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Summary

Remains of either a courtyard at Henry VIII's tower house, or a later formal garden

Monument Types

• COURTYARD? (Post Medieval - 1501 AD to 1900 AD)
• CULVERT (Post Medieval - 1501 AD to 1900 AD)
• FORMAL GARDEN (Post Medieval - 1501 AD to 1900 AD)
• YARD (Post Medieval - 1501 AD to 1900 AD)

Associated Events

• Monitoring at Hunsdon House, Church Lane, Hunsdon, 2014 (Ref: N)

Full description

Evaluation in the area between Hunsdon House [2789] and the adjacent parish church [4364] uncovered part of the late 18th-early 19th century stableyard, including an earlier yard surface and associated deposits. Fragments of structural brickwork could represent buildings of the second quarter of the 16th century associated with the royal tower house. The yard's south wall overlies post-medieval garden soil. This suggests that the yard may have succeeded 'an open court around which were placed the buildings of Henry VIII' beyond the west side of the moat around the tower house. If not an Henrician court, the remains would relate to a c.1700 garden layout shown in a Drapentier drawing, the bricks reused in garden features <1>.
A substantial culvert built of late 16th or early 17th century red bricks, found beneath a 20th century conservatory in 2014 (TL 4188 1274), may date to the early 17th century when the house was extended to the west for the Carey family; it ran roughly north-south and may have been constructed to serve the extension <2>. There were no associated finds.

<1> Murray, Jon, 1993, Hunsdon House stable yard: an initial archaeological evaluation, RNO 389 (Report). SHT4678.

<2> Hillman-Crouch, Barry J, 2014, Hunsdon House, Eastwick Road, Hunsdon, Hertfordshire SG12 8PP: watching brief on a conservatory foundation in the stable yard, RNO 3872 (Report). SHT18122.

Sources and further reading

Related records

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