Merryfield House (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Merrifield; Murefeld; Merefeld; Muryfield; Merifield; Wadham's Castle

In the civil parish of Cudworth.
In the historic county of Somerset.
Modern Authority of Somerset.
1974 county of Somerset.
Medieval County of Somerset.

OS Map Grid Reference: ST33981779
Latitude 50.95575° Longitude -2.94131°

Merryfield House has been described as a probable Fortified Manor House.

There are cropmark/slight earthwork remains.

Description

Documented manor site mentioned in the 1327 lay subsidy, occupied by Wadham family who founded Wadham College Oxford. A rectangular moat with entrance on S side. Inner side of the moat ditch is revetted with mortared stone walling. A causeway is original. The site of the house, demolished after 1618, could be traced in 1934 but is not now visible. A large boulder 2mx1m on the island has local legendary associations. Woodhouse Farm, the almshouses at Ilton and other local buildings said to contain re-used material from the house. The uneven area of pasture enclosed by the moat has a surface scatter of rubble with a few fragments of medieval ridge tiles and pottery. Good medieval fishpond on the N side, with possible extension on the NW. (OS record 1966)
Moat and fishponds are well preserved. A mortared lias wall revets the island and short lengths are visible on the outer rim of the moat opposite the main fishpond. North-south fishpond downslope from moat, defined by banks up to 1.5m high. Waterlogged at the north end, breached at the north-east corner. Additional banks in surrounding field (Site visit report - Burrow, I. Somerset County Council (11/10/1979)).
An associated deer park lies to the east (PRN 53382) (Verbal communication - Dennison, E. Somerset County Council, Sites and Monuments Record (5/9/1984))
A survey in 2003-4 found the moat to measure c40m by c50m with an average width of 6m. The moat is constructed with walls of Blue Lias. There is an earth causeway on the south side of the moat measuring 3m wide by 10m long (Patuck 2004) (Somerset HER)

Comments

Included by Dunning in a gazetteer of 'fortified houses and moated sites' although no other castle studies author has described it as fortified. He also mentions a base of a tower including a loophole surviving into the mid C18. Seems to have been called a 'castle' in the C16/C17 and still sometimes known as Wadham's castle. This large house, of the founders of Wadham College, within a revetted moat and with attached deer park is likely to have had some symbolic military architectural features such as the decorative battlements that can be seen on Wadham College's buildings.

Sources of information, references and further reading

Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 191616.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 53386.

Websites (Gatehouse is not responsible for the content of external websites.)
- wikimapia
Books
- Dunning, Robert, 1995, Somerset Castles (Somerset Books) p. 61
  Bush, Robin,1994, Somerset: The complete guide (Dovecote Press) p.
  Ellison, Ann, 1983, Medieval villages in SE Somerset (Western Archaeological Trust surveys 6) p. 43
  Collinson, J., 1791, The History and Antiquities of the County of Somerset (Bath) Vol. 1 p. 48 online copy
Periodical Articles
- Curtis, C.D., 1935, 'Merifield - the home of the Wadhams' Notes and queries for Somerset and Dorset Vol. 21 p. 213-4
  Wyndham, W., 1934, 'The Wadhams and Merifield' Somerset Archaeology and Natural History Vol. 80 p. 1-10
  1934, The Somerset Countryman Vol. 4 p. 12
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Patuck, F., 2004, To what extent can an archaeology study of Merryfield moated manor show evidence of wealth and status? (A-Level coursework. Location: HER files)

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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.

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