Bishopthorpe Palace (The Gatehouse Record)

In the civil parish of Bishopthorpe.
In the historic county of Yorkshire.
Modern Authority of York.
1974 county of North Yorkshire.
Medieval County of Yorkshire Ainsty & York.

OS Map Grid Reference: SE59724782
Latitude 53.92308° Longitude -1.09210°

Bishopthorpe Palace has been described as a certain Palace.

There are masonry footings remains.

This is a Grade 1 listed building protected by law*.

Description

Bishopthorpe Place was originally built in 1241 by Archbishop Walter de Grey with the undercroft being constructed using stone from an old manor house which de Grey pulled down when he bought the village of Thorpe St Andrew. It is constructed from magnesian limestone, almost certainly from Thevesdale near Tadcaster. It has mason's marks common to York Minster south transept (also built for de Grey) and was finished around 1250. The house then consisted of a Great Hall with a chapel at right angles at the upper end and offices with the Archbishop's rooms above them at the lower end. Grey decided that when each Archbishop completed his term of office the house should revert to the Dean and Chapter of York rather than to the King - a financially beneficial arrangement that was observed until the Reformation. Archbishop Thoresby extended his private rooms in 1364-5 and in 1483 Archbishop Rotherham added a range to the north built of red brick which doubled the size of the residential quarters and improved the kitchens. In 1766-9 a Gothic block was built to the west of the main range of the house by Thomas Atkinson for Archbishop Drummond and provided a new entrance hall, drawing rooms and services. An addition to the north range was produced in 1835, probably by Sir Rober Smirke on behalf of Archbishop Harcourt and rooms were built above the chapel. (PastScape)

Sources of information, references and further reading

National Heritage List for England Listed Building number(s) 1132487
Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 56358.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) MYO429; MYO328; MYO329.

Websites (Gatehouse is not responsible for the content of external websites.)
- John Sentamu, 2011, About Bishopthorpe Palace
Books
- Salter, Mike, 2001, The Castles and Tower Houses of Yorkshire (Malvern: Folly Publications) p. 21
  Thompson, M.W., 1998, Medieval bishops' houses in England and Wales (Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing) p. 105, 117, 118, 156, 188
  Emery, Anthony, 1996, Greater Medieval Houses of England and Wales Vol. 1 Northern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) p. 298-303
  James, T.B., 1990, The Palaces of Medieval England (London; Seaby) p. 155
  Ryder, P.F., 1982 (paperback edn 1992), The Medieval Buildings of Yorkshire (Ash Grove Book) p. 108-22
  Le Patourel, H.E. Jean, 1973, The Moated Sites of Yorkshire (The Society for Medieval Archaeology Monograph Series 5) p. 122
  Weston, Marion, 1911, 'Bishopthorpe' in Rait, R.S. (ed), English Episcopal Palaces (Province of York) (London; Constable & Co) p. 32-101 online copy
Guidebooks
- Gee, Eric A., 1983, Bishopthorpe Palace: an architectural history (York: The Ebor Press)
Antiquarian (Histories and accounts from late medieval and early modern writers)
- Chandler, John, 1993, John Leland's Itinerary: travels in Tudor England (Sutton Publishing) p. 522
  Toulmin-Smith, Lucy (ed), 1909, The itinerary of John Leland in or about the years 1535-1543 (London: Bell and Sons) Vol. 4 p. 12 online copy
  Celia Fiennes, 1888, Through England on a Side Saddle in the Time of William and Mary (London: Field and Tuer, The Leadenhall Press) Vision of Britain online transcription
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Howard, R.E., Arnold, A.J., and Tyers , C., 2008, Bishopthorpe Palace, Bishopthorpe, York: Tree-Ring Analysis of Timbers (English Heritage Research Department Reports series 57/2008) online summary
  Payne, Naomi, 2003, The medieval residences of the bishops of Bath and Wells, and Salisbury (PhD Thesis University of Bristol) Appendix B: List of Medieval Bishop's Palaces in England and Wales (available via EThOS)

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The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

Please help to make this as useful a resource as possible by contacting Gatehouse if you see errors, can add information or have suggestions for improvements in functality and design.
Help is acknowledged.

*The listed building may not be the actual medieval building, but a building on the site of, or incorporating fragments of, the described site.

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