The gatehouses have each a large and a small archway (Fig. 40), the large one for vehicles, the small for foot passengers. This double archway was now coming into vogue, and was very generally adopted in gatehouses of the fifteenth century. It indicates, among other things, that vehicles had come into more general use. Adjoining the outer gatehouse is a barn, still in excellent preservation, and offering an interesting example of this kind of building.
Although the accommodation at Wingfield is more elaborate than in houses of earlier date, it is still rather roughly and unscientifically thrown together, involving much waste both of space and material. It is also worthy of note that in spite of its great extent and its magnificent rooms, the only staircases were the old-fashioned circular turret stairs of no great diameter. There was indeed as yet no other fashion to follow, for the ancient newel stair held its own until the time of Elizabeth, when it was suddenly and without any transitional form replaced by wide wooden staircases in straight flights. England has no examples of the magnificent development of circular staircases which are to be seen in so many of the great châteaux of France.
Wingfield, it is also to be noted, was carefully built for defence. It stands nearly at the end of a spur of land, and the ground on three of its sides slopes steeply away, rendering access difficult. At the north end, where the ground is in part rather flatter, it is protected by a deep dry moat and a wall. The south side is the most level, and consequently the outer and inferior court was placed on this side. Even supposing that an attacking force gained possession of this court, there was still the mass of its north wing (Fig. 40) between them and the principal part of the house. The only internal communication between the two courts was through an exceedingly narrow doorway leading to a narrow crooked passage. The external walls of the north court are practically devoid of windows on the ground floor; those of the hall and adjoining rooms looked out on to a garden which lay between them and the high wall overhanging the moat. Here, then, as in other houses, the hall was placed in a secure position, and one in which it was possible to make use of large windows. That this part of the house was tolerably secure is proved by the fact that so much of it remains; for when the place was besieged and captured during the Civil Wars, it was the south court through which the breach was made and entrance was effected. It is to the Civil Wars that Wingfield owes its destruction, for, having caused some trouble to the Parliamentary forces, it was ordered to be “slighted,” and was so far destroyed as to be rendered uninhabitable. It passed from the descendants of the Earl of Shrewsbury, and the hall was for a time patched up as a dwelling. Subsequently it was further dismantled in order to build a new house at the foot of the hill. Since then time, as destructive as siege-guns, has wrought further havoc, for no more than “summer’s honey breath” can an unprotected building
“hold out
Against the wreckful siege of battering days.”
But fortunately in recent years the owners have realised this, and have taken what steps they can to arrest further decay.
40. South Wingfield Manor House.
The North Side of South Courtyard.
