Listed Building: MOAT HALL (279838)

COMBS BILDESTON ROAD TM 05 SW 5/63 Moat Hall (formerly listed as Moat Farmhouse) 9.12.55 - II Former farmhouse. Circa 1400, with alterations of c,1500, c.1600 and c.1970. An open-hall house with a partly later-medieval cross-wing at the left hand end. 2 storeys, and one storey with attics. Timber-framed and plastered, with C20 herringbone pargetting in panels. Thatched roofs, with C20 casement dormers. The cross-wing has a pair of cusped late C15 oak bargeboards on the west gable, removed c.1970 from the east gable (the house originally faced east). Axial chimneys: in the hall range is a mid C19 chimney of gault brick with 4 diagonally-set square flues on a sawtooth-banded base; a C19 axial chimney of red brick in the wing. Plastic casements of late C20, with leaded lights. A thatched gabled C20 entrance porch with boarded door. High quality C15 carpentry: the 2-bay open hall has a central truss, without its tie-beam, but retaining the octagonal c.1400 type crownpost with moulded capital and thick 4-way braces. Close-studding without visible windbracing. The roof is heavily smoke-encrusted. The parlour cell to right is original but altered, once having had a hipped roof. The hall has evidence for a rear cross-passage doorway with a 2-centred arched head. The cross-wing is of two 2-bays sections: the projecting part is apparently of c.1400 and contemporary with the hall, it was open and heavily smoke-encrusted, with a central crownpost truss, the crownpost being octagonal and with 2-way braces. The rebuilt section has a 2-bay solar with an open truss, the octagonal crownpost being well moulded in the late C15 manner (English Vernacular Houses: Mercer: HOM.S.O., Plate 56). An upper floor was inserted in the hall in late C16, with plain framing, and a chimney with back-to-back open fireplaces to hall and parlour. Major refurbishing of c.1970 following a period of dereliction; at this time a dogleg staircase taken from a demolished inn at Stowmarket was inserted into the hall; it has turned balusters and moulded newel finials of c.1600. A large wing of c.1980 on the east side is not of special interest. The house stands within a medieval moat. N.M.R photographs. Listing NGR: TM0207054744