Archaeology Sites

Scheduled Ancient Monument - Warton Rectory

District: Lancaster
Name: Warton Rectory.
Description : Substantial remains of a 13th century rectory. Associated with the nearby St. Oswald's church.

The rectory is located 60m east of St Oswald's Church, Warton and includes well preserved upstanding ruins of the late 13th - early 14th century great hall, with service rooms and a first floor at the north end, together with foundations of buildings and a porch to the east of the building and buried remains of a back court to the north of the main building. It is constructed of limestone rubble with sandstone dressings. The main building has gable ends surviving to full height and other walls to roughly first floor level. The focus of the rectory was the great hall which lay at the south end of the complex. It measures c.13.5m by 7.9m internally and was a large room open to the roof, probably with a central hearth and smoke escaping through a louvred vent in the ceiling, and was lit by an oval decorated window in the end gable. It had a raised platform or dais at the south end and could be entered directly through an external door near the south western corner. At the northern end of the great hall was a cross passage which could be entered at either end through external doorways. The eastern door of the cross passage originally had an attached porch and is thought to have been the major doorway giving access to the rectory. Originally the cross passage would have been separated from the hall by screens, these no longer survive.

North of the cross passage is a stone wall with three stone pointed arched doorways. That to the west led to the buttery, which was lit by a narrow window in the north gable wall, and that to the east led to a pantry, which was similarly lit but also has a square window in the east wall. The central doorway led to another passageway which provided access out of the main building to the north end. Timber partitions, which no longer survive, would have separated the central passageway from the rooms on either side. This northern end of the building was two-storeyed, access to the upper storey is thought to have been provided by a stairway located adjacent to the cross passage. There is evidence that the upper room, which was a solar or drawing room, had an inner chamber with a garderobe opening off it. The fireplace which warmed the room survives in the north gable wall.

To the north of the pantry and buttery lay a back courtyard which is thought to have contained a well and an external kitchen. Access to this back courtyard was through a pointed arched doorway in the north gable wall. To the east of the pantry, adjoining the rectory, are wall foundations indicating that additional buildings and rooms were located here, at present their function is uncertain.

SD:49900, 72300

© Crown Copyright. All rights reserved
Lancashire County Council OS Licence No.100023320 2003