| Description: | The Deanery is one of the largest and most complicated medieval buildings in Exeter. Immediately south-west of the cathedral, although on an alignment north-east to south-west (here taken as east-west for ease of description). Work at the Deanery has taken place on four occasions: in 1971, by Ann Hamlin, then of the University of Exeter and Michael Laithwaite, then of the University of Leicester when the interior fabric was observed and a photographic record made of the roofs of the chapel and first-floor hall (unpublished). In 1981 (in the next interregnum) by John Allan and John Thorp both (then) of Exeter Museums Archaeological Field Unit, when measured drawings of the roof of the great chamber, long sections, one elevation and a plan were made (Allan and Thorp 1990). In 1993, when the eastern block was separated off from the second block containing the great chamber, to provide for more appropriate living quarters for the Dean and separate more public rooms to the west. Trenches outside the building were observed and recorded; details of the screens passage bay of the medieval great hall in the first block, to the east, were recorded, and a number of other small observations were made (Blaylock 1993). Lastly in 1998-9 the floor structure of the great chamber was recorded whilst it was being dismantled for repair and strengthening, and dendrochronological analysis was carried out on the timbers of this floor and the roof of the great chamber (Blaylock 1999; Litton et al. 2000).
The building comprises four blocks arranged on the NE-SW axis, with a chapel adjoining the first and second blocks to the north. The first, or eastern block, is the oldest: where original fabric can be seen the masonry is of closely cut volcanic trap and Salcombe sandstone quoins; a shallow clasping buttress, with volcanic rubble masonry facework, suggests a date in the 13th century. The office of Dean was established in 1225 (Lega-Weekes 1915, 79), and this work could be as early as this. The independent existence of the chapel of St Michael can be identified at a still earlier date (since it appears on the list of Exeter churches by Bishop Marshall of c.1200: Rose-Troup 1923, v; cf. Monument No. 11038), but since this antedates the office of Dean this has been explained by seeing it as an independent chapel which was incorporated into the Deanery on its foundation, or alternatively on its enlargement in the late medieval period (ibid., 39-40).
The first block was a very large building, with internal dimensions of 15.4m long and 9.25m wide; a span exceeded only by the hall of the Bishop’s Palace (14.5m) amongst known medieval halls in Exeter, and this was certainly an aisled structure. Such a span could have been roofed by a single span; the roof of the great hall of the Archdeacon of Exeter’s house in Palace Gate spans a width of 8.65m (although this is substantially later in date). Although little of the early masonry style has survived later alteration, the size of the building, its location, documentary evidence, and recent observations combine to suggest that the eastern block contained the great hall of the medieval Deanery; the outline of tall windows can be seen in the south elevation of this block which, although containing later fabric may well originate in the earliest phase (Allan and Thorp 1990, 45-6). The hall apparently remained open until the late 18th or 19th century (it is described as a ‘cart house’ on Cornish’s plan of Kalendarhay of 1850, cf. Monument No. 11121): with the exception of the westernmost screens-passage bay, which was infilled in the 16th century (Blaylock 1993, 4-8), all of the interior fittings observed in the body of the medieval hall in 1993 were of mid-late 19th century date (ibid., 7-8).
To the west the second block was largely rebuilt in the 15th and 16th centuries, although the north wall is extremely thick, and may contain older fabric retained from an earlier building in this position. It has never been fully examined when stripped, although it is known that a 16th century fireplace is cut into it (Allan and Thorp 1990, 46). It also retains a number of narrow lancet windows which may be 13th or 14th century in date (one of which is still visible in the first floor great chamber (ibid., 46; Lega-Weekes 1915, 77). During recording of the floor structure in 1998 it was observed that many of the timbers, especially those of the joists supporting the ceiling of the ground floor parlour, were re-used timbers, containing vacant mortises. These were interpreted as coming from an earlier roof in the building, probably a rafter truss roof, possibly with scissor braces, with a suggested date of the 13th or 14th century (Blaylock 1999, 4). It was hoped that the recording of these timbers would yield a reconstruction of such a roof, but there proved to be too little information to ‘re-assemble’ the timbers, even on paper. This second block provides the most likely provenance of such a roof, since the 15th century reconstruction would provide a ready context for the re-use of timbers; the great hall is another possibility, although this would have to have been under reconstruction at the same time to have provided a source for material for re-use, and this is perhaps inherently improbable.
The third and fourth blocks of the Deanery, to the west (now in the occupation of the Cathedral School) are superficially late medieval and later, although it has been suggested that they may contain some early fabric (Allan and Thorp 1990, 46).
Extant: Yes |
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