Parsonage Farm

Parsonage Farm is a house, formerly a farmhouse, dating from the mid- to late 16th century with extensions in the 17th century and early 19th century, located in Over Stowey.

The building is constructed of rubble stone walls, partly lime-washed and partly rendered, with a brick wall forming a 19th-century infill between the south wall of the north wing and stair turret. Tile roofs and brick stacks complete the external structure. Windows are mostly replacement timber casements and 20th-century uPVC windows, though several blocked 17th-century mullioned windows remain exposed.

The house follows an essentially U-shaped plan. The earliest part is the south rear wing, to which a three-room through passage range of single depth was added in the late 16th century, aligned north to south as the principal range. Early 17th-century upgrades included extending the front range southward to accommodate a new parlour with chamber above, the addition of a rear stair turret, and construction of the north rear wing. Later 20th-century lean-to additions on the north and south sides have been added.

The main west elevation has four bays with an off-centre entrance and a 19th-century brick and timber porch. Window openings are positioned left and right of the entrance at ground floor, with three at first floor. The north gable wall features a single storey lean-to with a casement window above, adjacent to the three-bay northern rear wing. A lean-to conservatory runs along part of this elevation. The rear east wall of the wing has a central external brick stack with a casement window to the right and a buttress to the left, with windows at first floor either side of the stack. The return wall contains a doorway and a 17th-century flat mullioned timber window of at least four lights, recently exposed but with lights remaining blocked; a second mullioned window has also been uncovered nearby. Between the two wings stands a full-height stair turret from the early 17th century, featuring a six-light ovolo moulded mullioned window. The north wall of the south wing has a wide doorway with a buttress to the left; its rear east wall is similarly buttressed with a 19th-century window opening at ground floor and another above. The return has mostly 20th-century ground floor openings and 19th-century first floor ones with brick tile sills. A 20th-century single storey lean-to conservatory occupies much of this elevation. The front range roof was heightened in the early 19th century, visible in the stonework of the upper south gable end, which also displays a 20th-century ground floor doorway and uPVC first floor window.

The interior displays significant architectural interest. The through passage and left-hand room now form a single space containing an open-fire basket fireplace and slightly concave chamfered ceiling beams with step and run-out stops. The right-hand beam has regularly spaced peg-holes indicating the former position of a timber partition screen to the passageway. The central room features a large inglenook fireplace with a replacement bressumer; a recess flanking the east end possibly marks early winder stairs. This room has a six-panel framed ceiling of deeply chamfered beams not extending the full width, suggesting the room was originally smaller and enlarged in the 17th century when the parlour was extended. A 17th-century flat-headed doorway in the east wall of the central room has ovolo moulded surrounds with run-out stops to the jambs, opening into the south wing. The parlour has moulded coving and an inglenook fireplace, reduced in size at its left end when a French door was inserted in the 20th century. The hearth has been blocked and replaced with a smaller opening, though the wooden bressumer, missing its east end, remains visible with ovolo moulding.

The south wing, considered the earliest part of the house, has deeply chamfered ceiling beams with step and run-out stops, an open fireplace in the south wall, and a blocked window in the north wall. Drainage channels cut into the floor of the eastern half suggest this wing may have once served as a dairy or cheese room. The rear stair turret between the two wings contains a fine late 18th or early 19th-century staircase. The chamber above the parlour displays decorative 17th-century plasterwork over the mantel to the south wall depicting Adam and Eve, with the right-hand side angled to reflect the original roof pitch before the early 19th-century rebuilding. The front range roof is understood to be of more recent construction over earlier trusses with mortice and tenoned apexes, tenoned collars, and butt purlins. The north wing has similar roof trusses. The south wing roof carpentry comprises trusses with cambered collars; at the west end is a closed truss of staves and wattle and daub.

Adjacent subsidiary structures include a former single-storey stable block attached to the north side, built of rubble stone with brick dressings to windows and a central gable containing a stable door that appear to be 19th-century insertions. The interior has been converted to a pottery studio but retains a cobbled floor. Opposite stands a former cartshed, also with rubble stone walls, though its king post roof is a late 20th-century replacement.

The site has a long history. Documentary sources indicate the land passed from Stogursey Priory to the Bishop of Bath and Wells in 1239, was exchanged in 1326 with St Mark's Hospital in Bristol for lands elsewhere, and around 1541 passed to the Mayor and Commonalty of Bristol. Parsonage Farmhouse is a late 16th or early 17th-century house built on the site of the former rectory. Field investigation has identified earthworks to the north that may be remains of a post-medieval ornamental garden later replanted as an orchard. Historic fabric analysis indicates the current house was enlarged in the 17th century and underwent further alterations and remodelling in 1816. The city corporation sold the estate to a tenant in 1840, and by 1919 it had been absorbed into the Quantock Estate.