Medieval manor house and platform at Tyneham House

Summary

Remains of the medieval manor house of Tyneham, formerly an open hall house of the 14th century; altered in the late 16th century, early 19th century. It was abandoned in 1943 after requisition by the War Office. Some alterations were made in the late 20th century.

Reasons for Designation

The remains of the medieval manor house of Tyneham, formerly an open hall house, is listed at Grade II* for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:
* it represents a substantial survival of a significant, high-status medieval dwelling;
* the smoke-blackened hall roof is an excellent example of high quality medieval craftsmanship and has few close parallels in Dorset, being an important and early survival;
* although incomplete, the house's historical development can be read in the surviving fabric and contributes to our understanding of domestic vernacular architecture.

Historic interest:
* the building illustrates well the hierarchy of spaces in the medieval period and how living arrangements evolved subsequently. The early C19 alterations reflect its downgrading to an ancillary function.

History

The manor of Tyneham on the Isle of Purbeck appears to have been in the possession of the Russell family in the C14, possibly a junior branch of the family whose principal seat was at Kingston Russell to the west of Dorchester. In the C14 a manor house was built to the east of Tyneham village, which is recorded as Tigeham in the Domesday Book, situated within a broad wooded valley. It appears to have probably been a four-bay structure with an open hall. It has been suggested (Bond, see Sources) that a mid-C16 wing was built to the east, prior to the main phase of redevelopment of the house. Little is known of this wing.

In the early C15 Tyneham passed through marriage to the Chykes (Chicks or Chekes) and by the mid-C16 it had been sold to the Williams family, four generations of whom held it. Large additions, effectively a new house, to the east and north-east of the medieval manor house were constructed between 1563 and 1583 (The Architectural and Topographical Record, see Sources). They are attributed to Henry Williams, whose initials and the date 1583 appeared over the east entrance of the new principal range. The C14 manor house was retained but altered, with a new doorway and windows and the insertion of a first floor within the hall. A stone fireplace was added in the early C19; its form is consistent with a late-C16 date and with it having been used previously as a kitchen fireplace. Sources (Bond, 1956) suggest that it came from the mid-C16 wing to the east which was demolished in the 1820s. By the late C19 the building was used as a bakery, beer cellar, dairy and for storage.

The late-C16 addition to the north-east of the original house comprised an east-facing rectangular principal range which had a Classical porch and a staircase wing to the rear. A new wing was shortly built to the north-west and was itself enlarged in the C17. In 1691 the manor of Tyneham was acquired by lawyer and MP Nathaniel Bond and the house was settled on his younger son; the family’s principal seat was Creech Grange to the south of Wareham. During the C18 and C19 Tyneham House was occupied and updated by various members of the Bond family. In the 1820s a large-scale reorganisation of the house, including further additions, alterations and internal refurbishment, was carried out by the Reverend William Bond. The late-C16 wing on the east side of the former medieval house, and south of the Elizabethan principal range, was demolished and replaced with a new south range of two storeys. It is described in an article in Country Life from 1935 as being ‘on the site of the old kitchen, which had a large seven-light mullion window in its eastern wall’. The courtyard (west) elevation of early-C19 rear addition was rebuilt in 1914.

In 1941 Tyneham House was requisitioned by the RAF as an administrative centre and billet for the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force who were based at the nearby radar station at Brandy Bay. The Bond family also continued to live there until December 1943 when some 7500 acres which included Tyneham House, Tyneham village, nearby hamlets and farms were requisitioned by the War Office as part of an expansion of Lulworth Camp where a Royal Armoured Corps Gunnery School had been established in 1917. All local inhabitants were required to leave, displacing more than 200 people. The evacuation was intended to be temporary, but after the war the area was retained for military use and was compulsorily purchased by the War Office in 1948. There followed several long-running, but unsuccessful campaigns to allow the former residents to return to their homes. In 1974 a government White Paper was published re-affirming that Tyneham continued to be essential for military training.

After the war Tyneham House was never re-occupied. It was inspected by the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments of England (RCHME) in 1947, as part of their preparations for their Inventory volumes on Dorset, although the original medieval manor house was not surveyed until the 1960s. The condition of the late-C16 and later parts of the building deteriorated significantly during the second half of the C20; the roofs were stripped of lead by thieves, resulting in water ingress. In 1958 the Ancient Monuments Commission reviewed the building’s condition and found it to be beyond repair. In the late 1960s the Ministry of Works removed some architectural features from the Elizabethan and later parts of the house which was then largely demolished and survives only as a ruined shell. The medieval house to the south-west survived, however, a C16 doorcase and a window of the same date were removed. In about 1975 the stone roof tiles which by then were considered too heavy for the trusses were replaced with a covering of metal sheeting.

Details

Remains of a former open-hall house; C14 and altered in the late C16, early C19 and late C20.

MATERIALS
It is constructed of Purbeck stone rubble, brought to course, under a late-C20 roof covering of corrugated metal sheeting. It previously had a stone slate roof.

PLAN
The extant building has a rectangular footprint and is orientated on a roughly south-west to north-east alignment, although the cardinal compass points are used here. It represents three bays of a probable four-bay structure (or perhaps three bays with a cross wing at the east end).

EXTERIOR
The doorway and window openings in both the south and north elevations appear to be later insertions and there is no indication of original entrances. The north elevation appears to have been partly rebuilt in the late C16. It has a central doorway with a modern plank door which previously had a C16 surround with a four-centred arch and plain shields in the spandrels. This was present in 1968 (RCHME) but was removed probably in the late C20. A C16 mullion two-light first-floor window above the doorway has also been removed. On the ground floor, to either side of the entrance is a window, though the one in the west bay has been altered to a doorway; the remaining first-floor windows are horizontal sliding timber sashes. The openings are boarded over. A blocked doorway in the east gable wall previously led to a later single-storey building.

INTERIOR
The hall is formed of the east and central bays but may have possibly extended to an additional bay to the east which does not survive. It is divided vertically by a cross wall of random stone rubble and horizontally by a first floor; both added in the late C16. On the ground floor, the east room contains a large late-C16 fireplace that appears to have replaced an earlier fireplace. It has a segmental-pointed arched stone surround which is supported by a late-C20 wooden frame. It may have originally been in the mid-C16 wing that is mentioned by Bond and is described as the ‘old kitchen’ in the Country Life article from 1935 that was located to the east of the C14 house and was rebuilt in the 1820s as a dining room. A full-height timber-framed partition (closed truss) divides the hall from the former service bay to the west. At ground-floor level it has later brick infill but retains evidence of a pair of C14 doorways. The jambs of the north doorway and one to the south doorway survive, they are chamfered and are jointed into a finely-moulded cross beam with quarter-round moulding on the east, hall side. The west side of the partition contains an upright with a curved head that projects at right angles and appears be the remains of a jamb for a doorway. It may be evidence of a lateral partition in the service bay which would have originally been divided into a buttery and pantry. A doorway at the north end of the partition is an historic insertion that was later blocked by the addition of the stone staircase to the east. At first-floor level, the partition’s wattle and daub infill does not survive but there is a central stud with a pair of curved braces on the south side of it. The braces to the north are missing, although redundant mortices indicate their positions. One brace was removed when a first-floor doorway was added, and the other was still extant in 1965. Above the tie beam there is wattle and daub infill, a central stud and four cranked braces that rise to the slightly-cambered collar. Above the collar are two raking struts. The upper parts of the partition’s east side are smoke blackened.

On the ground floor of the service bay the partition contains an upright post with a curved head that projects at right angles into the room. It appears to be the remains of a jamb for a doorway and may be evidence of a lateral partition in the service bay which would have originally been divided into a buttery and pantry. There is also evidence that the ground floor was ceiled over, probably the late C16 at the same time as the floor was inserted in the hall. It is unclear if the service bay originally had an upper floor but given the early date of the building it is more likely it was open to the roof. The floor inserted into the hall is reached by a winder stone newel stair to the right of the entrance and is supported by an axial chamfered beam with stepped run-out stops.

The roof over the hall includes an open truss between the central and eastern bays which has an arch-braced collar beam with cusped braces (the lower parts are missing) that curve upwards to form an ogee at the centre. The principals are supported on timber posts that rise from first-floor level and are partially buried within the north and south walls. The RCHME suggests that a short horizontal beam, which has been cut back, originally projected from each post to form a false hammer beam arrangement that supported the arch braces. Above the collar are two cusped struts that form an open quatrefoil at their centre. Many of the pegs project westwards from the truss which indicates that the high end of the hall was towards the east. Other elements of the original medieval roof structure over the hall survive reinforced with late-C20 timbers and comprise two rows of purlins with two tiers of wind braces supporting them and common rafters. All are smoke blackened. The lower row of purlins have the quarter round moulding on their lower edge while the upper ones have a simpler plain chamfered edge. The lower tier of wind braces are also more decorative than the upper tier, with cusping to their lower edge. The purlins and wind braces can be seen continuing in the same form beyond the later stone stack but beyond this (to the east) the roof has been replaced with later timbers. Part of the roof over the service bay is concealed by later plaster but the rafters that are exposed are replacements. It is unclear if it retains any surviving medieval roof timbers.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURE
In front of the building, and running the length of it, is a raised stone rubble platform that has steps leading to the entrance.

Sources

Books and journals
Bond, L, Tyneham. A Lost Heritage (1956, reprinted 1984),
Tyneham, Dorset. The Seat of Mr. Ralph Bond in Country Life, ,Vol. LXXVII , (April 6 1935), 348-353

Websites
W I Travers, Parish of Tyneham, Dorsetshire, The Architectural and Topographical Record March-December Part III Vol 1 (1908), accessed 26 June 2024 from https://tynehamopc.org.uk/off-limits/tyneham-house/
Tyneham, An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Dorset, Volume 2, South east (1970), pp. 299-303 British History Online , accessed 2 July 2024 from http://www.british-history.ac.uk/rchme/dorset/vol2/pp299-303

Other
Dorset manor house being given away (9 April 1968), The Times

End of official list entry