The Old Manor House, Rosebery Road, Manningham, Bradford, West Yorkshire: A Historical and Architectural Survey
Author(s): Allison Borden, Colum Giles
The Old Manor House probably originated in the early 16th century as a hall-and-crosswing timber-framed house. Fragmentary evidence (comprising two arcade plates and part of the original roof structure) indicates that the main range, only one full bay of which remains, was aisled to both front and back and provided an open hall or, to use the local term, housebody, probably with a dais canopy at its west end. The details of the plan of this range are not recoverable. Its roof, however, survives in part and is of collar-rafter form, relatively unusual in this area, dominated by the use of king-post trusses. Internal evidence suggests that the housebody abutted a cross wing, but nothing of this structure survives. The suggested plan of the building – an aisled house of hall-and-cross-wing form – places it in a group of late-medieval houses of a well-established type in West Yorkshire, conventionally thought to represent the dwelling type adopted by the wealthiest yeomanry, especially in the Pennine region and associated with the wealth generated by engagement in the manufacture of woollen cloth. The owner and occupier of the Old Manor House in the medieval period has not been established. The original house was modified in a number of phases. The first identifiable phase of modifications took place in the mid 17th century when the building was encased in stone on a hall-and-cross-wings plan, a floor was inserted into the hitherto open housebody to give a first-floor chamber, and the accommodation upgraded to give a number of heated rooms on two floors. These changes represent common post-medieval improvements in living standards and demonstrate that the Old Manor House continued to accommodate a family at the upper levels of yeoman society. A tentative identification of this family is offered by the returns of the 1672 Hearth Tax, in which John Denton is recorded as paying tax on five hearths: Denton was earlier shown on a map of 1613 as the occupier of land in the area of the Old Manor House. The prese
- Report Number:
- 14/2012
- Series:
- Research Report
- Pages:
- 24
- Keywords:
- Medieval Standing Building
