Our Possible Medieval Aisled Hall
I noticed that the recent excavations are showing evidence of an Aisled Medieval Hall. This was not a phrase I was familiar with, but I did a search and found not just a description of them but schematics, details on who built what and when, and where such halls are known to exist.
http://www.ccurrie.me.uk/vag/walker/aisled1.htm
It would be interesting if one of the archaeologists, or someone else on the dig, could speculate on which of the designs we're most likely looking at and - perhaps more importantly - why it is there, when (according to the article) there are no known fully timber-frame buildings of that era anywhere in the north of England.
From the number known and the complexity, I'd say that these were expensive (in terms of manpower and materials as well as in coinage), so nobody is going to have put a structure like that in Mellor unless it was highly important at the time.
Posted by: Jonathan Day 9th August 06
I include some sources for research:
The first is a series of plans (there are three web pages of them in all) covering eight different designs of
Aisled Hall. http://www.ccurrie.me.uk/vag/walker/aisled1.htm
The second is an artist's impression of a typical Aisled Hall as used as a manor house (quite possibly the design used in Mellor).
http://www.mondes-normands.caen.fr/angleterre/cultures/GB_FR/2/pic2-5c.htm
The vast majority of Aisled Halls used near-identical and often interchangable posts. However, referring to that first ink given, if you look down to the section on Fyfield Hall, Essex, you will notice that the corner posts are significantly larger than the intermediate posts. So, this type of design was used.
There is then the matter of the post-hole sizes themselves. Also on that first link, there is a reference to Temple Balsall, in the West Midlands. The posts for this structure were a mere 44cm across. Another building listed there, Bishop's Palace, had posts 1.4m across.
These buildings were extremely large. Temple Balsall was 31' long and 17' wide. Bishop's Palace was a gigantic 105' x 24'. The height of these buildings is not stated and is hard to judge, but I would guess that the Bishop's Palace was around 60'.
We also run into another question. Aisled Halls, if they are not used as manors, have manors attached or nearby. Presumably, the manor was in use until 1600, as that is when the modern Mellor Hall dates to, and there would be no need to have two such Halls on the same hill. However, some Aisled Halls are the manor,although they can serve other purposes alongside.
As the post-holes provide for too narrow a building to get enough mass to justify the supports, I think we can eliminate the theory of a tall building. The lack of weapons rules out anything similar to that of Temple Balsall (which was used by the Knights Templar), which leaves a religious, agricultural or industrial use.
Religious would not make sense - there was already achurch there and possibly the monastary in Ludworth was still operating. One of the other Aisled Halls off the first link is a gigantic barn, but it demonstrates that floor-space is more critical than strength, which is the exact opposite of the Mellor case. That leaves industry, which we know Mellor had in abundance up to this time.
The conclusion I'm most confident in, then, is that there is still a manor to be discovered in the vicinity of the Aisled Hall. I would also conclude that the Aisled Hall will prove to be a two-floor industrial complex that required one or more large weights to be present and a fairly reasonable amountof workspace. (This building is very small in comparison to the size of the supports, but is still larger than at least half of the other examples I've linked to.)
Gritstone is one of the very few local resources of significance, and gritstone wheels were (and still are) used to grind things. The archaeological diary for the Mellor dig also shows that a segment of a sandstone grinding wheel has been found.
My tenuous conclusion is that, in order to explain the weight capacity and extreme engineering, that we're looking at a place capable of processing oats, wheat or barley in very high volume, of storing a significant amount of the raw grains and of storing a significant amount of the processed flours.
My other tenuous conclusion is that there will be no rows of pit posts outside the two rows discovered, but there may very well be traces of the outer walls. Only one of the Aisled Halls I could find reference to had posts marked on the outer wall, so it does happen, but it does seem to be rare. If I am correct in believing the building is designed with heavy internal weights in mind, extra roof supports would not be needed.
Now, if extra post-holes are indeed found, then all this goes out the window. We'd get the outer post-holes if the roof needed the extra support, above and beyond what the inner supports provided. That would mean we are probably looking at a highly ornate design that is far more complex and sophisticated than any such building I have reference to.
I considered the possibility of a military role - that the weight was connected to a defensive purpose (such as a horribly heavy roof that would have been invulnerable to any weapons of the day). It's a little small for that, though, and stone was more popular for such structures. It's also on the wrong part of the hill to hold a good defensive position. Finally, all the arrowheads found seem to relate to hunting, not combat, which would be most strange for any kind of wooden fort.
So, I am going to say that the most likely explanation is that the building is a large-scale industrial mill that processed in sufficient volume to need the weight capacity.
The "backup" explanation, if the first one is shown unlikely or wrong, is that it is a religious center of exceptional nature, affiliated with the Church of Hope (probably the original name for the modern Church of St. Thomas). A church tithing barn is a possibility, but it seems way too small and over-engineered for that.
(That does, however, lead on to the obvious question of where the tithing barn would be... To support the church as a whole and a local monastery, there would need to be a fairly efficient method of both storing and transporting those goods. That's not a small problem.)
Posted by: Jonathan Day 24th August 06
I think I may have been guilty of misleading people. I may not have made clear the difference between a postpit (dug to contain the post and its packing material) and a postpipe (the archaeological footprint of the post itself within the postpit) so include a photo from Trench 33 in 2005 which illustrates this quite nicely. In terms of dimensions our archaeologists seem to be suggesting about 12" to 14" diameter posts at the moment.Posted by: Pam Bates 28th August 06
The estimated size of the posts, at 12" - 14", is still larger than those used in many of the Medieval Aisled Halls listed on the websites I provided you with, but would be smaller than my original prediction.
Westwick Cottage is the closest in post size, but is still smaller than the dimensions you give. However,
it is now the closest fit to the information we have. Furthermore, the posts are going to have been closertogether than appears to have been normal, so I believe the building had a minimum of two floors (if it was a cottage or manor house) OR had exceptionally heavy styling, if it was closer to Temple Balsall (theother Aisled Hall that is close to the right size).
I would be exceptionally interested if the archaeologists can answer any of the following questions:
1) Is there anything to indicate how much pressure would have been placed on the post, and/or if that pressure was off-center?
2) The lists of Medieval Aisled Halls I have been able to find only document such halls in the south of England and in the midlands. How common are Aisled Halls this far north?
3) The lists I have found state that such Aisled Halls are usually attached to a manor, or are close to one. When excavating near the postpits, has anything been found that could be suggestive of such an ajoining building?
Posted by: Jonathan Day 29th August 06
I've re-appraised the probable size of the medieval hall, based on your new calculations. The examples on the page I provided the link to would suggest two-storey building, similar to the cottage listed there, that being the closest fit. As I mentioned before, though, Aisled Halls in the northern part of England seem to have been rare, so it would be interesting to get some speculation from the archaeologists on its nature.
I also found a fascinating article which describes 12th century aisled halls as being gothic in design, but those in the 13th century being more functional. They also talk of a very rapid change in technology and building materials, as well as architecture and style, over the two centuries. If the archaeologists could pin down the date a little better, it might be possible to produce (or download) an artistic impression of the type of Hall Mellor would have had.
Finally, I don't know if you're artistic or know anyone who is, but there is a truly superb 3D drawing package which could be used to produce artist impressions of roundhouses, aisled halls, Roman pottery kilns, etc, which a web browser could "fly around" or into. This might be useful for those things that are simply too unfamiliar for people to get a clear impression of what they would have been really like.
Posted by: Jonathan Day 31st August 06