Howden Palace

Description

Hall of the manor of the Bishops of Durham. 1388-1405 incorporating earlier work, for Bishop Skirlaugh. Alterations of the C16, C18 and C20. Magnesian limestone ashlar and rubble, brick, Welsh slate roof. Formerly an open hall and screens passage with entrance porch to north-west, now subdivided into rooms with inserted first floor. North facade: 2 storeys, 7 first-floor windows, with porch breaking forward to right. Main range: blind bay in brick to left. Moulded plinth to all other bays. C20 six-fielded-panel door beneath divided overlight with brackets holding cornice. 16-pane sash to left, otherwise sashes with glazing bars throughout. First-floor band and band over first-floor windows. Hipped roof. Ridge stack and stacks rising through side pitches of roof. Porch: stepped chamfered plinth and wide round archway with flat-headed 2-light cinque-cusped window above. Projecting embattled parapet with central niche surmounted by a pair of dogs and containing figure holding shield. West facade: tripartite sash with glazing bars to left and 5 blocked arched openings from former screens passage to right. Sashes with glazing bars to first floor and small Yorkshire sashes to attic. South facade: to left a C20 door in medieval pointed doorway of 2 moulded orders. C20 6-fielded-panel door to third bay, otherwise sashes with glazing bars throughout except for 16-pane sash to fourth bay. East facade: position of brick fireplace clearly visible to left of first floor with blocked window to right. Interior: evidence for an earlier rubble-built hall may be observed in the east wall with its tall blocked arch of uncertain function, and the stone foundations of a bench against it, probably the dais at the high end of the hall. Skirlaugh's work includes the porch with its embossed quadripartite vaulting, the axial doorway at the south end of the screens passage, the inserted doorway on the north wall of the north-east room, formerly leading to a staircase tower, and the tall windows whose jambs and springers may be seen in the south wall. The floor levels are C16. The current window positions are C18 although all windows are replacements. Several Georgian and Victorian fireplaces survive. The closed-string, turned baluster staircase is almost entirely a replica, the C17 original having been destroyed by fire. (Listed Building Report)

Remains of the medieval residence of the Bishops of Durham. The site was granted to the bishops in 1086 and held by them until late C16. The medieval layout comprised ranges of buildings set around an irregular courtyard. The north range contained the gate; the east the bishops' lodgings, chapel, oratory, chambers and guest rooms and the south the great hall, service rooms, kitchen and a second gate. The majority of the buildings were demolished in late C16 but part of the courtyard wall, the great hall, the southern gateway and two further medieval buildings survive. The great hall and porch were built by Bishop Skirlaw between 1388 and 1405 on the site of an earlier aisled hall. Bishop Skirlaw's hall was a tall, single storey building entered through a two storey, vaulted porch. The hall was floored in late C16, further altered in C18/early C19 and restored in 1983-5. The medieval moat and fishpond survive as landscaped earthworks in a park. (PastScape)