Another reason for “quartering” signs was on removing from one shop to another, when it was customary to add the sign of the old shop to that of the new one.
“WHEREAS Anthony Wilton, who lived at the GREEN CROSS publick-house against the new Turnpike on New Cross Hill, has been removed for two years past to the new boarded house now the sign of the GREEN CROSS AND KROSS KEYES on the same hill,” &c.--_Weekly Journal_, November 22, 1718.
“THOMAS BLACKALL and Francis Ives, Mercers, are removed from the SEVEN STARS on Ludgate Hill to the BLACK LION AND SEVEN STARS over the way.”--_Daily Courant_, November 17, 1718.
“PETER DUNCOMBE and Saunders Dancer, who lived at the NAKED BOY in Great Russell Street, Covent Garden, removed to the NAKED BOY AND MITRE, near Sommerset House, Strand,” &c.--_Postboy_, January 2-4, 1711.
“RICHARD MEARES, Musical Instrument maker, is removed from y’ GOLDEN VIOL in Leaden Hall Street to y’ North side of St Paul’s Churchyard, at y’ GOLDEN VIOL AND HAUTBOY, where he sells all sorts of musical instruments,” &c.--[Bagford bills.]
To increase this complexity still more, came the corruption of names arising from pronunciation; thus Mr Burn, in his introduction to the “Beaufoy Tokens,” mentions the sign of Pique and Carreau, on a gambling-house at Newport, Isle of Wight, which was Englished into the Pig and Carrot; again, the same sign at Godmanchester was still more obliterated into the Pig and Checkers. The sign of the Island Queen I have frequently heard, either in jest or in ignorance, called the Iceland Queen. The editor of the recently-published “Slang Dictionary” remarks that he has seen the name of the once popular premier, George Canning, metamorphosed on an alehouse-sign into the George and Cannon; so the GOLDEN FARMER became the Jolly Farmer; whilst the Four Alls, in Whitechapel, were altered into the Four Awls. Along with this practice, there is a tendency to translate a sign into a sort of jocular slang phrase; thus, in the seventeenth century, the BLACKMOORSHEAD AND WOOLPACK, in Pimlico, was called the DEVIL AND BAG OF NAILS by those that frequented that tavern, and by the last part of that name the house is still called at the present day. Thus the Elephant and Castle is vulgarly rendered as the _Pig and Tinderbox_; the Bear and Ragged Staff, the _Angel and Flute_; the Eagle and Child, the _Bird and Bantling_; the Hog in Armour, the Pig in Misery; the Pig in the Pound, the _Gentleman in Trouble_, &c.