Mancetter Manor And Attached Gatepier

Mancetter Manor and Attached Gatepier

This Grade II* listed manor house stands on the west side of Mancetter Green. Dating from around 1330, it represents a complex architectural evolution spanning nearly seven centuries, with significant phases of alteration and extension documented from the late 15th century through to the 20th century.

The main building is constructed with timber framing, featuring close studding and plastered infill. The front of the main range is predominantly rendered brick with a dentil cornice. The roof is of old plain tiles, with large rendered external stacks to the return sides and a ridge stack; these have 17th-century whitewashed brick shafts with pilaster strips.

The building developed from a single-ended aisled hall house with a cross-wing into a double-ended plan with minor rear additions. It presents as a 2-storey structure with a 6-window range. The 4-bay main range has a 3-bay right section. A recessed porch on the right features a rendered keyed round arch with a tapering Doric pilaster to the left and a simple entablature with dentil cornice. Inside the porch is a pointed arched doorway with three moulded wooden orders, possibly medieval in origin. The current doors are 19th or 20th-century studded part-glazed double-leaf examples.

The ground floor displays two wooden mullioned windows with two trefoiled lights each. The first floor has chamfered wooden cross-windows. All windows have raised quoined surrounds. A wide recessed left bay contains a first-floor balcony with a cut-out splat balustrade and posts with braces supporting a beam below the cornice. French windows with glazing bars on the first floor have early 19th-century reeded wooden surrounds. The ground floor also features cross-windows to left and right. The cross-wings contain wooden mullioned and transomed windows: the ground-floor bay windows have five moulded lights, and the floors above have three chamfered lights. Throughout, the lights are leaded.

The rear elevation is complex. The main range, of one storey and attic, displays heavy 14th-century studding with curved braces. A 19th or 20th-century porch on the right has a ribbed door and windows of three and four trefoiled lights. Two 17th-century dormers have renewed four-light wooden mullioned and transomed windows. The left wing is extended by a large 19th or 20th-century lean-to addition across its return side. This section has segmental-arched panelled double-leaf doors and windows of three trefoiled lights to the left and six to the right. The wing's ground floor is rough-cast, with a three-light casement to the left; the first floor has small one-, two-, and three-light casements of irregular arrangement. The right cross-wing has exposed framing with a small range at right angles. It features a large mullioned and transomed canted bay window and a small three-light window. The gable houses an 18th-century timber bell-turret with keyed segmental arches and a pyramid roof.

The building underwent a floor insertion in the south part of the hall in the late 15th century and in the north part in the 17th century. A south cross-wing was added around 1580. Early 18th-century alterations followed, and the north part of the main range was extended forward slightly in 1811. Significant 19th and 20th-century alterations include refacing of cross-wings with sham timber-framing and replacement of windows.

Interior

The room to the left of the screens passage contains 19th-century panelling and a fireplace. The room to its left retains moulded cross beams with a moulded post and curved bracket dating to around 1480, along with 17th-century panelling. The fireplace, possibly partly early 18th-century in origin, has a basket arch; the rear wall has a beam opened up. An early 18th-century dog-leg staircase behind features column-on-vase balusters.

A corridor retains re-set 16th or 17th-century panelling. A panel above the door is inscribed "15 HF 97" with the Latin phrase "HOMO BULLA" below.

The north cross-wing's east room features an ogee-stop-chamfered beam. A wide fireplace displays an early 16th-century run-out chamfered and moulded bressumer and an iron fireback bearing the royal arms and inscribed "CR". The overmantel is a made-up wooden piece of five alternating carved and plain 17th-century round arches with split turned balusters.

The south wing's east room has chamfered cross beams and an altered open fireplace. The west room features early 18th-century moulded and fielded panelled dado and a built-in corner cupboard with segmental-arched double-leaf doors.

The first floor preserves massive hall trusses almost intact in two rooms. The central truss has a very large trefoiled arch and a cambered tie beam. The south room has a more simply cusped south truss and a large chamfered wind brace, with a plaster vault over the French window. The northern room has a large chamfered arch truss between the hall and the former screens passage, with west wind braces (one cusped), moulded wall plates, and heavy purlins and rafters.

The upper part of the screens passage, now a corridor, has a north truss against the cross-wing with a central moulded cusped arch and posts; similar smaller arches cross the corridor at right angles, dividing off the former aisles. Doors from this corridor have short flights of steps with column-on-vase balusters. A six-panelled door to the cross-wing has a moulded panelled surround; double six-panelled doors in a basket arch lead to the room above the hall.

The north wing's east room contains a 14th-century chamfered arched truss with a cambered tie beam and braces to the ridge. A small room behind has a timber-framed partition. An early 18th-century room beyond features panelled doors in moulded wooden eared and shouldered architraves, panelling, and a moulded dentil cornice. A carved wooden eared chimneypiece displays blind fret panels.

The south wing has exposed posts and a stud partition, with a queen strut roof featuring wind braces. Throughout the house are a variety of panelled doors in styles from the 16th, 17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries.

Mancetter Manor was the home of the martyr Robert Glover.

An early 18th-century gatepier is attached to the right side of the north wing. Rendered with a stone cornice and ball finial, it stands approximately three metres high.