Description

BISHOPS TAWTON
SS 52 NE
10/4 Downrew Cottages
-
GV II

Farmhouse, now private dwelling in 2 occupations. Late C15 or early C16 with C17
alterations. Rendered stone and cob with asbestos slate roof with gable ends to
front range, hipped to rear extension. 3 cell through-passage plan, formerly an
open hall house. A right-angled rear extension at the left end, formerly an
outbuilding has been taken into the left hand cottage, the division of the house
into two occupations leaving the plan largely unaffected, the through-passage
becoming fossilized with the closing off of the internal access from it to the hall
and lower end. The whole lower end may once have accommodated animals. Axial hall
stack backs onto through-passage with bread oven projecting into the passage.
Additional stacks inserted across the corners at each end of the front range.
2 storeys. 3 window range, that to right side is gabled half dormer. Plank door
to through-passage. C16 rear through-passage doorway with shouldered jambs and
gentle ogee head.
Interior: 2 panelled door to staircase inserted in lower end, but ceiling beams
very roughly chamfered. Hall beams are set along rather than across the hall, that
bedded close to front wall has elaborately stopped ovolo moulding to its inner
ariss. C19 chimney piece to originally wider hearth with doorway access to flue to
right. 2 panelled door to former stair turret to rear of hall. Keel stops to
chamfered inner room beam. Medieval roof structure substantially intact. 4 raised
cruck trusses with cranked collars, all jointed except for the truss closest to the
axial stack on the lower side which has uninterrupted blades reducing in section
above and below the collar. Trenched purlins and diagonally set ridge purlin with
most of the rafters survive. The truss directly over the upper end of the hall is
closed with part cob, part lath and plaster partition, smoke-blackened on its inner
face only. The truss and rafters over the inner room have been replaced but the
thickness of the wall dividing hall and inner room suggests that the latter may
always have been floored over. Equal degrees of smoke-blackening to the hall and
lower end roof structure suggests that these were floored over at the same time.

Listing NGR: SS5924128967

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26401518

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

• 
  London 1: The City of London: City of London v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Period property manual, victorian house manual 2 books collection set by ian rock
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  London 3: North West: North West v. 3 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Hampshire: Winchester and the North (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides): Written by Charles O'Brien, 2014 Edition, Publisher: Yale University Press [Hardcover]
• 
  The green guide for historic buildings: how to improve the environmental performance of listed and historic buildings