Day 73. A Timber-Framed Farm Building

The timber-framed barn of Park Farm betrays the presence of another adjoining building.  The joints where its timbers were slotted in are still visible. Rather than being at right-angles, this building was angled at 100 degrees to the barn. It can be seen on a village map of c.1760.

 

 The farmhouse is the L-shaped building on the bottom left. The barn is at the top, the adjoining  building angled downwards.

The building may have been contemporary to the barn, which was built in the late 17^th century.  It was certainly timber-framed, probably wattled and thatched, and may have been destroyed by the same fire that ravaged this end of the barn (see Day 72).

The joints reach to only 1.5m high, so it was a low building, possibly a cowshed. Livestock housing  was typically on the west side of the yard to catch the morning sun, vital for warmth in winter and to provide light for the early morning milkers. The brick building that replaced this structure in the 19^th century was a cowshed. Cows were stalled and milked here until the 1950s. The cows' names are still painted on the walls.