The Market House, also known as Martock Town Hall, is a municipal building in Church Street in

Martock Martock is a large village and civil parish in Somerset, England, situated on the edge of the Somerset Levels north west of Yeovil in the South Somerset district. The parish includes Hurst, approximately one mile south of the village, and Bow ...

Somerset ( en, All The People of Somerset) , locator_map = , coordinates = , region = South West England , established_date = Ancient , established_by = , preceded_by = , origin = , lord_lieutenant_office =Lord Lieutenant of Somerset , lord_ ...

, England. The building, which is the meeting place of Martock Parish Council, is a Grade II

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

Tuscan order The Tuscan order (Latin ''Ordo Tuscanicus'' or ''Ordo Tuscanus'', with the meaning of Etruscan order) is one of the two classical orders developed by the Romans, the other being the composite order. It is influenced by the Doric order, but with ...

column, with a ball finial and a

wrought iron Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.08%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4%). It is a semi-fused mass of iron with fibrous slag inclusions (up to 2% by weight), which give it a wood-like "grain" ...

weather vane A wind vane, weather vane, or weathercock is an instrument used for showing the direction of the wind. It is typically used as an architectural ornament to the highest point of a building. The word ''vane'' comes from the Old English word , m ...

, which had been modelled on a monument commemorating the Emperor

Trajan Trajan ( ; la, Caesar Nerva Traianus; 18 September 539/11 August 117) was Roman emperor from 98 to 117. Officially declared ''optimus princeps'' ("best ruler") by the senate, Trajan is remembered as a successful soldier-emperor who presi ...

Wilton House Wilton House is an English country house at Wilton near Salisbury in Wiltshire, which has been the country seat of the Earls of Pembroke for over 400 years. It was built on the site of the medieval Wilton Abbey. Following the dissolution ...

, was installed in the market place in 1741. However, until the mid-18th century, the only protection from the weather that market traders in the town enjoyed was an ancient oak tree. In around 1753, the vestry started discussions about erecting a dedicated market house, although it was not until the Slade family acquired the local manor in 1759, that plans progressed: the then

lord of the manor Lord of the Manor is a title that, in Anglo-Saxon England, referred to the landholder of a rural estate. The lord enjoyed manorial rights (the rights to establish and occupy a residence, known as the manor house and demesne) as well as seig ...

, George Slade, commissioned the building in the early 1780s. The market hall was designed in the

neoclassical style Neoclassical architecture is an architectural style produced by the Neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century in Italy and France. It became one of the most prominent architectural styles in the Western world. The prevailing sty ...

, built in ashlar

hamstone Hamstone is the name given to a honey-coloured building stone from Ham Hill, Somerset, England. It is a well-cemented medium to coarse grained limestone characterised by marked bedding planes of clay inclusions and less well-cemented material ...

and was completed in around 1785. The design involved a symmetrical main frontage facing south down Church Street; the ground floor was arcaded, so that butchers' markets could be held, with an assembly room on the first floor. There was a round headed opening with

voussoir A voussoir () is a wedge-shaped element, typically a stone, which is used in building an arch or vault. Although each unit in an arch or vault is a voussoir, two units are of distinct functional importance: the keystone and the springer. The ...

s and keystones on the ground floor, a

Venetian window A Venetian window (also known as a Serlian window) is a large tripartite window which is a key element in Palladian architecture. Although Sebastiano Serlio (1475–1554) did not invent it, the window features largely in the work of the Italian ar ...

supported by

brackets A bracket is either of two tall fore- or back-facing punctuation marks commonly used to isolate a segment of text or data from its surroundings. Typically deployed in symmetric pairs, an individual bracket may be identified as a 'left' or ' ...

on the first floor and a semi-circular vent in the gable above. The side elevations extended back four bays with sash windows on the first floor while the north elevation, which was also fenestrated by a sash window on the first floor, was surmounted by a turret containing a small bell. The manorial estate, including the market house, was purchased by Robert Goodden of Compton House in the early 19th century. The ground floor was used to accommodate the local fire cart from around that time and was then used to accommodate the local horse-drawn fire engine from the mid-19th century. Following implementation of the

Local Government Act 1894 The Local Government Act 1894 (56 & 57 Vict. c. 73) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales outside the County of London. The Act followed the reforms carried out at county level un ...

, which established parish councils, the assembly room became the meeting place of the local parish council. A plaque commemorating the exploits of the early aviator, Douglas Graham Gilmour, who had flown in a Bristol Biplane from

Larkhill Larkhill is a garrison town in the civil parish of Durrington, Wiltshire, England. It lies about west of the centre of Durrington village and north of the prehistoric monument of Stonehenge. It is about north of Salisbury. The settlement ...

Wiltshire Wiltshire (; abbreviated Wilts) is a historic and ceremonial county in South West England with an area of . It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset to the southwest, Somerset to the west, Hampshire to the southeast, Gloucestershire ...

Hinton St George Hinton St George is a village and parish in Somerset, England, situated outside Crewkerne, south west of Yeovil in the South Somerset district. The village has a population of 442. It has a wide main street lined with hamstone cottages, some t ...

in Somerset in April 1911, was transferred from his hangar at Bower Hinton farm to the market house in June 1941. The building remained in the ownership of the Goodden family until it was acquired by the parish council in 1954. The building was restored in the early 1960s, at which time the rear two bays were infilled for use as public toilets. A grant of £190,000 was obtained from the

Heritage Lottery Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...

to restore the building and establish a community office on the ground floor in 2008. Following completion of the works, the parish council re-occupied the assembly room on the first floor.

References

{{reflist Government buildings completed in 1785 City and town halls in Somerset Grade II listed buildings in Somerset