Dalderby, Lincolnshire

 

All roof, no wall

I remember reading about this house years ago and seeing a picture of it in a book somewhere. The description said that the building was no longer there, having burned down in the 1940s, and that this was sad because it was an example of the very first, most ancient type of house type. What the writer meant was a building held up by a simple five-part frame, a pair of upright V-shapes joined at the apex by a horizontal ridge beam. This produces something not quite like the classic cruck frame, which leaves some room for a low wall at each side. The tent-like frame of the house in the picture, it was argued, became the first kind of house, and this fact showed that the building must have been very ancient.

This argument does not stand up at all. We now know that since prehistoric times people have made dwellings in all kinds of ways and that this particular house was probably no older than the 18th or 19th century. It was known as ’Teapot Hall’, from its shape and the fact that from the side the dormer window looked a little like a handle and the chimney could, with effort, be imagined as a spout. The fanciful name is also said to have led to the rhyme, ’Tea Pot Hall, All roof no wall’. One account has it as one of a pair that once acted as gate lodges to a road leading to nearby Scrivelsby Court; others say that it was always a one-off, put up as a curiosity to house someone who could manage with just a single room. It was inhabited until the 1920s and then fell into disrepair. It apparently burned down during victory celebrations in 1945: someone thought its by then untidy assemblage of thatch and wood was one of many bonfires that had been kindled to mark the end of World War II.

The other day I found a book in a charity shop which included the picture above it. I had to buy the book, for sentiment’s sake. And because it contained a lot of other interesting pictures. And because it will help me remember my first bookish encounter long ago with Teapot Hall, all roof, no wall.