Description

ROBOROUGH
SS 51 NE
8/174 Owlacombe Farmhouse and short
- section of adjoining front garden
wall

II

Farmhouse now divided. Late C15 or early C16, altered in the early C17. Further
altered and probably enlarged in the mid C19. Minor late C19 or early C20 addition.
Rendered cob with rendered mid C19 addition (probably over stone rubble). Gable-
ended C20 asbestos-slate roof (replacing C19 Welsh slates). Circa 1900 additions of
squared snecked stone with red brick dressings and gable-ended slate roof. Rendered
and later stacks.
Plan and development: Circa 1500 three-room and through-passage plan, facing north-
east (ground falls to left). Central hall with external lateral stack to front,
through passage and former service room to right and 2 rooms to the left with axial
stack between hall and first room and integral end stack to left-hand room. The hall
was formerly open to the roof, and the first floor and the stack were probably
inserted in the early C17. Porch to through passage with winder staircase to the
right, probably also a C17 addition. Two rooms to left of hall probably a mid C19
adition but possibly an enlargement of a c.1500 or later inner room. Entrance hall
immediately to left of hall with a mid C19 straight flight staircase along the rear
wall and an entrance to the front. The service room at the right-hand end of the
house had been divided longitudinally , probably a C19 alteration, the rear part a
dairy. The rear doorway of the through passage was probably blocked in the C19 too.
Kitchen wing projecting at right angles to rear of the left-hand end with an integral
later stack, probably a mid C19 addition but possibly incorporating earlier fabric.
House divided in the late C20 and a kitchen formed from part of the entrance hall to
the left of the hall. Circa 1900 outbuilding adjoining at the right angles to the
rear of the right-hand end. Two storeys with one-storey addition.
Exterior: Hall stack to front has chamfered offsets and a tapered square shaft with
a set back top stage. Later second flue to left. Asymmetrically-fenestrated front;
4 windows to first floor and 3 to ground floor, mostly C19 two-light small-paned
wooden casement, some replaced by C20 plate-glass casements. Porch to right with
catslide roof and depressed-arched opening. The doorway has a c.1500 continuously-
chamfered round-arched pegged wooden frame with broach stops (repaired in the C19)
and a C19 six-panelled door (lower 3 panels beaded flush and upper 3 recessed).
Small C19 two-light wooden casement to right of porch archway, lighting staircase.
Doorway between the first and second windows from left with a C20 glazed door and a
C19 beaded wooden frame. Two ground-floor C20 small-paned 2-light wooden casements
in the left-hand gable end (in mid C19 openings). Two large gabled semi dormers to
the side of the rear wing, and C19 two- and 3-light wooden casements in the gable
end. Outbuilding at the rear of the right-hand end has a segmental-headed 2-light
wooden casement to the right and a segmental-headed plank door to the left.
Short section of stone rubble garden wall adjoining right-hand front corner of house,
with gateway in the right-hand side and gateway opposite.
Interior: Through passage flanked by stud partitions and with C19 matchboarded dado.
Probably C17 oak winder stair in projection to right of porch. Hall with three C17
chamfered cross beams. Mid C19 staircase to left of hall with closed string,
diagonally-set stick balusters and turned foot newel. Mid C19 six-panelled doors in
left-hand end of house. End windows in left-hand ground-floor end rooms have jambs
which continue to floor level. Most of roof rebuilt in the mid to late C19. One
remaining c.1500 smoke-blackened truss, over the centre of the hall, with straight
principals (apparently) and mortice and tenoned cambered collar. The late Medieval
roof also had threaded purlins and a diagonally-set ridge-piece, set in a slot in the
mortice and tenoned apex.
Owlacombe is a manor mentioned in Domesday.

Listing NGR: SS5747116369

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26398963

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

• 
  Specifications for Building Conservation: Volume 1: External Structure: Practical Examples v. 2
• 
  Sussex: East with Brighton and Hove (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  ENGLAND GUIDE TO POST WAR LISTED: A Guide to Post-war Listed Buildings
• 
  Lancashire: Manchester and the South-East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Old House Care and Repair
• 
  [(Bedfordshire, Huntingdon and Peterborough)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1968)