CIVIL AND DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE 



by a door on the ground floor. In western Sussex, near the sea, such cottages 

 often consist only of two timber-framed gable-ends, hipped, and dwarf front 

 and back walls, so arranged as to afford the best shelter from the south- 

 westerly rains. The long thatched roofs, as in Climping village, often run 

 down to within 3 ft. of the ground. 



The timbers forming the wall framing are usually horizontal and vertical: 

 in the oldest work the uprights are very broad, and the plastered interspaces 

 proportionately narrow, as at Stonehill Farm, Chiddingly ; occasionally but 

 chiefly in later work curved braces are introduced, and at East Mascalls 

 these are treated in a very decorative fashion. Four small curved braces 

 cutting off the corners of a square panel is an ornamental treatment found in 

 half-timber houses at Rye, Sedlescombe, Lye Green, Withyham, Stonehill 

 Farm, Chiddingly, Ditchling, the Brotherhood Hall, Steyning, and the Middle 

 House, Mayfield in the last this forms a pattern over most of the front. 



The hipped end to roofs is very common in Sussex, probably for the 

 practical reason of weather. Where gables are found they are occasionally 

 furnished with plain or ornamental barge boards, and of the latter those at 

 West Tarring, having elegant cusped tracery, are the oldest. Several of the 

 Sedlescombe houses have later examples, while the very rich timber barge- 

 boards of the Middle House at Mayfield are ornamented with scroll-work of 

 Renaissance character. 



The face of the plaster between the timbers was often ' combed,' or 

 stamped with patterns while wet, and many instances of this treatment 

 survive, as at Amberley, Hardham, Fittleworth, Pulborough, &c. Weather- 

 boarding on houses is usually not very ancient. Good examples of its use are 

 found at Hurst Green, Horsham, and the Queen's Head Inn, Sedlescombe. 



There are a number of fine brick or brick-and-flint houses of late 

 seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century dates all over the county. With 

 them may be included for architectural purposes the Moated House, Groom- 

 bridge (on the Sussex border, but actually in Kent), a large brick house of the 

 latter part of the seventeenth century, with high-pitched tiled roofs, a graceful 

 stone portico, bridges, gate-piers, niches, and other details of great value to 

 the student. This house has been ascribed to Sir Christopher Wren, who 

 undoubtedly influenced its design. 



Of the same period is some fine stabling, in brickwork with tiled roofs, 

 near All Saints' Church, Hastings, and there are several brick or brick- 

 and-flint houses, later in date, in the older parts of the town, such as John 

 Collier's house. Burwash and neighbourhood are rich in stately old houses 

 of this period one with a finely designed canopied doorway ; so also is the 

 town of Rye, and most prominent among its architectural treasures of this 

 class is the beautiful red-brick front of the Grammar School, dating from 

 about 1660. All the cornices, pediments, pilasters, and elaborate doors and 

 windows are in that material. There is also a house with a richly carved 

 door canopy in West Street. Battle has some good but plain work of the 

 early part of the eighteenth century. The manor-house at Eastbourne and 

 the vicarage are other good examples of this date, chiefly brick built ; and a 

 stone-fronted house in the narrow street hard by, together with the old manor- 

 house, also of stone, are excellent earlier examples (c. 1650-80). Compton 

 Place, in the same neighbourhood, is of the early part of the eighteenth 



