Purpose – This article provides background on the historical development of royal hospitality in India before the advent of commercial hospitality in the twentieth century. The aim of the paper is to insert into the historiography of commercial hospitality the ancient Indian practice of...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is twofold: to explore how commercial hospitality has contributed to the development of urban areas in relation to commerce, hospitality, religious and imperial patronage in early modern, Safavid Iran (c. seventeenth century). Second, to combine material...

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of the changing food culture of Ireland focusing particularly on the evolution of commercial public dining in Dublin 1700‐1900, from taverns, coffeehouses and clubs to the proliferation of hotels and restaurants particularly during...

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to examine the early history of restaurants, as invented in Paris around 1766, deciding whether a market orientation ruled out genuine hospitality. Design/methodology/approach – Contemporary accounts, such as Brillat‐Savarin's section “On...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore commercial hospitality enterprise and its impact on settlement development in the American West during the 1800s, focussing on the story of the Fanthorp Inn in Texas, USA. Design/methodology/approach – The paper outlines the theory relating...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide an outline of the arguments for and against different types of journal ranking lists, and, against this background, an account of the development of the Association of Business Schools' (ABS) Journal Quality Guide . Design/methodology/approach...