shewhomust | Famous for seven things

Clearing my desk, I found a months-old copy of the local paper, which I had put aside because I was intrigued by a story in the "Looking Back" column about old pubs, including:

... the Three Tuns in New Elvet, parts of which date back to the 16th Century. In the Victorian era, this coaching inn was owned by the Brown family, and was a major landmark in the city. Indeed, there was a saying that Durham was famed for seven things: law, learning, wood, water, old maids, mustard and Mrs Brown's cherry brandy. Every guest to the hotel was treated to a free tot of the proprietor's homemade tipple.

The online version of the feature includes a picture of the staff proferring a tray at the serving hatch, in 1968; I don't remember the cherry brandy being famous when I arrived the following year (though I was never a guest, if that means actually staying in the hotel).

I was curious enough to ask the internet about that saying: It obliged with just a single source:

According to an old saying, Durham City was famed for seven things - wood, water and pleasant walks, law, gospel, old maids and mustard.

Which - surprise, surprise - is found in an article about Durham mustard (oh, yes, it's a thing) in the same paper in 2007.

If you accept learning and gospel as equivalents, the lists differ in only one item: the cherry brandy which is the whole point of the more recent version does not appear at all in the earlier one.

My father used to say that Durham, like Rome, was built on seven hills. I've never tried counting them ...