The Guildhall is a municipal facility at Register Square in

Beverley Beverley is a market town, market and minster (church), minster town and a civil parishes in England, civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, of which it is the county town. The town centre is located south-east of York's centre ...

East Riding of Yorkshire The East Riding of Yorkshire, or simply East Riding or East Yorkshire, is a ceremonial county and unitary authority area in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It borders North Yorkshire to the north and west, South Yorkshire to t ...

, England. It is a Grade I

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

History

The building, which dates back to 1320, was acquired from a householder, Edward Mynskyp, for use as a meeting place by the town officials in 1501. It was remodelled internally by William Middleton in 1762. It was remodelled again, both internally and externally in 1832, when the original arched entrance was removed and a large

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cult ...

with four

Doric order The Doric order was one of the three orders of ancient Greek and later Roman architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. The Doric is most easily recognized by the simple circular capitals at the top of col ...

columns and a pediment above, designed by Charles Mountain the Younger, was installed on the front of the building. The courtroom, located on the ground floor on the south side of the building, features a Rococo-style

stucco Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and a ...

ceiling, created by the stuccoist, Giuseppe Cortese (1704-1779), which was installed at the time of the remodelling by Middleton. The courtroom was used as the sole facility for dispensing justice in the town until the

Sessions House A sessions house in the United Kingdom was historically a courthouse that served as a dedicated court of quarter sessions, where criminal trials were held four times a year on quarter days. Sessions houses were also used for other purposes to do w ...

at New Walk opened in 1814. At that time the

quarter sessions The courts of quarter sessions or quarter sessions were local courts traditionally held at four set times each year in the Kingdom of England from 1388 (extending also to Wales following the Laws in Wales Act 1535). They were also established in ...

moved to the new Sessions House, but the magistrates' courts continued to be held in the guildhall. In 1827, a public gallery was created in the courtroom using two Doric order columns which had been designed by

Nicholas Hawksmoor Nicholas Hawksmoor (probably 1661 – 25 March 1736) was an English architect. He was a leading figure of the English Baroque style of architecture in the late-seventeenth and early-eighteenth centuries. Hawksmoor worked alongside the principa ...

for the galleries of

Beverley Minster Beverley Minster, otherwise known as the Parish Church of Saint John and Saint Martin, in Beverley, East Riding of Yorkshire, is a parish church in the Church of England. It is one of the largest parish churches in the UK, larger than one-third ...

and which had been removed from the minister the previous year. Also created by Middleton, as part of the remodelling, was the magistrates room, located on the first floor on the north side of the building: this functioned as the council chamber for the Borough of Beverley until 1832 when the mayor's parlour was created. The mayor's parlour, located on the first floor at the front of the building, was used as a council chamber for the Borough of Beverley from 1832 until council meetings moved to the courtroom in 1896. Although council offices were established at Lairgate in 1911, council meetings including the annual mayor choosing ceremony continued to be held at the guildhall. In the late 19th century, along with the Sessions House, the guildhall was also used as the meeting place for the

East Riding County Council East Riding County Council (ERCC) was the county council of the East Riding of Yorkshire (excluding the county borough of Kingston upon Hull) from 1 April 1889 to 31 March 1974. Chairmen * 1889–1890: David Burton (resigned) * 1890–1891: B ...

until County Hall was completed in 1891. The guildhall also ceased to be the local seat of government for the town when the new

unitary authority A unitary authority is a local authority responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are usually performed by a higher level of sub-national government or the national governmen ...

, the

East Riding of Yorkshire Council East Riding of Yorkshire Council is the local authority of the East Riding of Yorkshire. It is a unitary authority, having the powers of a non-metropolitan county and district council combined. It provides a full range of local government serv ...

, was formed in 1996. The guildhall now operates as a community museum which exhibits objects from Beverley's history. Works of art in the guildhall include paintings by Fred Elwell and his wife, Mary Elwell, and a collection of 15th century

minstrel A minstrel was an entertainer, initially in medieval Europe. It originally described any type of entertainer such as a musician, juggler, acrobat, singer or fool; later, from the sixteenth century, it came to mean a specialist entertainer who ...

s' chains. Staff at the guildhall also arrange local interest exhibitions.

Gallery

File:Beverley Guildhall Courtroom.jpg, The courtroom File:Beverley Guildhall Magistrates Room.tif, The magistrates' room File:Beverley Guildhall Parlour Room (39262564815).jpg, The Mayor's Parlour

References

{{reflist Grade I listed buildings in the East Riding of Yorkshire Beverley City and town halls in the East Riding of Yorkshire Buildings and structures completed in 1320