BREWING
Given the near impossibility of moving heavy goods it is almost inevitable that brewing beer would take place in Steventon. In fact at one time it was far more prolific than you might imagine.
In 1399 the eastern part of the village (around Sheepwash Lane) had twelve brewers and the western part (around the Mill) another twenty-four!
By 1528 an inventory of the goods of William Hopkins of Steventon included ‘foure old pans & 3 ketylls’ valued at ten shillings. This is long before tea or coffee were commonly drunk and so it is almost certain that the ‘kettyls’ were used for brewing beer.
By 1634 the vicar largely got his income from tythes from villagers, including ‘the tythe of garden hopps’ so obviously what Henry VIII had called a ‘pernicious weed’ was in use in the village by then.
Ale making and selling
