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Summary

Interesting and attractive former farmhouse at Yellam dating to the late 15th or early 16th century with major mid-17th century refurbishment. Whitewashed granite rubble construction with a thatched roof. Four-room and through passage plan longhouse. No longer part of the farmstead at Yellam.

Location

Protected Status

• Listed Building (II*) 1106165: YELLAM

Other References/Statuses

• National Monuments Record: SX78NW54
• National Record of the Historic Environment: 898285
• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX78NW/239
• Old Listed Building Ref (II*): 94618

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• FARMHOUSE (Constructed, XV to XVI - 1450 AD (Between) to 1550 AD (Between))

Full description

1840, Tithe Map (Cartographic). SDV339770.

Yellam farmhouse depicted on the Tithe Map of approximately 1840.

Department of Environment, 1987, Chagford, 75 (List of Blds of Arch or Historic Interest). SDV350463.

Yellam. House, formerly a farmhouse of late C15th or early C16th origin. It is likely that it originated as a longhouse and shippon, and was converted to the present four-room-and-through-passage plan in late C16th to mid C17th. Grade II*.

Cherry, B. + Pevsner, N., 1989, The Buildings of England: Devon, 251 (Monograph). SDV325629.

Parker, R. W., 2001, Archaeological Recording at Yellam, Chagford, 1 (Report - Survey). SDV250933.

Yellam is a farmstead lying to the south-east of Chagford. The farmyard lies to the west of the existing large Victorian farmhouse. The original farmhouse to the south of the yard is the listed property.

Ordnance Survey, 2011, MasterMap (Cartographic). SDV346129.

English Heritage, 2011, National Heritage List for England (National Heritage List for England). SDV347072.

House, former farmhouse. Probably late 15th or early 16th century with major later 16th and 17th century improvements including a major mid-17th century refurbishment, late 19th century modernisation. Whitewashed granite rubble; granite stacks with granite ashlar chimney shafts; thatch roof.
Plan and development: long building built down a slope and facing north-west. It has a 4-room-and-through-passage plan with the inner room well terraced into the slope at the right (south-west) end. It has a disused end stack. The hall has an axial stack backing onto the passage. The alcove projecting to front left of the fireplace is shallow but probably housed a winder stair before a stair built in an outshot to rear of the hall. On the lower side of the passage is an unheated dairy with a corridor along the front to a parlour with an end stack. The present plan is the result of a major mid-17th century refurbishment of an earlier house and although the evidence is not positive it is likely that the earlier house was a Dartmoor longhouse with a shippon where now the dairy and parlour are and the hall then open to the roof. It is now two storeys with attics over the hall and inner room.
Exterior: irregular 5-window front of 19th and 20th century casements with glazing bars. The front passage doorway contains a 20th century plank door behind a contemporary flat-roofed granite porch. Roof is gable-ended. The right end wall is blind although there are blocked small attic windows which still contain their oak frames and are exposed internally. The left end wall contains a small first floor closet window, a 2-light casement with a flat-faced mullion and containing rectangular panes of leaded glass; it is probably 18th century.
Good interior: most of the internal structural features date from the mid-17th century refurbishment but the 4-bay roof section over the passage and lower end rooms (the putative shippon) is earlier comprising true cruck trusses. Precise dating is impossible since the roofspace here is inaccessible. The inner room axial beam is replaced by a 20th century RSJ (rolled steel joist) and the fireplace lintel is a replacement too. The crosswall at the upper end of the hall is an oak plank-and- muntin screen; the muntins have central vertical recesses and chamfered edges with scroll-nick stops above bench level. Plain-chamfered crossbeam and granite fireplace. The stairs to rear are late 19th century, possibly replacing the 17th century original. Dairy crossbeam is a barely finished tree-trunk. Lower end parlour has a granite fireplace with soffit-chamfered oak lintel. The crossbeam is plastered over with a moulded plaster cornice of the late 17th-early 18th century date. The roof over the hall and inner room was raised in the 17th century to accommodate the attics and comprise A-frame trusses with pegged lap-jointed collars with dovetail halvings. Several doors are 17th and 18th century in date, either plank or panelled construction.
Yellam is an attractive and interesting farmhouse. It appears to have been converted from a Dartmoor longhouse in the mid-17th century and most of the structural detail dates from this time. The true cruck section of the farmhouse however indicates its earlier origins and other earlier features may survive behind later plaster (February 1967). Other details: LB UID: 94618.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events: none recorded

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