Monument Type(s):

• BUILDING (Medieval to 17th century - 1066 AD to 1699 AD)

Summary

The site of a medieval to 17th century building.

Related records

Associated Finds: None recorded

Associated Events

• ESA2039 - 1960 field observation by the Ordnance Survey
• ESA2070 - 1993 Evaluation of St Julian's Friars area, Shrewsbury by Oxford Archaeological Unit
• ESA5849 - 2003-2004 excavations off St Julian's Friars by Marches Archaeology

Description

An early medieval stone building which had stood behind the Barge Inn ... was demolished 1929-30. Forty feet by twenty feet, the lower part of the building was probably C14. The upper floor had a fireplace with massive oak principals carrying the roof. Later used as stables. The building stood on ground converted to a garden attached to the C16 Jones' mansion [PRN 01489] <1a>

OS 1:500 1882 confirmed the position of the Barge Inn at SJ 49531232. It has been demolished, along with the buildings to the rear of it. Their sites are occupied by a petrol station and modern buildings. The building shown on the OS 25" 1927 at SJ 49541230 has the dimensions given by Morris. <1b>

In 1993 the Oxford Archaeological Unit carried out an archaeological evaluation of the St Julian's Friar's area. On the basis of the deep fills encountered in their Trench 8 (at c SJ 4955 1229) and those noted in the watching brief carried out by SCCAS on the Kennings Garage site, they postulated the existence of a water channel leading from the river to the town ditch, which may have been used as a wharf. (See PRN 04716). They commented that the medieval building behind the Barge Inn may have been a building on this postulated wharf <3>

UAD Note: A building about 40 feet long by 20 feet wide (c.12.2m x 6.1m) demolished in March-April 1930, and formerly standing behind the Barge Inn, near English Bridge. The lower portion was stone, said to look 14th-century, but subsequently altered, the building was eventually used as stables. Timber-framed superstructure of 16th-century character, the roof with 'massive principals'; the walls generally rebuilt in or clad in brick. Within was a massive stone fireplace, said to have been rescued when the building was demolished. A drawing shows it to have had moulded jambs and a flat chamfered lintel cantilevered forward on a pair of plain rounded corbels or brackets, (a form that might suggest a 15th-century or later date) [<4><5>]. While the fireplace suggests that the building (or part of it) had a domestic function, its proximity to the waterfront also suggests that it may have combined a commercial role, possibly in the form of a hall raised over an undercroft. The building appears on the 1st ed. O.S. plan and is orientation is notable (NW-SE), conforming to no recorded surface features in the area. It might, as has been suggested by Brian Durham, have stood on an island between the main river channel and the town ditch/barge gutter/old channel hypothesised to have run through this area [<3>] <6>

Excavators in 2003-4 reported [<7>] the discovery of a section of the town wall [PRN 08545] which appeared to have been adapted in the 18th century or later to form part of a building. An east-west masonry wall had been inserted into the town wall, the upper part of the town wall thinned down to form a building wall, a mortar floor laid and the interior walls plastered. The walls were identified by the excavators with the east and south walls of the building marked on the OS first edition plan - apparently the same building claimed [<6>] to be the medieval or early post medieval building demolished in the 1920s. There is clearly a question of interpretation to be resolved here. However, there also appears to be a question mark over the accuracy of either the OS plan or the trench location given by the excavators [<7>]; the latter, when transferred to the SMR GIS, lies some 4m east of the building marked by the Ordnance Survey. One possibility, which the excavators themselves raised implicitly, is that the remains found in 2003-4 might relate to a gazebo or tower shown on 18th century illustrations [see PRN 08550] rather than to the main building <8>

This was demolished in the 1930s. It was described as stone-built, C14 in date and measuring 40ft x 20ft. It had a fireplace in the upper storey and 'massive oak principals carrying the roof'. The description suggests a first-floor hall house with a stone undercroft and a timber-framed superstructure. <9>

Sources

Search results generated by the HBSMR Gateway from exeGesIS SDM Ltd.