Coursebeer Farmhouse

The farmhouse at Coursebeer Farm dates to the early or mid 16th century, with significant alterations in the later 16th and 17th centuries, and an 18th-century extension. It is constructed of cob on stone rubble footings, with plastered front elevations, exposed rear elevations, some brick patching, and granite ashlar in the parlour wing. The farmhouse has granite stacks, two with granite ashlar chimney shafts and moulded coping, and a thatched roof.

The building is L-shaped, situated on a gentle slope. It originally comprised a five-room-and-through-passage plan. An unheated inner room is situated uphill to the west, while the hall features an unusual axial stack backing onto the inner room. The kitchen, located downhill from the passage, has a projecting rear stack, and a small, unheated room below it. An 18th-century byre is positioned at the east end, alongside a projecting parlour block set at right angles to the inner room, and which has its own gable-end stack of granite ashlar.

The original house likely began as an open hall house, though the inaccessible roof space makes its original layout unclear. The hall fireplace may be original or a 16th or 17th-century insertion. The hall was floored in the early 17th century, and the parlour wing was presumably added around the same time. The kitchen stack’s insertion date is uncertain, but is likely 17th century. The farmhouse is two storeys throughout.

The front elevation exhibits a nearly symmetrical three-window arrangement centered around the front doorway. The windows are late 19th and 20th-century casements with glazing bars, with one first-floor window rising into the eaves, and a late 19th-century four-panel door within a matching slate-roofed porch with trellis walls. External stone steps lead to an agricultural store situated above the dairy space. A 20th-century door opens to the dairy, and a byre door has a hayloft loading hatch above. The main roof is hipped at both ends.

Internal inspection was limited to some areas. The inner room and parlour wing were not accessible. The remainder of the interior appears largely 16th and 17th century, with little modern alteration. A 16th-century oak plank-and-muntin screen, with worn stops to the chamfered muntins, lines the upper side of the passage. A massive semi-circular block of oak forms the stair from the passage to the hall, while the passage chamber juts into the lower end of the hall. The hall fireplace is granite with a soffit-chamfered oak lintel. Crossbeams in the hall are soffit-chamfered with run-out stops. The kitchen’s interior is largely plain, and the fireplace has been blocked. The roof over the hall and passage is supported by two true crucks, but the roof space is inaccessible; the kitchen and dairy roof is a modern replacement.