NHER 44717 (Building record) - Church Cottage, Church Street

June 1981. Listed, Grade II.
Listing Description Excerpt:
"17th to 18th century timber-frame cottage, plastered. Thatched roof with gabled and hipped ends. Internal brick chimney stack in gable end. One storey and attic. One small dormer at eaves level. Two window range. 19th century casements. Plank door off centre. Modern lean-to on south end."
Information from (S1).
Please consult the National Heritage List for England (S1) for the current listing details.
A. Cattermole (NLA), 7 June 2006. Amended by J. Cullis (HES), 27 November 2019.

February 2012. Inspection prior to repair.
The timber-framed cottage has a simple two-bay plan divided into three bays plus a narrow bay at the southern end. This bay contains the stack which is contempoary with the brick gable -end. The stack is an 18th-century insertion in the former smoke bay. (a smoke bay is half way between an open hearth and a chimney proper where the smoke exits through a louvre above a narrow bay which contains the fire smoke to a degree). The pair of principal posts which support the fine chamfered bridging joist have provision for this beam. The jowls of the posts in the upper room have been cut away and the tie beam they supported, removed. There are three surviving tie beams: the northern one supports the hipped roof; the second one is braced and has provision for a queen post which has since gone; the southern one is hidden behind a partition but on investigation it can be seen that it has the queen posts in situ but without the collar yet the triangular purlin survives in part. The rest of the roof structure is more recent but probably of 18th-century date. The roof over the hipped end is a jumble of timbers that have been repaired in a variety of ways.
The side walls contain several windows of which one has been exposed to reveal diamond mullions. The northern corner posts have bracing to plate and tie. The frame has scratched numbering. A primary stud partition divided the house into two unequal parts. The studs have gone but the mortises remain with a large central mortise for a post. The doorway is in its original position next to the former partition at the low end of the hall. It leads into a through passage to the door opposite which is now blocked. The unheated room to the north of the former partition was the service end possibly divided into two rooms but there is no evidence. Some of the windows in the ground floor rooms are of interest and of early date. Three windows have their original metal casements of which that to the north east has a spring latch with decorative pull. The two to the west have their simple mullions, are set within the openings in the frame and have some interesting ironwork. The sill beams have largely rotted away and been underbuilt. Sections survive well in the north east corner. The boarded front door has incised decoration in the form of intersecting 'Y' tracery. This is rather obscured by paint.
The exterior of the building is plastered and thatched and strikingly attractive next to Morningthorpe parish church. The eaves of the building are very wide achieved by sprockets attached to the tops of the wall plates. This may be as a result of the 18th-century re-roofing. There is a modern lean-to to the south gable-end which contains a lavatory and a bathroom.
This is a good example of an early post-medieval house of circa 1570. It is very small yet of high quality which suggests a special function and its position suggests a connection with the church. This type of small house appears to be a distinctive aspect of Norfolk's early post medieval buildings. It had a smoke bay and remains of a queen post roof which is almost unique to south Norfolk and north central Suffolk. It has not suffered from unsuitable modernisation with the bathroom just an external addition.
S. Heywood (HES), 02 February 2012