Monument record ALP 013 - Mill House, Alpheton

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Summary

C15 timber framed hall house.

Location

Grid reference Centred TL 8785 4921 (50m by 50m)
Map sheet TL84NE
Civil Parish ALPHETON, BABERGH, SUFFOLK

Map

Type and Period (4)

Full Description

C15 Listed (S1) timber framed house. Originally open hall - smoke blackened roof timbers in hall roof, which has solid braced cross beams supporting crown post (very similar to Edgar's Farmhouse - see SKT 006). Later brick chimney, very large & ornate, inserted on E side of hall (against passage). Moulded brick decorative features go very high demonstrating open hall retained. Claimed date of 1460-1470 by owner for chimney (S2). Luminescence dating of 3 chimney bricks gave dates around 1500 (S4).
First storey floor inserted later (early 1600s?) obscuring moulded fireplace bricks. Further details in (S2).
Circa 1987-8: Restoration of floor tiles in chimney by owner (see 'Not to be published on web' tab for finder/s and/or findspot/s) led to excavation within large inglenook fireplace revealing large feature/hollow to W, infilled with `hard packed floor earth with scattered layers of fresh water mussel and oyster shells' (S2) and 6" to 1' to the E of this a single post hole circa 6" diameter by 6" deep, `dug into virgin soil'. This would have been (from memory) about 3' in from the house wall timber framing. Said to have been filled with `dust' - no finds from either `feature' (S2)(S3).
2002: This large house of three elements, a hall and two cross wings, is thought on stylistic grounds to date from the late-fifteenth century. It was found to contain oak, ash, and elm timbers in its framing. The oaks from the primary structure were found to be very fast-grown, and could not be dated. A single component of a floor inserted in the hall was found to have used a timber felled in spring or summer of AD 1617, slightly later than had been previously proposed. Although this phase is only represented by a single timber, this major component has to be primary to that phase and is unlikely to have been re-used from elsewhere (S5)

Sources/Archives (7)

  • <M1> Unpublished document: Suffolk Archaeological Service. Parish Files. Parish file: copy (S1)(S2).
  • <S1> (No record type): DOE listing, TL84NE 6/24, 10.1.1953.
  • <S2> (No record type): Tricker K,.
  • <S3> (No record type): Tricker Mr K, per SAU (Pendleton C), April 1997.
  • <S4> Article in serial: Antrobus, A.. 2004. Luminescence Dating of Brick Chimneys. Vernacular Architecture 35: 21-31.
  • <S5> Unpublished document: Bridge M. 2002. Tree-Ring Analysis, Timbers from Mill House, Bridge Street.
  • <S6> Bibliographic reference: Eavesdropper: The Newsletter of the Suffolk Historic Buildings Group. 2005 (26).

Finds (0)

Protected Status/Designation

Related Monuments/Buildings (0)

Related Events/Activities (1)

Record last edited

Feb 11 2021 4:15PM

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