Monument record DBN 138 - The Standing at the Bucks Head Inn, High Street

At the rear of number 27 High Street, Debenham, is the former Bucks Inn and a theatrical grandstand. The latter falls into a category of buildings known as Standings (also called scaffold, stage, or gallery) these structures were used to elevate spectators at sporting events, pageants, plays, hunts, executions and gardends. This Standing was galleried on one side towards the inn-yard and on the other towards the entrance to the Camping Close (an area used for the playing of sports, or holding church-ales, fairs, pageants, and plays) and so could have been used for viewing a variety of entertainment. Analysis carried out on eight samples from the timbers of this structure resulted in the construction of two site sequences. The first, of 79 rings, contains two samples and spans the period AD 1507-85. One of the samples is estimated to have been felled in AD 1600-25. An estimated felling date cannot be calculated for the other sample as it does not have the heartwood/sapwood boundary ring. The second site sequence, of 60 rings, contains two samples, and spans the period AD 1561-1620. Both samples are from trees felled in AD 1620. Sample KDS-A08 was dated individually to the period AD 1544-1605. This sample has complete sapwood and so that last measured ring date is the felling date of the timber represented (S1).