Reasons for Designation
A camera is a subsidiary farm of a preceptory (a medieval monastery of the
military orders of Knights Templar or Knights Hospitaller).
Camerae are very rare in England with less than 40 known examples. In view of
this rarity, and their importance in supporting the monastic communities of
the preceptories (examples of which are also rare), all camerae exhibiting
archaeological survival are identified as nationally important.
The remains of the camera of the Knights Hospitallers at Great Limber, and
adjacent settlement remains, survive as a continuous series of substantial
earthworks and buried deposits which have been undisturbed by excavation.
Valuable evidence for the relationship between the pre-existing settlement and
its field system (represented by the ridge-and-furrow cultivation remains) and
the superimposed establishments of the Templars and Hospitallers, will thus be
preserved. The remains of the early post-medieval house will permit not just
a study of its construction and function but also an understanding of the
appropriation and conversion of Hospitallers' estates by secular landlords in
the 16th century. The monument has been the subject of a detailed
archaeological survey and is thus quite well understood, and research on the
surviving historical documentation has further enhanced the appreciation of
the remains.
Details
The monument includes the remains of a medieval manor believed to have served
as a camera of the Knights Hospitallers from the 14th to the 16th centuries.
In the late 12th century the Knights Templar held the second largest manor in
Great Limber, which they let to secular tenants; when the order was dissolved
in the early 14th century the estate passed to the Hospitallers and thereafter
developed as a camera dependent on the preceptory at Willoughton, from which
it was administered as an agricultural estate under the management of a
steward. In 1338 there was a large house, dovecote and garden on the site.
After the dissolution of the preceptory in 1540 the house was first
reoccupied by Thomas Smyth and then sold to the Pelham family who must have
reconstructed it and let it to a variety of tenants until its abandonment in
the 17th century. The remains from the medieval and post-medieval periods are
partly overlain by the gardens and farmbuildings of a second house, to the
north east, called Limber House, built before 1812 and destroyed in the
mid-20th century. The area of the present farmyard and the site of Limber
House are excluded from the scheduling. The monument also includes the
earthwork remains of medieval settlement and cultivation which lie adjacent to
the west.
The remains of the camera are situated around and to the west of the farmyard
and garden of the former Limber House. Immediately to the south west of the
present farmyard, in an area of pastureland, are the earthworks of a
rectangular embanked enclosure. The bank varies between 1m and 2m in height
and includes the brick and flint foundations of a later wall. It encloses an
area of approximately 80m by 90m, near the centre of which are the low,
earth covered ruins of a large house of 16th and 17th century date built of
brick, stone and flint. In the south eastern corner of the enclosure are the
remains of a large rectangular barn, and the remainder of the enclosure is
subdivided by the earthwork remains of walls and ranges of outbuildings. This
enclosure is believed to represent the main enclosure of the Hospitallers
camera where the main house and outbuildings, a garden and probably a chapel
would have been located. The visible building remains, including the
enclosure wall, are principally associated with the post-medieval occupation
of the site but are believed to overlie structures of medieval date.
At its north western corner the enclosure bank overlies an earlier, lower bank
which runs northwards to form the western boundary of two rectangular closes
on the same alignment as the main enclosure. The closes are separated by a
further bank, and the northernmost close is bounded on the north by the
remains of a hollow way now partly overlain by a raised farm track. These two
closes are believed to delineate part of the estate owned by the Templars in
the 12th-14th centuries and reoccupied in the 14th-16th centuries as part of
the Hospitallers' camera. Both the north eastern part of the main enclosure
and the eastern parts of the closes to the north are overlain by the remains
of later features, including a broad bank on which trees were planted to
screen the farmyard at Limber House.
Running along the eastern side of the main enclosure are the earthworks of a
hollow way. Adjacent to the east are the remains of another rectangular
enclosure, thought to have formed part of the camera established by the
Hospitallers and reused in the post-medieval period. This enclosure is
represented beyond the northern and eastern sides of the modern farmyard by a
low chalk bank. The enclosure is now partly occupied by the farmyard (which
is wholly excluded from the scheduling) and by the remains of the garden which
surrounded the former Limber House. The south western corner of the garden is
bounded by a narrow bank which runs eastwards and northwards along the outside
edge of a linear depression; these features represent the remains of a ha-ha
which formerly separated the garden from adjacent pastureland.
The north western part of the monument is occupied by an area of settlement
remains representing the former eastern extent of the village of Great Limber.
The earthworks, which survive to a height of 0.5m-1m, include the remains of
buildings, plot boundaries and village streets. Running along the northern
edge of the monument are the remains of a hollow way, formerly part of the
village high street; running southwards from it, and curving westwards towards
the church, are the remains of another hollow way. Aligned approximately
north-south between these two streets are a series of parallel banks,
subdivided by further banks running at right angles, which represent plot
boundaries. Within these plots, situated along the southern side of the high
street, are the earthworks of stone building foundations and depressions
representing yards. On the south and east sides of the southern hollow way is
another series of rectangular plots, on the same alignment, with further
building remains. This part of the village was depopulated gradually; in 1676
there appear to have been two dwellings remaining in the north western corner
of the monument, and by 1812 the whole area had been abandoned.
Both the camera and the settlement partly overlie the remains of earlier
ridge-and-furrow cultivation. In the two closes which form the north western
part of the camera are a series of broad ridges running east-west representing
the remains of a furlong; at the western end of the southern close is a broad
ridge running north-south which served as a headland. Adjacent to the west are
the remains of another furlong in which the ridges are aligned north-south;
the northern part of this furlong is overlain by the house plots at the
south eastern limit of the settlement. Both of these furlongs formed part of
the same field which was cultivated in the earlier medieval period prior to
both the expansion of the settlement and the establishment of the camera.
These remains are bounded on the south by a hollow way running east-west;
beyond it are further traces of ridge-and-furrow cultivation on a slightly
different alignment, representing the remains of a field of later medieval
date which was known in the late 17th century as Stone Pit Furlong. In the
south eastern corner of the monument these features are overlain by traces of
post-medieval activity.
The area of the present farmyard and the site of Limber House are totally
excluded from the scheduling. All modern standing buildings, modern paving,
fences and gates are also excluded from the scheduling although the ground
beneath them is included.
MAP EXTRACT
The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.
