THE HOUSE

8
The house

The British roundhouse, the Roman villa and the

Anglo-Saxon hall many of them built in the same
place through successive
centuries have gone into the earth. A few ruined
villas remain as evidence of ancient civilization,
but most of them are now part of the land on which
they once rested.
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries the
standard house consisted of one square room on
the ground floor, with another square room built
above it; access to the latter was generally granted
by means of an external staircase. The furniture
was simple, and scarcely varied at all from that of
the Anglo-Saxons. A board laid on trestles acted as
a dining table, and a wooden bench was the
primary form of seating. In the houses built of
stone, alcoves or recesses in the wall could be
used for the same purpose. There were very few
chairs or stools, except for the chair of state in
noble households. Some of the richer families
might own chests, coffers and cupboards; the bed
was essentially a bag of straw laid upon a carved
frame.
Only the wealthy possessed houses of stone
with a 'hall' on the ground floor. A larger proportion
of families owned houses built of wood and
thatched with straw or reeds or heather; the

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windows boasted no glass, but wooden shutters

could be barred at night for safety and comfort.
Nevertheless the wooden house was always

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FOUNDATION

draughty and smoky. It was generally on two floors,

like its stone counterpart, with a living room and
kitchen on the ground floor; on the upper storey
was a bedroom for the master of the house and his
family. In the poorer dwellings the inhabitants
would sleep on the floor, with heather or straw as
their bedding. There might be a wooden booth in
front of the house, where goods and produce could
be sold; behind the house might be located a
warehouse or small factory where those goods
were manufactured.
The poorer sort had no such resources, most of
them living in huts of wattle and daub that were
little different from those of the early Britons. At
the level of absolute need, there are no variations.
Peasant buildings, in the countryside, had a limited
rate of survival; they either crumbled, or were
pulled down, within two generations. They rise
from the land and return to it. A form of tenure in
Hampshire was known as keyhold tenure'; if a
person could build a hut or house in one night, and
have his fire lit before morning, then his residency
was assured.
The style and method of peasant construction
survived for many hundreds, if not thousands, of
years. At the beginning of the twentieth century, for
example, Thomas Hardy recalled the method of
building used in his childhood. 'What was called
mud-wall', he wrote, 'was really a composition of
chalk, clay and straw essentially unbaked brick.
This was mixed up into a sort of dough-pudding
close to where the cottage was to be built. The
mixing was performed by treading and shovelling
women sometimes being called in to tread and
the straw was added to bind the mass together . . .
It was then thrown by pitch-forks on to the wall,
where . . . it was left to settle for a day or two.'
When the fabric had dried and hardened in the sun,
the roof was built of thatch. This was the method

THE HOUSE

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used by the Britons before the coming of Rome. It

was used by the English during the reign of
Victoria.
The dimensions of a modest thirteenth-century
house are given in a Worcestershire court roll of
1281; it was of one storey, 30 feet long (9 metres)
and 14 feet broad (4.25 metres), with three doors
and two windows. The windows were on each side,
to be left open when a cool breeze blew, but stuffed
with straw or fern in inclement weather. The family
would have eaten and slept together within the
same room. This was not a period in which the
private self can
be said to exist. A thirteenth-century cottage
excavated in Berkshire consisted of one room, 10
by 12 feet (3 by 3.6 metres), and another in
Yorkshire had dimensions of 10 by 20 feet (3 by 6
metres). The room was generally open to the roof,
with a central hearth. In the longhouses of the
same period the rooms were used for livestock as
well as people, together with a store of grain. The
inhabitants were living and sleeping side by side
with their animals.
Houses were lengthened, or rebuilt, or
extended, as time and occasion demanded. Certain
improvements, from human industry and human
ingenuity, were possible. The houses of the
eleventh century were made of clay without timber
frames; by the thirteenth century most houses
were constructed with timber frames and, less
than a century later, the walls were being erected
on stone bases to curb damp and decay. The
beaten-earth floors were generally strewn with
rushes that became so moist and dirty that they
were known as 'the marsh'. The first evidence of
chimney pots comes from Whitefriars, just south of
Fleet Street, in London; in 1278 Ralph de

Crockerlane was selling clay chimney pots in that

quarter.
Yet the essential structure of the dwelling
remained identical for many hundreds of years.
The furniture was scanty, household items
rudimentary; the spoons and dishes were generally
made of wood by members of the family. There
might have been a few brass pots and cups. A bed
acted in the daytime as a seat. These were bare
rooms for bare living. It is surprising, perhaps, that
richer and poorer agricultural workers of England
tended to live in the same kind of dwelling;
whatever their economic circumstances, they
reverted to the ancient model. It is another
indication of the customary traditions of the
countryside. In the larger houses the same identity
of purpose can be found, with a central hall flanked
by smaller rooms. One gradual change did occur:
towards the end of the thirteenth century more
provision was made, at least in the larger towns,
for adequate drainage and cesspit systems.
Houses from the fourteenth century have
survived in far greater numbers than those of any
earlier period. They are generally more solid and
substantial than their predecessors, and in London
they often attained three storeys with a height
between 30 and 40 feet (9 and 12 metres). A visitor
from the country would have been surprised by
these urban 'skyscrapers', quite a new thing in
England.

From the middle of fourteenth-century London, too,

come fragments of small yellow bricks. The
townhouse of a wealthy merchant
from that century was highly decorated, with
interiors of colour
and of costliness; tapestries, curtains and hangings
draped the walls. Tiles, rather than rushes, were
laid upon the floors; finely glazed
pottery was imported from France and Spain,
sparkling glass from Venice and silks from Persia.
This was still in great contrast to the rudimentary
furnishings of the ordinary English house, but the
appetite for luxury and colour slowly spread among
the wealthier families. In the fifteenth century
inventories of the richer households include such
items as cushions and tapestries, painted cloths
and carpets, basins and screens, wainscoting and
coverings for benches and chairs. The colours
would by modern standards of taste be considered
inharmonious, with strident yellows and purples
and greens placed beside each other. The intended
effect was one of brilliancy and vivacity. That is
why an image of the sun was sometimes
embroidered on cloths and tapestries and articles
of dress. In a similar spirit men often wore shoes of
different colours. Brick and glass became more
common. Open hearths were being replaced by
fireplaces.
The objects of medieval life are still recovered
from the ground. Traces of wooden stools and of
other pieces of furniture, undisturbed for many
hundreds of years, have been found at Winchester
and Beverley. Two locks were smashed with an axe
before being discarded; another lock was repaired
by its owner. The vast quantity of medieval locks
and padlocks, found within the excavated spaces,
suggests a life of threat or at least of suspicion and
caution. Medieval life was dominated by the key.

Candlesticks, of lead and copper alloy, have

been taken from the earth by archaeological teams.
By the fifteenth century these candlesticks have
become larger, an indication that candles had
increased in thickness. This in turn suggests
greater wealth. So from small material details we
may be able to reach larger conclusions. Hanging
lamps of glass began to take the place of hanging
lamps of stone or ceramic by the end of the
thirteenth century; oil lamps, in which a wick
floated upon a small pool of oil, were being
replaced by candles at the beginning of the
fourteenth century. Vessels of wood (generally of
ash) are to be found everywhere,
FOUNDATION
but glass was becoming popular among the
wealthier families by the fourteenth century. There
are glass flasks, jugs, and of course glasses. Glass
urinals, in which urine was examined for the signs
of health or disease, are relatively common.
Other archaeological relics of the dead have
been found. A balance to weigh coin had been
adjusted to give false readings, but at a later date
it was deliberately destroyed; perhaps its owner
had then been placed in the pillory. Vessels of
copper alloy or of ceramic were often patched up,
suggesting how in the domestic economy the
cheapest items were valued; cracks in the ceramic
surface were sealed with lead. An iron helmet was
inverted, supplied with a handle, and turned into a
cooking vessel. Spindles are found everywhere. So
are needles and thimbles, from an age when both
linen and women were skilled in sewing cloth and
leather. It was a common and necessary household
occupation. Many spoons and spoon-handles
survive, some of them inscribed with a pattern or

mark to indicate ownership; this gives a picture of

communal dining. Some vessels have been found
bearing the legend CUM SIS IN MENSA PRIMO DI
PAVPERE PENSO - 'When you are at the table, first
think of the poor'. A brooch of the thirteenth
century has, as its inscription, 'I am a brooch to
guard the breast, that no rascal may put his hand
thereon.' A ring of the fourteenth century has the
legend 'He who spends more than belongs to him,
kills himself without a blow.' Whistles, book clasps,
writing implements, hooks, hinges, chests, caskets,
leather shoes, are all mute testimony of a forgotten
life.
The most commonly found location is naturally
that of the `undercroft' or basement. Many of them
are lined with chalk or flint, and in some of them
the tiles still cover the floor. There is evidence of
steps leading from the street, and of small windows
on a level with the ground. The life of the past
leaves other marks on the earth. A worn floor will
trace the path of a door once swinging to and fro.
Go in.