Lower Chichacott Cottage

Lower Chichacott Cottage is a house that originated as a farmhouse in the early to mid-16th century and underwent alterations in the 17th century before being modernised in the 20th century. It stands in the Chichacott hamlet near Okehampton.

The building is constructed of plastered stone rubble walls with some cob to the wall tops. It has a hipped reinforced plastic thatched-style roof. The chimney stack is rendered stone rubble with dripstones and a late 20th-century brick shaft at the right-hand end.

The building follows a longhouse derivative plan, with a shippon (livestock shelter) at the right end separated by a stone partition from the domestic end. The domestic portion consists of a cross passage with the hall to the left and a very narrow service room at the higher end. A shallow two-storey hall projection exists at the higher end, which is unlikely to have been part of the original design. All internal partitions are solid walls.

The house was originally open to the roof over the hall and possibly over the lower end as well, though lack of roof space access prevents confirmation of smoke-blackening from an original open hearth. The relationship of the hall fireplace to the ceiling suggests the stack formerly heated an open hall. The projecting hall bay was likely added when the hall was ceiled to provide light to the room above. The lower end, notably more regular in shape, was probably rebuilt and possibly extended in the 18th or early 19th century. In the later 20th century, the shippon was converted to domestic use with doorways inserted to allow internal access to the lower end.

The front elevation is asymmetrical with three windows on the upper floor and six on the ground floor. The former shippon to the right has a lower roof-line, whilst the two-storey gabled hall bay projects towards the left-hand end. All windows are 20th-century casements with one, two, or three lights and glazing bars, except for the first-floor window to the projection, which is a 19th-century three-light casement. The first-floor opening to the right was originally a loading hatch to the shippon loft. A 20th-century plank door stands to the left of centre beneath a 20th-century gabled doorhood.

Two original roof trusses survive in the interior. One over the hall, close to its stack, is a true cruck with threaded purlins and morticed cranked collar, stained dark with what appears to be encrustation resembling sooting from an open hearth. The other truss, likely originally identical, has had its front foot cut off and its collar removed. The trusses over the shippon are much lighter and rougher, likely dating to the 19th century. Other original features include the doorway to the hall from the passage, which has a wooden frame with a shouldered cranked head, a form distinctive to this part of Devon, and the doorway to the inner room with a shouldered segmental head and slightly bowed jambs. These different forms may reflect the different status of the two rooms. The hall fireplace may be later, featuring a very high wooden lintel higher than ceiling level, roughly dressed granite jambs, and a stone oven. The ceiling has one chamfered cross beam with draw stops.

Despite recent alterations, the house preserves numerous original features, and its interesting and slightly puzzling original plan form remains evident. It forms part of an unspoilt hamlet of early farmhouses.