A GRADE-II listed property dating to the 15th century has gone on the market in Littleton.
The five-bedroom detached house in Church Lane is being sold by independent estate agent Nony Kerr-Smiley with a guide price of £1.5m.
A former rectory, the property overlooks the church to the front.
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One of the most important and attractive properties in the popular Winchester village of Littleton.
Monks Rest sits under a glorious rose-covered brick frontage and is a timber-framed 15th Century Grade II Listed former rectory with brick, flint and stone dressing – the chequerboard style chimney being of particular note – under a pitched clay tile roof.
This beautiful home briefly comprises three principal reception rooms, a modern kitchen/dining room which was opened up recently into the former Victorian school room, and features an exquisite Italian stone floor, four bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a self-contained one-bedroomed annexe, all within charming mature cottage gardens, with off-road parking, in a plot of approximately a third of an acre.
Monks Rest does have an interesting history: In 1500 the Prior Silkstead leased 40 acres of land at Littleton "near the hospital or house of St. Mary Magdalene" to one William Atkins.
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It seems likely this became known as Monks Rest as it became a 'country retreat' for the monks of St Swithun's Priory. Later the house became the village parsonage, with sympathetic 17th Century alterations, and then in Victorian times the village school (generations of school children have carved their initials into the brick by the back door).
Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, the 20th century architectural historian, describes the house in his Architectural Guide; with the details of the open hall with moulded dais beam and the fine arched stone fireplace in the 'Parlour', now the Drawing Room, catching his eye.
For more information, visit the Nony Kerr-Smiley website.
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