DescriptionChristopher Dacre's map of 1584 shows a tower at Yeavering (Bates 1891).
A long quadrangular house at Old Yeavering has walls five feet thick and is probably a medieval pele (Tate 1862)
The building is now used as a farm outbuilding and is in reasonable condition (F1 DK 27-JAN-1967).
Probably 16th century, with alterations. Built of random igneous rubble with Welsh slate roof. Formerly a towerhouse or bastle, quite possibly of a similar type to the nearby Akeld bastle since it shares the same long rectangular plan. It is now much altered and only one storey, but it has walls 4-5ft thick and an early doorway on the side, now blocked, but with a chamfered alterating block surround. Right of this are two other later doors, gabled roof (Grundy 1987). (Northumberland HER)
Tradition says, that a long quadrangular house at Old Yevering, now occupied by a shepherd, is Edwin's palace. The walls are five feet in thickness and built of porphyry blocks, but not in regular courses, and seemingly without lime; squared oak posts pass perpendicularly through the middle of the walls, and they supported the roof and helped too to give stability to these walls. Old doorways and windows with square headings are traceable; but besides rudeness of structure, there are no characters to carry back this building to the Saxon period. Possibly it may stand on or near the site of the old palace; it probably belongs to mediaeval times, and may have been a rude pele for the protection of the village against the raids which rendered life and property insecure in the border land. (Tate 1862)
There is now no visible evidence of 'squared oak post', which is unfortunate, as the description suggests that the building was a survivor of an unusual type, unrecorded elsewhere in the country. The thickness of the walls suggest that it was intended to be a defensible structure, and the use of timber links it to the 'peles' of Tynedale recorded in the 1541 survey. The remains of the substantial wall enclosing the small field to the south may also imply a defensive role, and a barmkin or yard attached to the main building.
Christopher Dacre's 1584 'plat' or map of 'castles and fortresses' shows a line of defensible buildings (indicated by drawings of small house like structures) in this area, including Akeld (presumably the build now known as 'Akeld Castle'), Yeavering, East Newton and West Newton. It seems highly likely that the building shown at Yeavering (which does not figure in the 1541 Border survey) is in fact 'King Edwin's Palace'; its dimensions (at present 17 x 7-7.5m, but probably originally a little longer) correspond exactly with those of Akeld Bastle (19 x 7.3m), although in its having a stone-vaulted ground floor Akeld is clearly a rather superior building.
it would appear to have been a building transitional in form between a timber-framed and a stone structure, where the timber-frame provided the main structural support, and the rough rubble masonry, possibly unmortared, a substantial barrier and a defense against fire. (Ryder 1991)
A project to conserve the building known as 'King Edwin's Palace', now more commonly called 'The Old Palace', located on the eastern edge of Kirknewton township and parish (NGR NT 924302) is being funded by Natural England as part of a Higher Level Stewardship management agreement for the Yeavering Estate. The site is owned by Lord Anthony Hill of Lilburn Hill Ltd, while the architect for the conservation project is Robin Dower of Spence & Dower Chartered Architects. Paul Frodsham, of ORACLE Heritage Services, is the owner's archaeological advisor and has acted as Project Manager for this evaluation. The work is funded by Natural England through the Yeavering Higher Level Stewardship agreement, under the management of Tom Gledhill. The Northumberland National Park Authority is also closely involved as the local planning authority. Indeed, the National Park Authority has long had an interest in the Old Palace, and the current project will help to realise the better management of the building as proposed in a long-standing Management Agreement between the Authority and the owner of the Yeavering Estate.
Excavation within the Old Palace has revealed a floor surface of stone flags patched with brickwork at the east end of the structure, probably associated with a fireplace and largely confined to the east side of an interior division marked by the footings of a stone wall.
Elsewhere in the building it appears that the flagged floor which is presumed to have been present has been removed, presumably for re-use elsewhere. Although hints of rough flagging were present to suggest that the building may have been re-floored for later use as a stock barn, it is just as likely that the compressed earth floor immediately underlying the modern concrete surface served such a purpose during its latest phase of agricultural use.
Excavations into the underlying deposits of river worn cobbles did not identify any earlier floor levels or other features. In particular, the re-excavation of a trench excavated by Hope-Taylor in the 1950s did not reveal any unnatural features, such as floor surfaces, or breaks in stratigraphy indicating the depth of made deposits.
With regard to the impact of scheme originally proposed for supporting a roofed structure on beams within the Old Palace building, it is concluded that this would impact negatively upon the surviving floor at the east end of the building and a preferable option would be to site pillars for such a structure outside the structure.
With regard to the standing structure, a building survey carried out in association with Peter Ryder and photographic recording with Paul Frodsham provided a more complete record of the building than had hitherto been undertaken. As a result of observations made during these investigations, it was concluded that the earliest structure was a long narrow and low building with thick walls of clay-bonded rubble, which include early structural timber elements, a feature which makes the building unique in the area. Further evidence for the original character or construction and subsequent phasing of the building may come to light during consolidation works, but it is concluded that the potential for dendro-archaeological dating of the upright wall timbers also merits investigation.
With regard to the pre-modern function of the building, aerial photographs of the structure in the context of its immediate landscape setting provide additional evidence upon which to base hypotheses that could be tested archaeologically. (
The Archaological Practice Website)
