page_title: Meare Pool
section_title: Fishery
hierarchical_section_title: Meare Pool / Fishery
caption_attribution_description: Meare Fish House
context_page_description: Meare Pool was a lake in the Somerset Levels in South West England. Lake villages existed there in prehistoric times. During medieval times it was an important fishery, but following extensive drainage works it had disappeared from maps in the eighteenth century.
context_section_description: In the Domesday book of 1086 the village of Meare is recorded as supporting "10 fishermen and 3 fisheries paying 20 pence". At the time of the Dissolution in 1540, Meare Pool was said to contain a great abundance of pike, tench, roach and eels. In 1638 it was owned by William Freake, who described it as "lately a fish pool".
  In the 14th century a Fish House was built at Meare for the chief fisherman of the Abbot of Glastonbury that was also used for salting and preparing fish. It is the only surviving monastic fishery building in England. The importance of this industry is illustrated by a series of acrimonious disputes between Glastonbury and the Dean and Chapter of Wells Cathedral. The Abbey required fish on Fridays, fast days and during Lent. As many as 5000 eels were landed in a typical year.
  There were also three fishponds which would have allowed fish to have been bred or stored.
caption: Meare Fish House
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