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Summary

Partial excavation of two tenements at 61-65 Fore Street by Exeter Museum Archaeological Field Unit in 1985 revealed 16th-18th century buildings.

Location

Protected Status

• Listed Building (II) 1235701: 63, FORE STREET
• Listed Building (II*) 1235702: PRIORY GATE HOUSE
• Listed Building (II) 1264923: SOUTH HAMS DISTRICT COUNCIL

Other References/Statuses

• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX86SW/127

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• BUILDING (XVI to XVIII - 1550 AD to 1800 AD (Between))

Full description

Ordnance Survey, 1855-1895, First Edition 1:500 Town Map (Cartographic). SDV338879.

Map object also based on this source.

Laithwaite, M. and Henderson, C.G., 1985, Early Owners and Occupants of 61-5 Fore Street, Totnes, 66-68 (Article in Serial). SDV350509.

The site excavated in 1984/5 consists basically of two burgage plots, the eastern one carrying 61 and 63 Fore Street, the western one 65 Fore Street and Little Priory. Number 61 is the former vicarage house rebuilt circa 1838.

Davison, A. and Henderson, C.G., 1985, Excavations at Fore Street, Totnes, 1984-85, 64-66 (Article in Monograph). SDV340327.

Between December 1984 and March 1985 the Archaeological Field Unit carried out a programme of archaeological investigations in advance of the construction of a new International Stores supermarket outside the East Gate of Totnes.

The most important results relate to the Tudor/Stuart finds and buildings on site.

Little Priory is the earliest surviving structure on the plot, for which structural and decorative features suggest a date in the third quarter of the 16th century, although an earlier date cannot be ruled out. Excavation showed that Little Priory occupied the full width of the plot. Built of stone, it comprised a cellar, a kitchen to the ground floor, and above a high quality chamber, perhaps a parlour, provided with decorative plaster ceiling carried on an arch-braced roof.

The late medieval house which must have occupied the street frontage when Little Priory was built was replaced in the late 16th or early 17th century by the building of which is now 65 Fore Street. At the same time or later a second house was erected on the remaining section of the frontage to the east. This house described in a deed of 1713 as 54 foot long, 16 foot wide at the front and 15 foot wide at the back. The width of the tapered plot between 63 and 65 Fore Street matches these dimensions quite well.

The space between the small eastern house and Little Priory was subsequently infilled by a room taking up the eastern part of the courtyard.

Excavation behind Little Priory revealed a previously unknown L-shaped range of buildings enclosing a second courtyard. This had apparently been erected in three main stages during the later 16th and early 17th centuries.

In the early 18th century, a two-storeyed block was added to the rear of Little Priory which occupied part of this courtyard on the western side of the plot.

In the 19th century, the eastern third of Little Priory, the 16th-17th century additions to its rear and the eastern house of the street frontage were demolished to make way for a driveway. The 18th century rear block of Little Priory was heightened and an independent house created which faced onto the new driveway.

Map object also based on this source.

Egan, G., 1986, Post-Medieval Britain in 1985, 337-339 (Article in Serial). SDV350510.

Partial excavation of two tenements at 61-65 Fore Street by Exeter Museum Archaeological Field Unit in 1985 revealed 17th-18th century houses. Little Priory stands on this site. Plan.

Partial excavation by Exeter Museum Archaeological Field Unit, between 1984/5, of the tenement occupied by "Little Priory", and 65 Fore Street revealed that the house on the street frontage was demolished circa 1600, to be replaced by two new houses. That on the west (Number 65) remained part of the main tenement, and is a 2-storey building one room wide and two rooms deep, with a side passage on the east. The side walls are of stone, the back wall of close-studded timber framing, with a range of mullioned windows. A timber framed rear porch is surmounted by a closet.

The house to the east, which was demolished in the 19th century, occupied a tenement described in 1713 as 54 feet deep, 16 feet wide at the street and 15 feet wide at the back. The house probably contained 2 rooms on each floor, with fireplaces in the party wall to the west, a side passage on the east, and a kitchen. This probably belonged to craftsman Roger Greene in 1610.

The rebuilding of the original street-front house was accompanied by major changes in the back block. The kitchen was converted to a parlour or dining room with a 2 metre wide fireplace and flanked by ornate stone columns supporting carved brackets carrying a projecting stone hood. This room, or the chamber above, probably had a moulded plaster ceiling, fragments of which were found in the fill of the eastern third of the cellar.

In the 18th century, a stair-lobby and corner fireplaces were inserted in Number 65.

In the early 19th century, the eastern third of Little Priory, the 17th century additions to its rear, and the eastern house on the street frontage were all demolished to make way for a new drive way.

Ordnance Survey, 2012, MasterMap (Cartographic). SDV348725.

Pink, F., 2014, Devon Extensive Urban Survey Project. Rapid Assessment of Archaeological Interventions (Report - non-specific). SDV357343.

An excavation was undertaken at 61-65 Fore Street, Totnes by the Exeter Museums Archaeological Field Unit in 1985.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events

• EDV6636 - Excavation, 61-65 Fore Street, Totnes

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