Description

SOUTH ELMHAM, ST. PETER
TM 38 NW

2/84 St. Peter's Hall

1.9.53
GV II*

Manor house on a moated site. C15, C16 and C17, but probably with an earlier
core to part. 2 storeys; attics to part. L-shaped form: main range aligned
east-west; rear wing, north-south. Mainly in ashlar stone, but also partly in
brick, rendered flint rubble, and render over timber-framing. Plaintiled
roofs. A stone chimney-stack projects slightly from the eastern side of the
south front, and another stack, having 2 square red brick shafts with moulded
bases, forms part of the west gable. An important feature of the building is
the fine series of medieval 3-light stone-traceried windows, which are clearly
not in situ, and are thought to have come from the Augustinian nunnery at
Flixton following the Dissolution. The main entrance is through a storied
porch on the north side: pointed arched doorway, with multiple mouldings and a
4-light traceried window above, diagonal buttresses, roof pitch raised in C19.
Round the base of the porch and along the eastern half of-the north front are
reused stone panels with flushwork decoration, including the crowned sacred
monogram and 'M'. To the right (west) of the porch there are indications,
including a blocked doorway, of an earlier core to this part of the house.
Cross-entry inside, and further evidence of reused stonework. To the east of
the entry the former hall, which was divided into 2 by a large inserted
chimney-stack in the late C16, has now been returned to a single room, with
the ceiling raised, and the original external stack reopened; this has a Tudor
arch with multiple mouldings. To the west of the entry, a large 3-bay upper
room, with heavy moulded cross-beams and C16 square panelling, was divided up
later. This part of the building may have had a flat lead-covered roof
originally: the present roof is a C19 replacement. Above the eastern half of
the front the roof was replaced in the C17: 5 bays have 2 rows of stepped butt
purlins; deep, narrow chamfered principals, and the rafters in 2 separate
lengths, tenoned into the lower purlins; some reused medieval rafters around
the site of the chimnmey-stack. The timber-framed north-south range is an
early C17 addition mainly of service rooms. For information on the background
of the house and its owners, cf. Nesta Evans, 'The Tasburghs of South Elmham:
the rise and fall of a Suffolk gentry family', in Procs. Suff. Inst. Arch &
Hist., Vol. XXXIV Pt.4, 1980.

Listing NGR: TM3360085342

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17546703

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Central Leinster: Kildare, Laois and Offaly (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  A Buying and Owning a Listed Building: A Brief Guide
• 
  Listed Buildings: The Law and Practice of History Buildings, Ancient Monuments and Conservation Areas
• 
  Old House Care and Repair
• 
  Dorset (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)