York Historic Environment Record

Formerly known as: Sir Thomas Herbert's House PAVEMENT. House, now shop and offices. Early C17 house with mid C17 extension linking with mid C16 house at rear; extension enlarged during late C19 restoration; further restoration including partial rebuilding, shopfront, and re-roofing of rear house, in 1925. Early C17 house probably built for John Jacques, Merchant, c1614.

MATERIALS: all parts timber-framed. Early C17 house has front of white-washed plaster, rear rebuilt in re-used orange-red brick in English garden-wall bond; pantile roof of two parallel ranges, masked at rear by ramped-up brick parapet; brick stack. Mid C17 extension rebuilt in pink-orange brick in English garden-wall bond, with lead and pantile roofs. Mid C16 house has rebuilt ground floor of pink-orange brick in Flemish bond, upper floors of white-washed plaster, and tiled roof.

EXTERIOR: early C17 house: 3 storeys and attics; 3-bay twin-gabled front, with jettied first and second floors and exposed framing. Shopfront has windows of three segment-headed lights with transoms framed in plain mullions, and recessed glazed door. At left end, ogee-arched door with original door furniture, beneath divided overlight, gives access to upper floors. Passage opening at right end leads to Lady Peckitt's Yard.

First floor windows are mullioned and transomed, of 4 and 5 lights, with small 2- and 3-light mullion windows at each end: second floor and attic windows are mullioned, of 2 or 4 lights: all windows are diamond-lattice casements. Jetty bressumers carry carved fascia boards; gables finished with carved barge boards and restored or replacement spike finials and drop pendants; roof valleys masked by renewed timber panels carved with grapes and vines.

Rear: windows on first and second floors are replacements; in attic gables, original openings survive, one blocked, one with renewed window. Right return to Lady Peckitt's Yard: rebuilt extension has door of 6 beaded panels with semicircular fanlight in reset open-pedimented doorcase with fluted half-column jambs and garlanded frieze blocks. Mid C16 house: 3-storey front of 4 unequal bays, with jettied upper floors and exposed framing. Ground floor has shallow bow window with moulded cornice to left of paired shop windows of 5 arcaded lights beneath panelled friezes, all with small-pane glazing. First and second floor windows are single or multi-light casements as on Pavement front. Rear: first floor jetty incorporated into side passage of adjacent Golden Fleece public house (qv).

INTERIOR: coffered ceiling to through passage. Early C17 house, ground floor: transverse beams carried on cast-iron columns with leaf capitals. First floor: chamfer-stopped moulded beams and joists throughout. Replacement open string staircase with turned balusters and heavy, ramped-up moulded handrail on column newels rises to second floor. Front room now subdivided by reset C17 panelling. Larger room lined throughout with run-through panelling beneath fretwork frieze and moulded cornice on carved consoles; panelled door in fluted doorcase with angle roundels. Replacement fire surround framed in tapered carved pilaster jambs and fretwork frieze: massive tripartite overmantel of carved and jewelled panels between squat Corinthian columns, and vine-carved frieze incorporating the Herbert Arms. Roof: trusses carried on sole-pieces. Mid C16 house: first floor rear room has plaster-encased beams decorated with pomegranates and foliage. Doorway with 4-centred head cut in wallplate leads to later building.

HISTORICAL NOTE: the house takes its name from associations with Sir Thomas Herbert, friend and attendant of Charles I, whose family acquired an earlier house on the site in 1557. In 1639, Charles I was entertained here by the Lord Mayor, Roger Jaques, on which occasion he knighted Thomas Widdrington, Recorder of York, and early historian of the City.

(Bartholomew City Guides: Hutchinson J and Palliser DM: York: Edinburgh: 1980-: 190-91; City of York: RCHME: The Central Area: HMSO: 1981-: 176).
Listing NGR: SE6048751780

Derived from English Heritage LB download dated: 22/08/2005

1920s refurbishment including removal/replacement of ground floor walls and infills to timber frame on first and second floor were replaced with concrete. These changes and increase in traffic on Pavement has led to the sinking of the shop frontage. The frontage was underpinned in the 1980s. (Pers Comms Guy Bowyer YCT 2018).

NMR info:
1. PAVEMENT 5343

Nos 12 and 14 (The Herbert House) (formerly listed as Sir Thomas Herbert's House)
SE 6051 NW 28/434 14.6.54
I GV

2.
Mid-C16 to mid-C17 with later alterations and restorations. Consists of an early C17 house facing the street and a mid-C16 wing at the rear in Lady Peckitt's Yard with a short linking portion of mid-C17. Timber frame and plaster with later brick infilling at rear. The front block is of 3 storeys plus attic with oversailing upper storeys and carved fascia boards and with twin gables having restored barge-boards and finials. Renewed windows. Inserted shop front, generally in keeping. The rear block is of 3 storeys, timber frame and brick, and oversailing upper storeys on west side. The ground storey is mainly modern brick, the north end with re-used timbers and a 4-centred door head. The interior has exposed timber- framing and, in the upper front room, a good fireplace and re-set panelling. A plate on right-hand side above covered-way records that Sir Thomas Herbert was born here in 1606. He was the sole attendant on Charles I during the last 3 years before his execution. (RCHM Vol V, Monument 311).

1 List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest 272 City of York, June 1983.
2 List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest e. District of York, 14-MAR-1997

Related object BF060982 THE HERBERT HOUSE, YORK

Heritage Mapping, 2019, Herbert House (12-14 Pavement) and 11 Lady Peckett’s Yard, York (Unpublished document). SYO2568.