Parsonage Farmhouse

Farmhouse. It likely dates to the 16th century, with significant rearrangement in the late 17th century. The walls are plastered cob on rubble footings, with stone rubble or cob stacks topped with 20th-century brick and a concrete interlocking tile roof, originally thatched. The building was originally a three-room-and-through-passage plan, facing south, with a former inner room (now the kitchen) at the right (east) end. The rear of the passage was blocked in the late 17th century by a staircase, and at the same time, the former service end room was upgraded. The former inner room has a projecting rear lateral stack, and the former service end room has a rear lateral stack. A rear courtyard is enclosed by an outshot to the rear of the former inner room, a gable-ended 19th-century cartshed at a right angle to the rear of the former service end room, and a cob and rubble wall between the two. The main house is two stories high, and has a regular seven-window front featuring mostly 19th-century casement windows, with some 20th-century replacements, and some glazing bars. One first-floor window is blind. The front passage doorway has a 19th-century six-panel door, and there is a secondary plank door at the left end. A length of soffit-chamfered oak wall plate is visible under the eaves. The roof is gable-ended. On the rear wall, a first-floor 17th-century oak three-light window frame with chamfered mullions lights the head of the stairwell. A late 17th-century oak two-light window frame with a flat-faced mullion and an internal head moulding is at first floor level in the inner room end. Internally, the plasterwork and joinery are mostly 19th and 20th century, but the original layout is preserved, so original features are likely hidden. The kitchen (former inner room) has a late 17th-century soffit-chamfered crossbeam with run-out stops. The blocked fireplace here has a late 17th-century soffit-chamfered and straight cut-stopped crossbeam. The hall fireplace is also blocked, and its crossbeam is boxed in. The inner room apparently has no crossbeam; the exposed fireplace is late 17th century, with a curving pent and a reused soffit-chamfered and late step-stopped oak lintel. The roof is inaccessible, and the principal rafters are not visible. The rear courtyard wall and outbuildings form a group value context with the farmhouse.