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Summary

Farmhouse, former Dartmoor longhouse type, early 16th century with major 17th century improvements. Modernised circa 1960 when the shippon was converted and brought into domestic use.

Location

Protected Status

• Listed Building (II*) 1171794: COMBE FARMHOUSE

Other References/Statuses

• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX69NE/52
• Old Listed Building Ref (II*): 95070

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• FARMHOUSE (XVI to XX - 1501 AD to 2000 AD (Between))
• LONGHOUSE (XVI to XVII - 1501 AD to 1700 AD (Between))

Full description

Department of Environment, 1988, Spreyton, 200 (List of Blds of Arch or Historic Interest). SDV350986.

Farmhouse, former Dartmoor longhouse type. Early C16 with major C17 improvements, modernised circa 1960 when shippon was converted and brought into domestic use. Plastered cob on stone rubble footings; granite and cob stacks, the former (to the hall) with its orignal granite ashlar chimneyshaft; thatch roof. Plan and development: L-shaped building. The main block faces north-west and is built down the hillslope. It has a 4-room-and-through-passage plan facing north- west. Uphill at the right (south-west) end the inner room parlour has an end stack serving ground and first floor rooms. The hall has an axial stack backing onto the passage. Circa 1960 the passage front doorway was blocked and the shippon end converted to 2 rooms, the inner with a projecting front lateral stack of that date. At the same time a new front doorway was inserted into the left end room. Kitchen block projects forward at right angles from the inner room and it overlaps the hall a little. It has a large gable-end stack. The original early C16 house was open to the roof from end to end, divided by low partitions and heated by an open hearth fire. Usually the process by which the fireplaces were inserted and the rooms floored was a progressive piecemeal process leaving the hall open until the early or mid C17. If that process had been happening here all evidence was removed in a major mid C17 refurbishment. The hall and inner room fireplaces and ceiling beams all seem to be the result of a single building phase. The kitchen block was added about the same time and was quite likely part of the same scheme. Nothing earlier than circa 1960 shows in the shippon end. House is 2 storeys throughout. Exterior: main block has a 2-window front of C20 casements without glazing bars and more similar windows to rear. The single front ground floor window is blocking the passage doorway. Circa 1960 doorway to converted shippon contains a door of that date behind a contemporary gabled porch. Main roof is hipped to left and half- hipped to right. The kitchen block is gable-ended and heavily buttressed. Good interior: the mid C17 hall and inner room are separated by a cob crosswall. The hall fireplace is built of Cocktree ashlar (now lined with C20 stone) and has a Soffit-moulded oak lintel with runout stops. The axial beam has double ovolo mouldings with bar-runout stops and plain joists. The contemporary oak doorframe from hall to inner room has an ovolo-moulded surround with exaggerated scroll stops. The inner room parlour fireplace oak lintel is ogee-moulded with step stops (A date of 1701 inscribed on the lintel is surely secondary). There is a smaller version of the fireplace above. Parlour ceiling carried on half beams each end, both with filletted ogee mouldings and bar-runout stops. In the kitchen the fireplace is blocked and the crossbeam is soffit-chamfered with one scroll stop exposed. The roof over this block is carried on 2 mid C17 A-frame trusses with pegged lap-jointed collars. An C18 cupboard with panelled doors in the parlour and possibly C17, maybe C18, first floor doorframe with scratch-moulded, almost reeded, surround. Roof over inner room, hall and passage is late medieval. There are 3 face-pegged jointed crucks with cambered collars and small triangular yokes (Alcock's apex type L1). The truss over the hall is of larger scantling and has chamfered arch braces but part of it has been cut through to accommodate the C20 stairs. All 3 trusses and the hip cruck are heavily smoke-blackened from the original open hearth fire. The rest of the roof structure was replaced circa 1960.

Ordnance Survey, 2013, MasterMap (Cartographic). SDV350786.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments: none recorded

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events: none recorded

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