Innyards Used as Theatres

Innyards Used as Theatres, London. These may have been converted, or merely equipped with a trestle stage at one end of the yard. The best-known were the Bel Savage on Ludgate Hill in the City of London, where plays were performed from 1579 to 1588 and occasionally thereafter; the Bell in Gracious (now Gracechurch) Street in the City of London, which was used for plays in 1576 and 1583; the Boar's Head in Aldgate, where a ‘lewd’ play called A Sack Full of News was suppressed in 1557, the players being kept under arrest for 24 hours; another Boar's Head somewhere in Middlesex, which was in use between 1602 and 1608; the Bull in Bishopsgate Street in the City of London, which was used for plays before 1575 and until some time after 1594; the Cross Keys, also in Gracious Street, where plays were performed before 1579 and up to about 1596; the Red Lion in Stepney, where a play called Samson was performed in 1567; and the Saracen's Head in Islington, where, according to Foxe's Book of Martyrs (1563), a play was being performed when the dissenter John Rough was arrested.