Holditch Court, Thorncombe (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Holdich

In the civil parish of Thorncombe.
In the historic county of Dorset.
Modern Authority of Dorset.
1974 county of Dorset.
Medieval County of Devon.

OS Map Grid Reference: ST34490219
Latitude 50.81523° Longitude -2.93127°

Holditch Court, Thorncombe has been described as a certain Fortified Manor House.

There are masonry ruins/remnants remains.

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

Description

Holditch Court, built as a gate-house early in the 16th century and extended in the 17th century, is a two-storeyed, rubble and flint house with tiled roofs. It retains two of the original windows, and inside is an original doorway. The tower, situated south-east of the house, formed part of a semi-fortified manor house of late medieval date, and traces of a rectangular stone building can be seen 16 yards to the south-east. Immediately to the south are traces of a bank and scarp and of another bank, which may represent a defensive enclosure. The remains of a fishpond can be seen north-east of the house. (PastScape–ref. RCHME and buildings listing)

A Royal licence to crenellate was granted in 1397 Feb 20 (Click on the date for details of this licence.).

Sources of information, references and further reading

National Heritage List for England Scheduled Monument Number 1002835, Legacy Scheduled Monument Number do426
National Heritage List for England Listed Building number(s) 1118927
Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 191525.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 1 112 005 A.

Websites (Gatehouse is not responsible for the content of external websites.)
- Eve Higgs, Brief Overview of Thorncombe's History
Books
- Emery, Anthony, 2006, Greater Medieval Houses of England and Wales Vol. 3 Southern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) p. 577-8, 695
  Salter, Mike, 2002, The Castles of Wessex (Malvern: Folly Publications) p. 22
  Higham, Robert A., 1999, 'Castles, Fortified Houses and Fortified Towns in the Middle Ages' in Kain, R. and Ravenhill, W., Historical Atlas of South-West England (University of Exeter Press) p. 136-43
  King, D.J.C., 1983, Castellarium Anglicanum (London: Kraus) Vol. 1 p. 130 (Dorset - no mention of licence)
  Pevsner, N. and Newman J., 1972, Buildings of England: Dorset (London) p. 421
  RCHME, 1952, An inventory of historical monuments in the County of Dorset Vol. 1: west (HMSO) p. 247 no. 5 online transcription
  Turner, T.H. and Parker, J.H., 1859, Some account of Domestic Architecture in England (Oxford) Vol. 3 Part 2 p. 355, 420 online copy
Periodical Articles
- Higham, R.A., 1988, 'Devon Castles: an annotated list' Proceedings of the Devon Archaeological Society Vol. 46 p. 142-9
Primary (Medieval documents or transcriptions of such documents - This section is far from complete and the secondary sources should be consulted for full references.)
- Maxwell Lyte, H.C. (ed), 1909, Calendar of Patent Rolls Richard II (1396-99) Vol. 6 p. 85 online copy
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Historic England, 2016, Heritage at Risk South West Register 2016 (London: Historic England) p. 136, 147 (listed tower add to previous at risk scheduled area) online copy
  Historic England, 2015, Heritage at Risk South West Register 2015 (London: Historic England) p. 148 online copy
  English Heritage, 2014, Heritage at Risk Register 2014 South West (London: English Heritage) p. 157 online copy
  English Heritage, 2013, Heritage at Risk Register 2013 South West (London: English Heritage) p. 151 online copy
  English Heritage, 2012, Heritage at Risk Register 2012 South West (London: English Heritage) p. 165 online copy
  English Heritage, 2011, Heritage at Risk Register 2011 South West (London: English Heritage) p. 150 online copy
  English Heritage, 2010, Heritage at Risk Register 2010 South West (London: English Heritage) p. 147 online copy
  English Heritage, 2009, Heritage at Risk Register 2009 South West (London: English Heritage) p. 153 online copy

Most of the sites or buildings recorded in this web site are NOT open to the public and permission to visit a site must always be sought from the landowner or tenant.
It is an offence to disturb a Scheduled Monument without consent. It is a destruction of everyone's heritage to remove archaeological evidence from ANY site without proper recording and reporting.
Don't use metal detectors on historic sites without authorisation.

The information on this web page may be derived from information compiled by and/or copyright of Historic England, County Historic Environment Records and other individuals and organisations. It may also contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence. All the sources given should be consulted to identify the original copyright holder and permission obtained from them before use of the information on this site for commercial purposes.
The author and compiler of Gatehouse does not receive any income from the site and funds it himself. The information within this site is provided freely for educational purposes only.

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.

Data >	PastScape	County HER	Scheduling	Listing	I. O. E.
Maps >	Streetmap	NLS maps	Where's the path	Old-Maps
Data/Maps >	Magic	V. O. B.	Geology	LiDAR	Open Domesday
Air Photos >	Bing Maps	Google Maps	Getmapping	ZoomEarth
Photos >	CastleFacts	Geograph	Flickr	Panoramio