Building record HRT 043 - Pippin Cottage & Pompes, Hartest Hill

Pippin Cottage and Pompes lie adjacent to each other near the edge of the parish of Hartest. Pippin Cottage lies to the right in the cover photograph and abuts the Shimpling Road, while Pompes to the left is set further back in its plot. The close proximity of the two timber-framed buildings suggests they formed part of the same medieval holding, although now in separate ownership. Pompes represents three-quarters of a late–medieval open hall house, probably dating from the second quarter of the 15th century. Rural houses of this period almost invariably contained the same tripartite plan, consisting of a central open hall flanked on one side by a pair of service or storage rooms and on the other by a ground-floor sleeping chamber known as a parlour (as further described in the Appendix of this report). Pompes preserves the service and hall bays of a typical medium-status farmhouse of 1½ storeys, but has lost its parlour bay to the left and would have extended by approximately ten feet further in this direction. The timber-frame of Pippin Cottage is largely concealed and has lost its original roof, rendering precise interpretation impossible, but its timber frame appears to date from the two separate periods. The right-hand half of the structure is the earlier, and, while much altered, appears to have lacked windows when first built. It may be contemporary with Pompes, and represent a rare ancillary building such as an animal bier or small barn. This building was extended or partly reconstructed at the beginning of the 17th century to form a domestic house, and was subsequently divided into two cottages (S1).