Oatens Farmhouse

Oatens Farmhouse is a longhouse that may date back to the late medieval period, with a ceiling added in the 16th century and subsequent alterations and restoration in the 20th century. The building features roughcast over rubble and has a half-hipped thatched roof with stone stacks located at the left gable end and to the left of the through passage. It consists of two rooms to the left of the through passage, which originally formed an open hall, and has two storeys inserted to the right with the end bay open to the roof. The house has one and a half storeys and is arranged in a 2:1 bay configuration, with all 20th-century wooden casements. To the left, there is a two-light window set below the eaves, and the roof continues as a catslide over a projection beside the entrance. A dormer rises from the eaves on the right, while the ground floor features two windows on the left and one to the right of a square-headed plank door.

Inside, there is a recess with canted walls leading into the through passage stack, and a peaked doorframe adjoining it. The fireplace has a chamfered lintel, and there is a blocked bread oven or curing chamber on the facade wall. In the gable end room, a lateral chamfered beam has a step and run-out stops, and a modern grate indicates that there was once a gable entry, now filled with a window. An early 17th-century table with turned legs serves as the lintel for this window, with the legs resting on the window sill and a hollow area beneath. The purpose of the table in this position is unclear; it does not seem to be of high quality to have served as an altar table, possibly hinting at a long-lost joke or an early example of surrealism in Somerset, although the parish was part of Devon until 1896. To the left of the through passage, a smoke-blackened jointed cruck is set into the half-hipped gable end on the front wall, with the rear section cut. There is significant smoke blackening on the roof timbers at this end, likely due to agricultural activity. The upper storey of the dwelling was not visible, making this farmhouse particularly interesting.