The Saracen Head
Glasgow’s historic coaching inn on the Gallowgate, famed for hosting Johnson & Boswell, Robert Burns and other luminaries — and for the “witch’s skull” displayed behind the bar.
The Saracen Head (locally “the Sarry Heid”) began life in 1755 as Glasgow’s premier coaching inn on the Gallowgate. Built of hewn stone with 36 rooms, stabling for 60 horses and a grand ballroom, it quickly became the city’s elite stopover. Notable guests included Dr Samuel Johnson and James Boswell on their return from the Hebrides (1773), as well as Robert Burns and, later, William Wordsworth, Dorothy Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
The present pub (opened 1904) sits almost opposite the original site and keeps the storied name alive. Inside, a glass case displays a human skull commonly attributed to “Maggie Wall” — popularly, the last woman burned as a witch in Scotland. Whatever its true identity, the skull has become a macabre focal point and fuels the bar’s dark reputation.
Add to this that the first Saracen Head was raised on former kirkyard ground (Little St Mungo’s), with reused stone from the bishop’s castle and the old Gallowgate gatehouse, and you have a venue where polite Georgian society and Glasgow’s grimmer folklore still collide.
Location: On the Gallowgate, a short walk east from Glasgow Cross.
Address: 209 Gallowgate, Glasgow G1 5DX, Scotland
Category: pub, witch
Tags: Saracen Head, Sarry Heid, Gallowgate, coaching inn, Samuel Johnson, James Boswell, Robert Burns, witch trials, Maggie Wall, skull, Maggie Wall
Darkness Level: ☠ ☠ ☠ ☠ ☠ ☠ ☠
Map: Open in Google Maps
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