’s, the famous old Swindlestock (Siren or Mermaid Inn). These are good specimens of early fifteenth century vaults. It is supposed that when these cellars were dug, the earth was thrown out into the street and there remained in the usual mediæval way. This, it is maintained, accounts for the hill at Carfax. Certainly the earliest roadway at Carfax is traceable at the unexpected depth of eleven feet seven inches below the present high road, which is some three and a half feet below what it should be according to the average one foot per hundred years observed by most mediæval towns as their rate of deposit.