Bolling Hall, Bradford (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Bowling Hall

In the civil parish of Bradford.
In the historic county of Yorkshire.
Modern Authority of Bradford.
1974 county of West Yorkshire.
Medieval County of Yorkshire West Riding.

OS Map Grid Reference: SE17303143
Latitude 53.77892° Longitude -1.73885°

Bolling Hall, Bradford has been described as a certain Pele Tower.

There are major building remains.

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

Description

A large hall, the most substantial surviving in Bradford. It' is also the earliest in structural origin being an enlargement on the basis of 2 medieval probably C14 towers. Sandstone and gritstone rubble. The towers with parapet copings and stone slate roofs. The main south front between the towers is mid C17, circa 1660 and has a remarkable variety of fenestration and motifes: cross mullioned windows, semi-circular and circular mullioned windows, 2 canted bays through 2-storeys of 8 lights and a vast hall window of 5 plus 5 lights with 2 transoms. Rising from the lintel of the hall window is a 3 light semi-circular window and 3 light ogee window, above this there is also a Victorian canted bay window next to the right hand tower. The rear elevation has projecting wings, the west one is the only ashlar faced part of the hall and has plain mullioned windows but there is a probably reset medieval window of 3 ogee headed lights on the top floor. The east wing has mullioned and transomed windows. Inside the hall has an C18 ceiling and a gallery to the rear. One room on the first floor retains lively original plasterwork consisting of broad bands foliage and birds contained between them. (Listed Building Report)

Sources of information, references and further reading

National Heritage List for England Listed Building number(s) 1299398
Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 49662.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 5107.

Websites (Gatehouse is not responsible for the content of external websites.)
- Bradford Museums and Galleries
  Wikipedia entry
Books
- Turner, Maurice, 2004, Yorkshire Castles: Exploring Historic Yorkshire (Otley: Westbury Publishing) p. 11, 219, 235
  Salter, Mike, 2001, The Castles and Tower Houses of Yorkshire (Malvern: Folly Publications) p. 21
  Emery, Anthony, 1996, Greater Medieval Houses of England and Wales Vol. 1 Northern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) p. 317
  Pettifer, A., 1995, English Castles, A guide by counties (Woodbridge: Boydell Press) p. 302
  King, D.J.C., 1983, Castellarium Anglicanum (London: Kraus) Vol. 2 p. 514
  Ryder, P.F., 1982 (paperback edn 1992), The Medieval Buildings of Yorkshire (Ash Grove Book) p. 108-22
  Pevsner, N., 1959, Buildings of England: Yorkshire: West Riding (London, Penguin) p. 132-3
  Ambler, L., 1913, The old halls and manor houses of Yorkshire, with some examples of other houses built before the year 1700 (London: Batsford) p. 50 online copy
Periodical Articles
- Wood, 1960, Country Life Vol. 128 p. 1482
  Scruton, W., 1883, 'Bolling Hall' Old Yorkshire Vol. 4 p. 107-111 online copy
Guidebooks
- WYAS, 1988, Historic Houses of West Yorkshire: Bolling Hall, Bradford
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. 569
  Toulmin-Smith, Lucy (ed), 1910, The itinerary of John Leland in or about the years 1535-1543 (London: Bell and Sons) Vol. 5 p. 38, 39 online copy
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Creighton, O.H., 1998, Castles and Landscapes: An Archaeological Survey of Yorkshire and the East Midlands (PhD Thesis University of Leicester) p. 762 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.

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