Tithe Cottage

Tithe Cottage is a house dating probably from the late 16th century, with later alterations and additions in the 17th and 19th centuries. The walls are rendered, revealing some timber-framing with rendered infill, set on a stone plinth. The main part of the house has four bays and two-and-a-half stories, one room deep, with rear additions including a single-storey one-bay wing at a right angle to the road, and a three-bay single-storey wing on the left gable. The house’s gable faces the road, with the entrance on the left side.

The ground floor timber framing has largely been replaced by a rendered wall, but incorporates a late 20th-century twelve-pane window, a sash window to the left, and a two-panel front door with semi-circular heads to the panels. An open, gabled porch with heavy square posts and openwork timber sides and gable covers the door. Three two-light casements are on the left, with an external brick chimney between the first two. A single-storey cider house is at the left end, with a boarded door and shuttered window, covered by a half-hip roof. The first floor has a rendered gable end on the right, with square two-panel framing, a brace to the wallplate, and a three-light casement in an oriel, supported by shaped brackets below. The eaves are slightly raised. To the left, the framing changes to close-studded, single-panel high framing, with two two-light casements and a chimney. A further three similar windows are present, with the first in square panel framing and the remainder set within a rendered wall replacing timber framing. A chimney is on the right gable, and a two-light casement is in a gabled dormer to the left of the lateral chimney. The rear wall is timber-framed.

Inside, a timber-framed wall is on the right of the entrance. A high-level beam has been reset, with cambered heads to three doors indicating a former cross-passage, though positioned too high for its original location. The floor beams over the room on the right have a heavy chamfer with bar stops. A wide brick gable fireplace features, with ovolo moulding to the timber lintel. A three-plank door retains original hinges. Ceiling beams are heavily chamfered over the hall and a room above, with a decorative stop to the chamfer of a ceiling beam in the first-floor room on the right. The roof structure comprises tie-beam trusses, struts, one-pair purlins in the weakest plane, and a heavy ridge member. The end wing has paving for a cider mill floor, angle-strut trusses, one pair of purlins, and a square ridge. The house appears originally to have been a three-bay building, enlarged one bay towards the road in the 17th century by removing the original ground-floor gable. A single-storey wing along the road is said to have been a butcher’s shop. The cottage forms a group with the adjacent church.