Inn brand names like Holiday Inn, and in some laws that refer to lodging operators as "innkeepers". The Inns of Court in London were once accommodations for members of the legal profession. Other forms of inn exist throughout the world. Among them are the honjin and ryokan of Japan, caravanserai of the Ottoman Empire, and Jiuguan in ancient China. In Asia Minor, during the periods of rule by the Seljuq and Ottoman Turks, impressive structures functioning as inns () were built because it was thought that inns were socially significant. These inns provided accommodation for people and their vehicles or animals
Tales of a Wayside Inn title "Tales of a Wayside Inn". He wrote in his journal that day: "Write a little on the Wayside Inn. A beginning only." Longfellow visited the real-life Wayside Inn in 1862 with his friend and publisher James Thomas Fields. At the time, the inn was called the Red Horse Tavern and had closed after the owner, Lyman Howe, died in 1861. It would not reopen as an inn until 1897. Longfellow referred to it as "a rambling, tumble-down building". He toured the building with Abigail Eaton, a relative of the Howe family, who told Longfellow the history of the building