Old Thatch TA909 (two dwellings)

Old Thatch is a high status medieval building. The timber-framing of four bays, with a service bay to the west, a central two bay hall, and a solar bay with an end jetty to the east, is clearly visible along the rear elevation. At the high end of the hall there is a beautifully constructed plank and muntin screen below a mounded dais beam. There are indications of an internal window from the solar chamber into the hall, an uncommon feature which is more often found in high status houses. The chimney stack serving two hearths and the flooring at the western end of the hall were probably inserted c1580.

The decorative detail and plan indicate a dating of 1450-1500. The hall bay appears to have been floored c1580, after which the first floor window would have been rebuilt on the site of the wooden mullioned hall window on the southern elevation. This flooring may have been associated with a single chimney stack within the service end of the central hall, retaining a cross passage behind. A later brick stack blocked the cross passage but there was still enough room for a baffle-entry. The newels to the present stair within the service bay suggest a date in the early 1600s but, as there is no other trimmer, it is clearly a development on the site of the original stair. The details and dimensions of the original house, as well as the standard of the later adaptations, all suggests that its occupants/owners had considerable local status over several generations. This would have been a significant dwelling in the settlement until it dropped down the social scale, probably from the mid-1700s when building fashions began to change and expectations were different. In 1840 the house was in use as two cottages.

Old photographs show the house thatched, hipped at both ends and standing apart from the Victorian wing projecting eastwards towards the road.

These notes have been compiled from survey reports prepared by Dr Annabelle Hughes.
The full reports have been deposited in the Sussex Archaeological Society Library, Barbican House, Lewes, where they can be consulted by researchers.

Old Thatch and Attrees c1920
Reproduced by kind permission of Mike Green

Tithe Data

Cottages (2) & yard
(Old Thatch, Tudor Cottages)

1841 Census

Tenement Analysis

Buildings

Archaeology

Old Maps

Further Information