Higher Manor

Higher Manor is a house originally built as a longhouse in the early to mid-16th century, possibly extended in the 17th century, and substantially altered in the 19th and 20th centuries. It stands in Peter Tavy, Cudlipptown.

The building is constructed of stone rubble walls with a gable-ended roof, slated over the main house with corrugated sheeting covering the former shippon. A rubble stack projects from the right gable end, and there is a rebuilt rendered axial stack.

Originally configured as a longhouse with the shippon occupying the left end, the building contained a through-passage, a hall with newel stairs in a rear projection, and an inner room to the right. The hall stack sits behind the passage in the characteristic longhouse position, though evidence suggests an earlier lateral fireplace existed at the rear of the hall—an unusual but documented feature in longhouses. The equal size of the hall and parlour, and the length of the shippon, suggest the building was substantially remodelled in the 17th century, possibly when the hall stack was relocated. At this stage the inner room became a heated parlour with an outshut constructed to its rear for service functions. The rear door of the passage was blocked at an indeterminate stage.

In the 19th century the house was converted into two self-contained one-room cottages, each with new front doors, and the shippon was entirely separated from the domestic part. The building fell into disuse and reverted to agricultural use in the first half of the 20th century, when the newel stair turret was probably destroyed. In the late 20th century it was converted back to a single house with a plan broadly reflecting its 17th-century arrangement, though the shippon was adapted to semi-domestic use and an outshut built at the rear of the hall. The eaves were considerably heightened at this time.

The exterior presents two storeys with an asymmetrical three-window front to the house using 20th-century metal-frame windows. A 20th-century glazed door to the right of centre enters the inner room. The shippon to the left, with a considerably lower roof-line, features a wide doorway to the right with 20th-century doors and a large 20th-century window on the first floor. The gable end of the shippon is slate hung with original ventilation slits left exposed. The rear wall of the shippon is slightly buttressed at its higher end.

The interior retains the most early features in the hall. The fireplace has a chamfered wooden lintel and probably chamfered granite jambs, with an oven built into its right side. To the right of the fireplace is an interesting arrangement of features related to domestic functions: a hollowed stone built into the rear wall that drained to the outside with a piscina-like function, and below it a granite basin set into the floor that extends beneath the oven projection adjoining the fireplace. The former rear fireplace in the hall now forms a recess with chamfered jambs of dressed granite pieces. At the higher end of the hall, the first step of the newel stairs remains visible in the rear wall. The doorway to the inner room has a shouldered-head wooden frame, partially rebuilt.

Although considerably altered by recent modernisation, the building remains recognisable as a longhouse with several features of architectural interest.