The Bottle Inn is one of the few remaining examples of an unspoilt 16th Century Dorset Wayside Inn.

By repute, in 1585 there was a tythe barn on this site, where people paid their tythes to the church, a barrel of mead was kept therin to soften the blow. Popular myth has it that the premises become the local drinking den after the Revenue men closed down the ale house on the smugglers trail which came up from Charmouth over Coneys castle to meet the Bristol road above Fishponds. Thus an alehouse was born. The first documented record we have seen showing The Bottle Inn as a pub is on the deed of the Crewkerne to Lyme Regis toll road dated 1760 which mentions passing The Bottle Inn west of Marshwood.

It became known as the Bottle Inn by being the first inn in the area to sell beer by the bottle sometime in the 18th Century.

During the second world war the building in the car park was used as the local school. After that it was run as a shop up until the late 1960's. The then landlord Percy Williams boasted that he would sell everything from a mousetrap to a motor car and when called to task over this boast promptly obliged the enquiring customer selling him both a mousetrap and a Rover 100.

More recently the Bottle Inn has become famous as the home of the World Stinging Nettle eating Championships .......... but that's another story.