Obs. The house at which the inquests in a ward or parish were commonly held.
1571. Acc. St. Giles, Cripplegate, in MS. Addit. 12222 [cited by Halliwell, s.v.].
1607. Dekker & Webster, Northw. Hoe, I. D.’s Wks. 1873, III. 12. Are all the Quest-houses broken vp?
1668. Pepys, Diary, 24 Jan. At the Quest House, where the company meets to the burial of my cozen Joyce.
1696. Lond. Gaz., No. 3239/4. At the Quest-house on Little-Tower-Hill is a Grammar-School.
1828. Nares, Lett. to A. Dyce. A Quest-house was the chief Watch-house in a parish…. Some parishes in London still have them, e. g. St. Giles’s Cripplegate.
fig. 1635. Quarles, Embl., 102. It is a world, whose Work … Is vanity, and vexation;… A Quest-house of complaint.
attrib. 1628. Spelman, De Sepult. (1641), 22. A Parish Audit, or a Quest-House dinner.
