The house with no kitchen or fireplace

 

The facade of Paycocke's House: built 1509, but all the oriel windows, and much of the highly detailed carving, date from early in the 20th century

Paycocke’s House in Coggeshall, Essex, is one of the best-known Tudor houses in England. It was owned by a wool merchant, Thomas Paycocke, who made his fortune from selling undyed wool. So I was fascinated to see this demonstration of a wealthy Tudor merchant’s lifestyle. But on arrival, my response was a number of questions. 

Like many old houses, this one had been altered. I’ve nothing against adapting old houses to suit current needs, but the biggest alterations took place around 1900, when Noel Buxton made a lot of changes, including adding fireplaces to the main rooms, and moving the main staircase, and more or less rebuilding the front of the house, adding oriel windows, for example. All of these changes were made to give the appearance of putting the house back to its original state. To the present-day visitor, it’s difficult to imagine the house in its original layout, and at a first glance, the front looks all of a piece. But, of course, the reality is, as with so many English parish churches, that what you are looking at is as much a Victorian restorer’s idea of what medieval (or Tudor) looked like, rather than the original. None of those oriel windows existed in 19th-century photographs. Inside, there are beautifully carved bressummer beams, usually found over a fireplace – but none of them is in the original position. All the fireplaces are new.

Those fireplaces intrigued me. Thomas Paycocke used this house as his main showroom, where he met clients, many of them from continental Europe. Indeed, in the main room, visitors can see the table is set for a meal. Yet we learn that Paycocke’s house had neither a kitchen, nor any fireplaces! Records of tenants in the early 20th century report how cold the house was, and it must have been similar for Paycocke in his day. How did he not have a fire, or any kitchen? How can you live in a house with neither? According to the National Trust website, Thomas didn’t live there, but had another house in the town. Nonetheless, he let his son, John, live there. There was originally a third storey, but it’s difficult to imagine fires at that level and not on the ground floor.

Medieval halls had a central fire with a hole in the roof, but I don’t imagine any newly built Tudor dwelling trying to replicate that heating system. So what did Thomas Paycocke do for heat, and what did he do to provide food for his clients? He certainly had the money – he left the equivalent of over £500,000 in bequests in his will.

Sadly, Paycocke’s House raises more questions than answers, and it doesn’t seem to offer a very good example of what everyday Tudor living was really like. Although the later inhabitants are certainly of interest, the reason we visit the house – to get a glimpse of how people actually lived – is not, sadly, something the current house can provide.