Paycocke'S

A timber-framed merchant's house of exceptional quality, built in two main phases during the 15th and early 16th centuries, with later alterations and a comprehensive restoration in 1910. The house demonstrates the wealth of the Paycocke family, prosperous clothiers in Coggeshall's textile trade.

Structure and Date

The main range of five bays faces north and dates from around 1505. It originally rose to three storeys but was reduced to two around 1600, when the upper portions of the rear posts were sawn off at what became the new eaves level. The building is timber-framed with plaster and some exposed framing and brick nogging, roofed with handmade red plain tiles. It has a 19th-century axial stack near the right end and two rear stacks from the late 16th and 18th centuries.

Behind the right end stands a three-bay wing from the 15th or early 16th century, with a stack in its rear bay. Beyond this is a two-bay building jettied to the left, also 15th century and originally separate, now connected by a short link. A three-bay rear wing with end jetty, dating from around 1570, extends from near the left end of the main range. An 18th-century stair tower occupies the angle to its right, with a small 18th or 19th-century extension beside it.

The 1910 Restoration

The house underwent comprehensive restoration in 1910, with high-quality carving by Ernest Beckwith. This work retained some original carved woodwork but substantially reconstructed the street elevation. Photographs taken before restoration by Miss Frances Noel (copies held by Essex County Planning Department) and images published in Country Life (2 February 1984, page 291) and by the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments around 1922 document the pre-restoration appearance.

Street Elevation

The close-studded main elevation showcases remarkable decorative carving, both original and restored. The ground floor has two square oriels and three fixed lights, with five similar oriels on the first floor, all 20th-century reconstructions in early 16th-century style. A plain section of jetty plate with two free tenons near the right end indicates that originally a third ground-floor oriel stood there; two of the modern ground-floor oriels appear to be accurate reconstructions of missing originals.

An original door of six linenfold panels with moulded rails and muntins, now positioned almost centrally, has been restored and moved from its earlier location since the Royal Commission photographed the exterior. Two 20th-century carved figures stand above it. Two blocked doorways with 20th-century carved arched heads flank it.

At the left end stand restored original double vehicle doors with linenfold panelling and moulded frames, rails and muntins. The original four-centred arched head has spandrels carved with foliage. The door-posts have restored pedestals, each supporting an original figure of a man beneath a canopy. The left figure wears a hood and long gown and holds a staff or musical instrument, part of which is missing. The right figure wears a short tunic and holds a mask in the right hand; the left arm is missing from the elbow. Attached to the lower parts of the posts is original weathered carving of serpentine foliage, which has been re-sited.

The full-length jetty retains its original moulded and carved fascia featuring serpentine vine ornament, small heads and figures, the letters T and P (for Thomas Paycocke), and a shield bearing a merchant's mark of a two-stemmed clover or ermine tail, all in high relief. The jetty plate is carved with blind tracery. Restored attached shafts with chevron-carved capitals and moulded brackets ornament both storeys.

The jetty plate above the upper storey is carved with spiral foliage. The original beams and joists above, which formerly projected to form a second jetty, have been sawn off, and moulded and carved extension pieces were added in 1910.

Brick Nogging

The exposed brick nogging is partly original, partly from 1910. On the lower storey, eight panels are substantially original, and seventeen panels on the upper storey, all laid in opposed triangles pattern. Panels adjacent to the modern windows have been infilled with modern bricks in rectangular patterns. Two panels in reversed blocks pattern on the upper storey appear to use original bricks. This early decorative brickwork is discussed in J. McCann's study "Brick Nogging in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, with examples drawn mainly from Essex" (Transactions of the Ancient Monuments Society, volume 31, 1987, pages 106-133).

Rear and Side Elevations

The upper storey of the rear left wing retains original windows at the rear and right, each with two ovolo mullions (the saddle bars missing). The latter has a later wrought iron casement. The rear elevation has a moulded bressumer and moulded tiebeam. The rear right building displays exposed studding with restored curved tension braces trenched to the outside.

In the main range, all the rear posts continue upwards above the girt which now effectively forms the rear eaves plate; these were sawn off when the building was reduced from three storeys. Structural evidence indicates that the left bay was added shortly after the original build.

Interior: Ground Floor

Close studding with curved bracing trenched into it is exposed in most rooms. The partition wall between the vehicle way and the left ground-floor room has been moved outwards; the transverse beam which originally divided the two is chamfered on the left side and moulded on the right.

In the bay to the left, the axial beam is chamfered, and the joists are chamfered with step stops. In the bay to the right, all the beams are moulded, and the joists are moulded with foliate carved stops. At the rear, the joists are framed around an original stair-trap, now blocked with 20th-century moulded joists; the blocked entrance to the stair is visible in the wall to the right. A similar stair-trap in the floor above originally led to the former second floor.

In the rear wall, a late 16th-century wide wood-burning hearth has a re-used early 16th-century mantel beam with cranked top, moulded soffit, and face carved with animals, the merchant's mark, and scrolls bearing the name Thomas Paycock. The right end is wholly 20th-century restoration, with minor restoration elsewhere. The remainder of this room is lined with original linenfold panelling.

The middle room of two bays has a 20th-century hearth. All the beams and joists are moulded and richly carved with flowing blind tracery; additionally, some joists are carved with the merchant's mark and the initials T.P. and M.P. (for Thomas Paycocke and his first wife Margaret, née Horrold). The plates and beams are carved to form a frieze of similar tracery all around.

In the right ground-floor room, the beams and joists are moulded. The front and rear walls have a frieze of billet moulding. Original doorways to left and rear have moulded jambs and four-centred arched heads with carved spandrels. The small 19th-century hearth is faced with Delft tiles.

Interior: First Floor

Over the first-floor middle and left rooms, the beams and joists are moulded; in the front bays the planks are laid parallel with the joists, across them elsewhere. Over the two outer rooms, the beams are chamfered, and the joists are chamfered with step stops.

In the second room from the left, near the rear left corner, the lower half of one panel retains plaster painted with roses and foliage, with a later painted border half-covering the roses. This room has a wood-burning hearth with an original mantel beam carved with grotesque beasts and the merchant's mark. In the right wall is a blocked original doorway with moulded jambs, the arched head missing.

Above the right room is a blocked original stair-trap; in its left wall is a similar blocked doorway with a mortice for a draught screen. The room between has an 18th-century hearth with rounded interior.

Roof Structure

The roof of the main range is of clasped purlin construction with thin arched wind-bracing, characteristic of the late 16th or early 17th century, and of poorer quality than the remainder of this range. All the rafters are modern. Some charring near the left end reportedly occurred around 1950.

Rear Wings

In the rear left wing, the binding and bridging beams (two in each bay) are chamfered with lamb's tongue stops. Plain joists of horizontal section are jointed to them with soffit tenons with diminished haunches. Arched braces are trenched inside the studding; the posts are jowled. A 17th-century hearth on the upper floor has a plain mantel beam, to which carved timber from elsewhere has been applied. The roof has been rebuilt in gambrel form in the 18th century.

The stair tower has unjowled posts and primary straight bracing. Heavily weathered timber on the rear wall of the main range indicates it was added long after the main construction.

The wing to rear right is of narrow span, with chamfered binding beams and plain joists of horizontal section jointed to them with unrefined soffit tenons. It has a clasped purlin roof with high arched collars.

The building beyond has a chamfered axial beam. To the right of it, plain joists of horizontal section are jointed to it with unrefined soffit tenons; to the left the jointing is of low-central tenons, indicating a sophisticated appreciation of the cantilever effect of the jetty. A complete unglazed window to the right of the upper storey has two diamond mullions and a rebate for a shutter. Thick arched braces support the central tiebeam. The roof is of coupled rafter construction. This frame is illustrated in C.A. Hewett's "The Development of Carpentry, 1200-1700, an Essex study" (1969, pages 135, 137, and 197).

Historical Context

The house was built for Thomas Paycocke, a wealthy clothier, around 1505. His merchant's mark and the initials of himself and his first wife Margaret (née Horrold) appear repeatedly in the carved decoration. The house represents the prosperity of Coggeshall's textile industry in the late medieval period. Historical accounts of the house appear in G.F. Beaumont's "A History of Coggeshall in Essex" (1890, pages 207-9 and 241) and J.S. Gardner's edited volume "Coggeshall, Essex" (1951, page 22). The building is recorded in volume 3 of the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments.