Summary
Part of a medieval moated site at Ickenham with extant waterfilled moats.
Reasons for Designation
Ickenham Manor Farm is scheduled for the following principal reasons:
* Potential: for the waterfilled moats which have the potential to contain well-preserved archaeological deposits which can increase our understanding of the history and development of the site;
* Survival: both the extant and the buried remains have seen little disturbance by later activity, being used as playing fields and garden, and as such the site holds a high degree of potential for further archaeological investigation;
* Group value: for its association with the adjacent medieval manor house, listed Grade I, which helps to contextualise and understand the evolution of the moated site;
* Documentation: documents survive relating to the owners, the Shorediche family, lords of the manor of Ickenham, and together with the C19 maps (which indicate areas where the buried remains would survive) provide a more complete record of the site.
History
Around 6,000 moated sites are known in England. They consist of wide ditches, often water-filled or seasonally water-filled, partly or completely enclosing one or more islands of dry ground on which stood domestic or religious buildings. The majority of moated sites served as prestigious residences with the provision of a moat intended as a status symbol rather than a practical military defence. The peak period during which moated sites were built was between about 1250 and 1350 and by far the greatest concentration lies in central and eastern parts of England. However, moated sites were built throughout the medieval period, are widely scattered throughout England and exhibit a high level of diversity in their forms and sizes. They form a significant class of medieval monument and are important for the understanding of the distribution of wealth and status in the countryside. Many examples provide conditions favourable to the survival of organic remains. Moats were constructed by all seignorial sectors of medieval society, both lay and ecclesiastical. Some were manor houses while others served as the messuages (a dwelling house together with its outbuildings, curtilage, and the adjacent land appropriated to its use) attached to freehold estates.
The site was once the manor of Ickenham and its origins can be traced back to three Saxon holdings amalgamated under Earl Roger of Shrewsbury by the time of Domesday Book. In the second quarter of the C14 the estate was acquired, through marriage, by Nicholas Shorediche and it is likely that the construction of the manor house is related to the acquisition of the site by Nicholas Shorediche at about this time. The manor house (listed Grade I and outside the scheduled area) is a two-storeyed timber-framed house of several phases; the first phase a medieval open hall house dated on stylistic grounds and carpentry (particularly scarf joints) to the mid-late C14. A later cross-wing has been dated by dendrochronology to c 1483. Ickenham was a superior house owned by the lord of Ickenham manor, its value apparent in the quality and degree of decoration and it is a rare representative of a house of this status and quality in Middlesex (Clarke 1991, 111-2).
If a moat once existed around the house, which seems likely, there is no sign of it today except on the western side. The spoil from the excavation of the moat was sometimes used to build up the ground surface of the island inside to level it or to raise it above the water level to make it more habitable. This appears to have been the case with Ickenham Manor as the house is on a higher level than much of the surrounding area which is low-lying and marshy.
Both the 1842 tithe map and the sale plan of 1859 indicate that the moat surrounded the western side of the manor house and continued into the adjacent land to the west to form an outer moat. The sales particulars describe the outer moated land as Pigeon House Orchard, a pasturefield of 4 acres belonging to the manor farm. As much of the area was marshy, the moat may represent repeated attempts to drain the land and keep it free of inundations.
The Shorediche family held the manorial estate until it was sold in 1812 after Michael Shorediche could not pay the mortgage. The next owner and lord of the manor was George Robinson whose heirs sold it to Thomas Truesdale Clarke, lord of the adjoining Swakeleys Manor in 1859. The house with only a few acres of land was purchased in 1961 by Sir Peter Tizard, a descendent of the Shorediche family and it remains in the family. The rest of the land including the outer moated area was sold. The 1962 map indicates that the south side of the moat was still extant, but by 1967 the south side was infilled and the area laid with tennis courts. The outer moated area is now (2015) occupied by playing fields.
Details
The monument includes a medieval moated site surviving as a water-filled earthwork and archaeological remains. It is situated on low-lying flat ground, west of Ickenham Marsh and Yeading Brook. It is likely that the moated area originally comprised an inner and outer moat which could be the work of two phases. It now encloses some 2.23 hectares.
The moat follows a sub-rectangular course and is visible as a water-filled earthwork, about 2.5m wide and 170m long on the western side and 152m long on the northern side. Part of a low bank still exists inside the moated area in the north-west corner. At the north-east corner the moat turns to the north for 25m and widens to become a small pond.
The eastern side is visible on the tithe map of 1842 some of which has been infilled but much survives as a water-filled feature in the garden of Ickenham Manor.
Much of the southern side is now visible on the ground only as a shallow infilled feature. Where it continues into the garden of Ickenham Manor it has widened to include a pond connected by a narrow feeder ditch only.
Exclusions: the scheduled area excludes all modern fences and fence posts, gates or gate posts but the ground beneath these features is included.
