Pembridge Amenity Trust

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Protecting the Scheduled Historic Buildings and Monuments of Pembridge. A Registered Charity No 1060265

Pembridge the Village - Pembridge has clearly seen many changes since its inception. The village pre-dates the Domesday book. A community has existed at this place for over 1000 years. At one point in its history the village exceeded Leominster in size and was an important centre of commerce during the mediaeval period. Following the Industrial Revolution, Pembridge appeared to "fall off the map" and economic activity declined. The village was left alone to continue its rural traditions in relative isolation and, as a consequence, much of its medieval character remained unspoiled.

Fig Tree House/Grosmont House, East Street (RCHM 15, SMR 16366)

Discussion
A single dated sample is not always the most reliable way to date a building but there were no further accessible timbers at the time of sampling. As with so many of the buildings in Pembridge the cruck-blades are quite different in character from the other timbers. The use of one poplar/willow blade and one scarfed blade indicates some sort of resource shortage at the time of the construction. The dated blade is the earliest timber identified as part of this project. It was felled between 6 months and 6 weeks earlier than the blade from West End Farm felled in the spring of AD1425. The identification of the two earliest timbers felled so close together in date and used at opposite ends of the village certainly prevents any discussion of the direction of development of the village! Duncan James had previously noted that there are marked similarities in layout, size, proportion and style between West End Farm and Fig Tree/Grosmont Houses such that it is tempting to think that they may have been constructed by the same team of craftsmen, this is certainly supported by the near coincidence of dates, viz. 1425 and 1424.

The above is from the following report: "The History and Heritage of Pembridge: A report on the tree-ring analysis of ten houses"
Report Number ARCUS 574q
Compiled by Ian Tyers, with contributions by Duncan James
Date December 2002

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What is Dendrochronology or tree ring analysis?

ARCUS Dendrochronology Laboratory
University of Sheffield
West Court
2 Mappin Street
Sheffield
S1 4DT

Phone: 0114 222 5107 Fax: 0114 276 3146 Email: dendro@sheffield.ac.uk

For more information please contact the secretary of the Pembridge Amenity Trust info@pembridgeamenitytrust.co.uk