Welcome to Dragon Hall, the home of the National Centre for Writing: a unique medieval trading hall and the site of one thousand years of stories.
As you walk around the site, you’ll also see some exhibits with a headphone symbol next to them and a QR code. Scan the QR code with your phone to listen.
2. The Gallery
Our tour officially starts in the Gallery; a contemporary glass-covered room overlooking the garden.
3. Screen’s Passage
Head inside Screen’s Passage, which screened parts of the hall – the private areas – from the more public areas
4. The Old Barge Room
The tour continues into the Old Barge Room, used as the front bar of the pub known as the Three Merry Wherrymen.
5. The Great Hall
Welcome to the most spectacular part of Dragon Hall: Robert Toppes’ Great Hall!
6. Robert Toppes (The Weston Hall)
Discover the life and legacy of Robert Toppes, an ambitious merchant who bought this site in the early 15th century.
7. The Rectory/Workshop Space
Step into The Rectory, used for the parishes of St Julian and St Peter Parmentergate in King St.
Our tour officially starts in the Gallery; a modern, glass-covered room.
This contemporary glass-covered room, built in the 21st century, is one of several new additions to Dragon Hall, a building which survived for over 600 years by adapting and evolving to changing times. https://nationalcentreforwriting.org.uk/listening-post/
Image © Matthew Dartford
As you stand with the garden to your left towards the end of the gallery there is a large arched doorway. The corridor on the other side of the doorway is the Screen’s Passage.
This is called Screen’s Passage because this was a service area separated from the main living space by a timber screen, such as the one which survives on your left.
This effectively screened other parts of the hall – the private areas – from the more public areas where guests or visitors might be accommodated.
The tour continues up the short flight of steps from Screen’s Passage into the Old Barge Room.
From the mid-18th century this room was used as the front bar of the pub known as the Three Merry Wherrymen. A bit of a tongue twister even before a pint or two of the local ale!
In the 1880s, it was renamed as The Old Barge Inn, and may still be known as The Old Barge building for some older Norwich residents.
This is the most spectacular part of Dragon Hall: Robert Toppes’ Great Hall!
This space was the showroom where goods were displayed for merchants from England and Europe to examine and buy. It is the only surviving medieval trading hall in Western Europe built by a single merchant.
This trading hall was built by a single merchant, Robert Toppes. We have managed to piece together a lot of information to build up a picture of his life as his will tells us about his family and properties.
We know that Toppes was much more than a merchant. He was an entrepreneur with his finger in many pies – a landlord and perhaps a money lender. He was a politician at a time of great unrest in both Norwich and England.
During the 20th century Dragon Hall was almost unrecognisable as a single building as it had been divided into three dwellings.
After the Second World War, these rooms became part of the rectory for the parishes of St Julian and St Peter Parmentergate in King St. You’ll see the cross in the glass of the front door, a reminder of its past.
Thank you for visiting us!
Thank you so much for visiting the National Centre for Writing at Dragon Hall, our Literature House and the centerpiece of Norwich UNESCO City of Literature.
We hope very much that you have enjoyed your visit here today and that you have enjoyed discovering Robert Toppes’ hall, the only surviving medieval merchant’s hall in western Europe.
Voice-overs: John Osborne & Ellie Reeves
Production, Audio Recording and Mixing: Jonathan Baker
Original Music: Jonathan Baker
Musicians: James Davies (drums, bodhran, bells), Mark Howe (lute, mandolin), Rachel O’Malley (recorders) & Clare Pelzer (dulcimer)
Copy editor: Steph McKenna
Adapted from an audio tour written by: Jonathan Baker & Caroline Davison