The Pope's Head is described by Walter Wicks as being one of the oldest Norwich Inns. He speculates that the sign was put up in pre-Reformation days which dates its as being open early in the 16th century.
Following the blowing up of the Committee House in Bethel Street, the Pope's Head was mentioned in the trial of ( Royalist ) rioters 1648.
The licence was provisionally refused in March 1912 and it was referred for Compensation before being closed in December of the same year. It was demolished in 1935 to make way for the new City Hall.
The Pope's Head stood in a yard of the same name. To the left we see George Plunkett's photo taken of the entrance to the yard in 1934, long after the Tavern had been closed as a Public House. To the right is Charles Hobbis' drawing of the building which previously housed the Pope's Head , executed in 1935 (Reproduced by Courtesy of Norwich Museum and Art Gallery.