Nattonhole Farmhouse

SX 79 SW DREWSTEIGNTON

5/51 Nattonhole Farmhouse

4.4.85 II*

Farmhouse. Apparently wholly mid C17 but plan suggests earlier origins. Plastered local stone rubble, the east end is exposed with large dressed granite quoins; stone rubble stacks with original granite ashlar chimneyshafts; thatch roof. Plan: a single phase building. Long 4-room-and-through-passage plan Dartmoor longhouse built across the hillslope facing south-south-west, say south. Inner room parlour at right (east) end with projecting gable-end stack. Hall has large axial stack backing onto the passage and large stair turret projecting to rear. Rear of passage now blocked by secondary stair. Kitchen on lower side of passage with large lateral stack projecting to rear. Shippon with hayloft over at left (west) end. It is possible that the hall was originally used as the kitchen and that the lower end kitchen was a later conversion of a dairy. 2 storeys throughout and secondary outshots to rear of hall and inner room parlour. Exterior: main house has an irregular 4-window front, with a fifth to the shippon; all C20 casements with glazing bars. Passage front doorway is just left of centre and now contains a C20 part-glazed 4-panel door behind a contemporary slate-roofed porch. The shippon has a cow doorway with hayloft loading hatch directly above (both containing plain plank doors). Roof is gable-ended. Interior was not available for inspection at the time of this survey and therefore the following account is based on the former list description. Both hall and inner room parlour have crossbeams with double ovolo mouldings. These rooms are separated by an oak plank-and-muntin screen; the muntins have shallow mouldings on both sides and scroll stops to the hall, urn stops to the parlour. Plain carpentry detail in kitchen and shippon. Roof of A-frame trusses mortise-and-tenoned onto short wall posts. The "principal bedroom" (presumably over the inner room parlour) has late C17 ornamental plasterwork featuring a centrepiece of stylised stiff foliage design. Nattonhole is a most interesting house. It is a Dartmoor longhouse completely new- built in the mid C17. Its carpentry detail is very similar to nearly Drascombe Barton (q.v.). It is less than 400m from two other important farmhouses, Drascombe Barton (q.v.) and Hobhouse Farmhouse (q.v.). Source: plan is published in : Peter Beacham. The Dartmoor Longhouse, Devon Archaeology No. 3 (1985) p.25.

Listing NGR: SX7011491718