The White Horse
Squeezed into Broad Street between the entrances to Blackwell’s bookshop, and standing opposite the Sheldonian Theatre, The White Horse is one of Oxford’s smallest pubs, but it occupies one of the city’s grandest settings.
There has been a pub on this site for more than 400 years. In 1591, a baker named Roger Scott was granted a licence for an alehouse here, then known as The Mermaid. Over the centuries, the pub changed names several times: The Mermaid, The White Mermaid, The Jolly Volunteer, The Elephant, and finally The White Horse, the name by which it has been consistently known since the late 1830s.
Broad Street itself has seen almost every side of Oxford’s history. Once part of the city’s defensive edge, it later became a street of booksellers, colleges, churches, museums, and university buildings. The White Horse stands close to some of Oxford’s most famous landmarks: the Bodleian Library, the Sheldonian Theatre, and the Museum of the History of Science.
The Sheldonian Theatre, directly opposite the pub, was designed by Christopher Wren and opened in the 1660s. It was built as the University’s ceremonial hall, and it remains the place where generations of Oxford students have formally entered and left the University. Just beside it, the Bodleian Library preserves one of the greatest collections of books and manuscripts in the world.
The White Horse’s other great neighbour is Blackwell’s. Founded in 1879 by Benjamin Henry Blackwell, the bookshop became one of Oxford’s great institutions, serving students, scholars, locals, and visitors. Its famous Norrington Room extends deep beneath Trinity College Gardens, making this little stretch of Broad Street a place where books, beer, and scholarship sit unusually close together.
The pub is also part of Oxford’s life on screen. Its intimate, panelled interior has appeared in the world of Inspector Morse, Lewis, and Endeavour, helping to turn The White Horse into one of the city’s most recognisable small pubs for television viewers as well as regulars.
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Today, The White Horse remains what it has long been: a compact, characterful Oxford pub hidden in plain sight. Step inside from Broad Street, and you move from one of the city’s great public spaces into a small room full of old Oxford atmosphere.
Like so many places in Oxford, The White Horse proves that the city’s stories are not only found in colleges and libraries. Sometimes they are tucked behind a narrow doorway, waiting beside a pint.