View source for The Mended Drum

[[Image:Dunelm.jpg|200px|left]] [[Filigree Street]] at [[Short Street]], Ankh-Morpork.

Well-known disreputable tavern.  Heroes of the Discworld frequent it when they are in [[Ankh-Morpork]], and bar brawl casualties are quite high.  However, if a ''tourist'' wants to meet [[Barbarian heroes|heroes]] and see them in bar fights, The Drum is the place to go.  Originally The Broken Drum, this tavern has been renamed The Mended Drum after a change of ownership and a reconstruction due to a fire chronicled in {{COM}}.

The interior does not differ much from the interiors of an uncountable number of other taverns which are less well known. But one does not enter the Drum for posh decoration. To enter the Drum one first has to pass one of the troll bouncers. And believe me, they really know how to bounce. In fact, they used to be called ''Splatters''. After entering the pub one has to walk down some stairs into a dimly lit room filled with cheap furniture. The furniture is cheap, because it usually needs to be replaced after the nightly bar fight. The floor is covered with sawdust to soak up all kinds of liquids sprayed on the floor. And the guests, well, let's not talk about the guests. But in spite of all this, on some nights this is actually the place to be. And if the barkeeper is in a really good mood, he might even put out some bowls with peanuts. But ''only'' if he's sure the [[Librarian]] isn't going to come in.

It is said that, nowadays, a child can safely walk into The Drum, purchase a glass of milk, and not be bothered by the rest of the clientele. The worst that the child may come to face is a ding alongside the ear when his mother hears his expanded vocabulary.

Like 80% of pubs on [[Roundworld]], the Drum has tried to re-invent itself many times so as to get a larger share of the drinking person's liquid assets. Sometimes this has been unavoidable - as when the first mentioned licencee [[Broadman]] was sold an insurance policy by [[Twoflower]], interpreted it in that cheerfully entrepreneurial Ankh-Morporkian fashion, and in seeking to capitalise on the policy, succeeded in setting fire not just to the Drum (and himself), but half the city. 

Other tenants of the Drum, notably [[Hibiscus Dunelm]] (shown, as drawn by [[User:Knmatt|Matt Smith]]), have tried to re-invent the establishment as a venue for unlicenced music and entertainment, but the entertainment provided to the patrons was along the lines of "Oh look! A moving target!", as [[the Band With Rocks In]] discovered. 

Still others have tried to provide games of skill,  knowledge and dexterity, but the [[Quizzing Device]] was hastily removed after [[Carrot Ironfoundersson|Captain Carrot]] saw its potential. This was replaced with [[Barbarian Invaders]], but nobody else could get a look in because of the [[Librarian]].

While it is true to note that in today's Mended Drum, the pub brawls are as often as not extensively and meticuluously choreographed for the visual spectacle they offer to visiting tourists (with an Igor standing by to re-attach any mislaid bodily parts - just be sure ''everything'' is tatooed with your name, lads, as Igor can't be expected to guess), it can still be a dangerous place where [[Suicide]] is an option. Objecting to a muscled horned-helmet wearing and axe-toting hero who has moved in on your girlfriend while you're getting the drinks in, for instance, is a form of committing suicide, as [[Moist von Lipwig]] correctly surmised. However, if she then threatens to drill through his foot by application of principles of simple leverage via the fulcrum provided by a "Lucrezia" kitten heel, this is considered to be a creatively acceptible way of disarming the situation).

Other mentioned pubs in [[Ankh-Morpork]] are [[Biers]], [[The Bucket]] and [[The Troll's Head]].  The Drum is famed not for it's beer (which tastes like battery acid) but for it's clientele.  It is said that if you sit the Mended Drum long enough sooner or later every manjor hero on the disk will come by ans steal your horse.   The is certain true.  In the course of the tales, the following notable heroes have frequented the drum:

* [[Rincewind]] - {{COM}}, {{S}}
* [[Twoflower]] - {{COM}}
* [[Death]] - {{SM}}
* [[Alberto Malich]] - {{M}}
* [[The Band With Rocks In]] - {{SM}}
* [[Librarian|The Librarian]] - {{G!G!}}, {{S}}, {{WS}}
* [[Susan Sto Helit]] - {{SM}}
* [[Moist von Lipwig]] - {{GP}}
* [[Herrena the Henna-Haired Harridan]] - {{E}}
* [[Red Scharron]] - {{E}} 
* [[Diome, Witch of the Night]] - {{E}}
* [[Carrot Ironfoundersson]] - {{G!G!}}
* [[Nobby Nobbs]] - {{G!G!}}, {{FOC}}
* [[Fred Colon]] - {{G!G!}}, {{FOC}}
* [[Samuel Vimes]] - {{G!G!}}
* [[Hwel|Hwel the play-write]] - {{WS}}
* [[Tomjon]] - {{WS}}
* [[Adora Belle Dearheart]] - {{GP}}
* [[Detritus]] - {{G!G!}}
* [[Mustrum Ridcully]] - {{MP}}
* [[Vincent the Invulnerable]]









==Annotation==

It is well known that a Broken Drum cannot be beaten...

When [[Moist von Lipwig]] and [[Adora Belle Dearheart]] visit the Drum to observe training is in progress for  a staged pub fight, the description of the moves and choreography involved could come straight out of the sort of old-time Saturday afternoon wrestling show, "live from the Town Hall, Batley, Yorkshire" (as hosted by Kent Walton) or other prestige venue in the North. For as everyone knows, profesional wrestling is elaborately scripted for the spectacle rather than the sport. This is more the old-fashioned spit and sawdust arena of British pro wrestling, rather than the hyper-athletic glitz of the WWF.

This also echoes the long-term drift of the Discworld, from the {{COM}} days where Heroes were free to roam, and savage tribal [[Gnolls]] infested the remote places ready to beat up a wagon train, the Disc has shrunk, with [[Clacks]] lines and coach roads  bisecting the continent. The world no longer has a place for old-fashioned free-spirited barbarian heroes, as we see in  {{TLH}}, and the last remnants of defeated Gnoll-dom are trickling into the big cities to perform the lowest and most menial tasks (such as collecting rubbish for [[Harry King]]). 

The inescapable analogy for the Discworld is with the tail-end of the nineteenth century and the last subjugation of the American West. The end came with unbeleivable speed: as late as 1870, the Sioux still roamed free: but by the 1890's, they were all in reservations and the last Indian hold-outs, the south-western Apache tribes, also surrendered. All Indians entered the subjugation of the reservation system, or filtered into towns to be given the dregs, work and housing-wise.  (reference the fate of the [[Gnolls]]). North America also discovered it had no place for living heroes, except in institutions like Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, where cowboys and Western heroes performed choreographed routines for their supper.  This institution is  reminiscent of the way the barbarian heroes now earn their living staging mock bar fights in the Drum. A pub which twenty-odd years ago was the staging-post for barbarian expeditions into the hinterland (in best Dungeons and Dragons fantasy tradition) now hosts the last remnants of the barbarian hero tradition, pretending to beat seven bells out of each other for money. 



[[category:Locations|Mended Drum,The]]
[[Category:Ankh-Morpork Businesses|Mended Drum, The]]

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