Description

SO 51 SE COLEFORD HIGH MEADOW

4/9
Old Farmhouse

GV II*

Gatehouse range with lodging, later farmhouse, presently storage. Late C15,
remodelled mid C16, altered and embellished early/mid C17, extended to north
west c.1830. Stone, roof tiled to south west side, corrugated iron to north
east, rebuilt brick stacks. Rectangular single depth range of two storeys.
Scattered fenestration, basically 7 windows, some blocked, two C15 ones with
trefoil stone tracery, mullions and hoodmoulds; others in C16 frames, some C19.
The original range had a central thoroughway with C15 arched heads blocked in
during the C17 with a Tudor arched doorway on one side. Above is a balcony on 4
large corbel brackets the outer faces carved with scroll ornament. Several
plain later square-headed doorways, probably C19. Three ridge stacks, the gable
end one projecting from the first floor up. Interior has evidence of an
original high status lodging at first floor level. The SE room was heated by a
plain fireplace in the gable wall, its projecting stack carried on a corbel. it
was open to the roof, whose central truss was arch-braced to the collar, with
stub ties from the braces to the wall plates (both braces and collar are now
missing). This is a late development from base cruck forms, generally of C15
(but not later) date. There is a blocked doorway in the SW wall, which must
have led to a stair or link to another building, probably of timber since it was
not bonded into the main building. This was replaced, probably in the C16, by a
masonry block, the lower part of which survives under a modern roof. The
adjacent chamber is one bay wide, formed by close-studded partitions and closed
collar beam trusses with V-struts. It has a square-headed fireplace with ogee,
quarter-circle and ovolo mouldings and swept stops which looks later C15; built
into the wall of a modern outbuilding is the quatrefoil frieze of a larger fire-
place of much the same date. The interior of the gatehouse to the NW of the
passage seems to have been substantially reconstructed around 1630-40 when a
masonry cross wall and diagonal chimney breast were inserted. The ceiling of
the first floor chambers also probably belongs to this phase, when reused C16
windows were inserted in the SE gable (presumably from demolitions elsewhere),
and a 3-light oak ovolo-moulded window inserted high in the NW gable. Probably
in the later C18, and certainly before the house was extended, the upper part of
the SW wall was rebuilt NW of the archway. An important building with features
of interest from several periods, it is a survivor of High Meadow a great house
of C15 date of which this was the gatehouse range. It was retained when a new
High Meadows was built in c.1640 and again when that was demolished in 1805.

Listing NGR: SO5595810476

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17537386

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

• 
  Northumberland (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Yorkshire West Riding: Sheffield and the South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Somerset: North and Bristol: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Gwent/Monmouthshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Wales)
• 
  For the Record