Scrooby Palace

Description

The manor House or Archiepiscopal Palace of Scrooby, was built of brick and wood, and contained 39 rooms, including a domestic chapel. The remains of the moat can be seen, but the mansion has disappeared. The present farm-house may incorporate part of the building, or be built from the materials of it. 'The site of the palace is now the home close of a farmhouse. There was a bridge and a gate-house at the entrance, and the area was walled round in 'brick'. (Mellors)
The palace, at Scrooby, was constantly used by the Archbishops of York in the C13 and C14, and remained in use until the episcopate of Archbishop Sandes (1577-89). (Niemeyer)
Archbishop Sandes caused the palace at Scrooby to be leased to his son, Sir Samuel Sandes. The house has since 'been demolished almost to the ground'. It was standing 'within memory' 1677. (Thoroton)
The published siting symbol was not confirmed. This part of the enclosed area is grass covered and hummocky. Some of these disturbances, in conjunction with the remains of fishponds, can probably be ascribed to landscape gardening. Others are suggestive of concealed foundations. There is no evidence to suggest that part of the former palace is incorporated in the present farmhouse. Some features, however, would seem to confirm that material from it was utilized in the building. These include the remains of two C16 windows contained in the west wall, which itself is built of a thin "Tudor type" brick; and carved oak beams in the roof structure of one of the farm outbuildings. The surrounding moat is best preserved in the S.W. corner, where it has an average internal depth of 1.3 m. The western and northern arms are traceable by a single scarp only, except where it is obliterated by Manor House Farm. This scarp varies in height from 1.6 m. to 0.6m. In the east the arm is extant for three quarters of its length, and has an average depth of 0.7 m. No trace of the moat remains in the S.E. corner. Remains of a bank on the counterscarp, of average height 0.5 m., exist, externally on the eastern, and internally on the southern arms.The bottom of the moat is marshy in the east and south and it is transversed by a modern drainage ditch. A modern ditch also abuts the remains of the northern arm. No traces of a gatehouse and bridge, or of an encircling wall remain (Field Investigators Comments-F1 RWE 02-MAR-60). (PastScape)

Comments

C15 double courted palace of the Archbishop of York was moated and had a brick gatehouse, but buildings were otherwise timber framed (cf. Leconfield, a house of the Percies). A fragment of the gatehouse remains.