The Tabard is famous as the place owned by Harry Bailey, the host in Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales.
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The Tabard, an inn that stood on the east side of Borough High Street in Southwark, was established in 1307, when the abbot of Hyde purchased the land to construct a hostel for himself and his brethren, when business took them to London, as well as an inn to accommodate the numerous pilgrims headed on annual pilgrimage to the Shrine of Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral.
From 1998 to 2005, the Cheese Lords served as artists in residence at Mount St. Sepulchre Franciscan Monastery, the Franciscan Monastery in Washington, D.C. The Cheese Lords assisted in developing "An Evening at the Tabard Inn", an event for the Smithsonian Institution's Resident Associates program, for which the group provided music contemporary to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and related to the theme of pilgrimage.