Old Cordwents And Cordwents Cottage

This is a pair of cottages, known as Old Cordwents and Cordwents Cottage, located in Halberton Lower Town. Dating back to the 15th or early 16th century, the cottages have undergone later alterations. They are constructed of roughcast cob with stone footings, some stone facing, and have gabled-end thatched roofs. Originally a three-room, through-passage plan house open to the roof, the higher end is to the left of the passage. A front internal lateral stack, built of stone with a brick shaft dated 1837, heats the hall, while an external end stack (now projecting from a later lean-to) heats the lower end. The inner room remains unheated.

The cottages are two storeys high and have an irregular fenestration pattern. First-floor windows are primarily 2- and 3-light casements, with five of them under eyebrow eaves. One 3-light window has eight leaded panes per light. The ground floor features a single-light window and four 2-light windows, all with 19th or 20th-century casements. There are two doors: one to the former passage, now divided by a party wall between the two cottages, and another inserted later. A lean-to addition at the lower end incorporates a reused 3-light window with ovolo-moulded mullions and a double-ovolo-moulded frame. The rear of the cottages has 2-light casement windows, dating from the 19th and 20th centuries. The building extends along the same axis at the higher end, now converted into a linhay with tallet, weatherboarded to the rear and with a single inserted window to the front.

Detailed descriptions of the interior features, including jointed arches, stud and panel screens (two within the through-passage and one between the hall and parlour), fireplaces, and beams, can be found in published works by N W Alcock and C Hulland, and by Alcock and M Laithwaite. The roof space remains inaccessible. Nos. 1 and 3 Lower Town represent a good example of a medieval house with low screens, which was modernized around 1550 with the insertion of a floor and stack. Historically known as Cordwents Farmhouse, that name now applies to a 20th-century dwelling that is not listed.