Tortington Priory Barn, to the North of Priory Farm

Details

ARUNDEL

692/9/10006 PRIORY ROAD 20-SEP-84 Tortington Priory Barn, to the north o f Priory Farm (Formerly listed as: FORD ROAD BARN AT PRIORY FARM, ARUNDEL, TO THE S OUTH EAST OF THE FARMHOUSE)

II* A single-aisled, six-bay, late C17 or early C18 barn, incorporating medieval fabric.

MATERIALS: stone rubble and flint with weatherboarding and a thatched hipped roof.

EXTERIOR: The barn is aligned east-west, and the south wall of the barn incorporates part of the ruined north wall of the nave of the Augustinian Priory church, standing to about three quarters of its original height. The remains of the former nave wall were breached to form an opening for one of the barn's opposed double doors. This southern double door now has C19 brick dressings to one side and a modern glazed door. This south wall has the remains of three mid-C13 vaulting shafts with bell capitals. The two shafts either side of the door are each made up of three smaller shafts supporting a circular abacus, from which spring the stumps of vault ribs. Traces of windows are visible to the rear of the right-hand shaft. About half of the east gable end wall of the barn is composed of part of the rubble-built west wall of the north transept of the church, visible on both the exterior and interior of the east barn wall, and standing to about three-quarters of its original height. Both east and west gable ends are weatherboarded to their upper parts, the east end having a four-light window in the weatherboarding. The west gable end of the barn has a doorway inserted with a modern half-glazed plank door. The north wall of the barn has modern double plank doors, opposing the double door on the south side, with stone dressings. All walls have ventilation slits with stone dressings.

INTERIOR: The roof comprises five queen-post trusses and staggered purlins are tenoned into the principals. The single aisle is on the north side of the building. The jowled arcade posts are set on stone pads and have mortices in their outer faces for aisle ties and arched braces to the tie beams. Arched braces on the south side spring from the stone wall, which supports the trusses and rafters on this side. Internal framing for the wagon entrance on the south side was removed during the conversion to accommodate modern doors. On the north side the roof slopes down, possibly to a winnowing door on that side, a common C17 arrangement. The floor of the barn is of C18 stone tile.

HISTORY: The barn stands on the site of the priory church of the Augustinian Priory of Tortington, founded c1180, probably by Hadwissa Corbet (Alicia de Corbet). For most of its history the record of the small priory was one of decay, neglect and disorder, and at the time of the Dissolution (1536), the priory came automatically within the scope of the Act. However the walls of the church were not completely levelled and, in the late C17 or early C18, using the abundant stone left on the site after the demolition of the remainder of the priory, stone was added to the north and west of the remaining upstanding church walls in order to construct the barn. The external south and east elevations of the barn were originally the internal north nave wall and the west wall of the north transept. The barn now forms an entrance lobby to a courtyard around which a bungalow was built in the 1990s.

SOURCES: The Boxgrove History Group, Tortington and the Black Canons (2002). N Griffin, An Archaeological Evaluation at Priory Farm, Tortington, Arundel, West Sussex (2002). I Nairn and N Pevsner, The Buildings of England: Sussex (1985) p354.

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION: The late-C17 or early-C18 threshing barn at Priory Farm is designated at Grade II* for the following principal reasons: * Architectural interest: as a well-preserved late-C17 or early C18 barn incorporating medieval fabric of the priory church which stood on the site * Historic interest: as the last remaining upstanding medieval fabric of Tortington Priory * Group value: for its direct association with the scheduled medieval priory.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

413992

Legacy System:

LBS

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