I am interested in any additional information about what some people call Scottish barns in America or "New World Scottish Barns".

In upstate New York their are some barns built with reverse-assembly framing which have been credited to Scottish immigrant(s) such as at this link: http://persistencefoundation.org/scottishbarn.htm

A blog about these barns is here (scroll down to "...Scotch Barns..."): http://www.heritagebarns.com/blog/

My questions are:

1. Is their a precedent for reverse assembly framing in Scotland?

2. How many barns in NY have been attributed to Scotsmen?

Thanks;
Jim

Hi Jim,

I think that you will struggle to make this link !

Most vernacular buildings in Scotland are of masonary construction with a small number of shutter formed clay walled agricultural buildings but I have yet to see a timber framed building in that country however that does not mean that they do not or did not exist at one time or another.

It is now emerging that a fairly extensive tradition of cruck building was employed for both house and barn but with stone rather than timber walls. It is also possible to see hammer beamed roofs and collar purlin roofs but these do not tend to be found in combination with timber walls and so it is in my mind doubtful if Scottish "clearance" carpenters would have been able to take the building tradition that you describe above with them from Scotland to the new world.

Please note that the people are called "Scots" and the alcoholic drink is called "Scotch" and so you should not describe barns as being Scotch barns unless these are being used to store whiskey.

Regards

Ken Hume

Ken,
Stone crucks? I assume you mean straight stone walls, with cruck timber roofs then on top of these. The first image that came to my mind was that of long, curved monolithic stones!

In your observation, Ken, what vernacular building style would this seem to resemble? I find this all very interesting, and it has got me curious.

I do not know about the very earliest settler in New Holland, but I believe most of the early Scots in this country were lowlanders, and a group that we call 'Scots-Irish' which are themselves descended from lowland Scots ad people from the northermost section of England who settled first in Ulster, then in America (they are not at all Irish. Though this may have some bearing on building methods.

Thanks for the comments so far.

Earlier I meant to post this link to this photo showing the post and tie beam missing the plate. http://persistencefoundation.org/scottishbarnduring.htm

Jim

Hi,

Scottish cruck frames probably were raised in much the same way as southern rude crucks but using mainly jointed / elbowed crucks. Instead of timber walls, stone walls were then built around the cruck blades. In later years, and especially following the Highland clearances (post 1745) people were forced off the land and shipped to America, with their houses and farmsteadings being burnt to the ground to prevent their return. This has resulted in the only remaining widespread evidence of this cruck construction tradition being the standing stone walls where slots can still be seen today on the inside face of the stone walls in the locations where once the cruck blades were effectively embedded in the walls. I have taken some photographs of just such a house being dismantled at Killin, Argyll but it will take some time to retrieve these from the photo archive.

There is an illustraton of a cruck framed barn at Corrimony near Inverness, Scotland in The Cruck Catalogue (Alcock et al, 1981) by Hay (1975) and also a study of Scottish (G P Stell, 1981) and Irish (A Gailey, 1964 & D McCourt, 1961 & 1972) cruck framed buildings.

G P Stell makes an intertesting statement "cruck framing was the standard method of constructing farm buildings in lowland Scotland and that this practice was widespread from the Solway Firth [border with England] to Aberdeen [NE Scotland]"

This last statement by Stell is bold but does tend to fit the visual pattern of early vernacular building construction in Scotland. Unfortunately, without close internal inspection, it would be impossible to confirm or deny this postulation and therefore the claims by the Babcocks about the Nipmoose barn would prove equally difficult to justify.

On balance, like G P Stell, I am prepared to take a bold punt and say that the Nipmoose barn construction method is not a typical Scottish vernacular construction method but might be more a localised invention devised and implemented in response to new found building material supplies and different climatic and crop processing circumstances.

Sounds like a good timber building conservation dissertation topic for a student with good cross pond connections to investigate.

Regards

Ken Hume

Hi Jim,

I have just checked out the link that you kindly provided for us at :-

http://persistencefoundation.org/scottishbarnduring02.htm

and the centre picture at the top appears to show two normal English tying joint type jowl posts that have been rotated and joined together to form this joint. The resulting joint would be very difficult to assemble if a normal assembly wall plate were added.

I think therefore that this joint is an evolution based on English rather than standard Scottish building practice.

Case prooved ?

Regards

Ken Hume

It is hard to tell from the pictures provided, is the tenon on the end of the tie beam a free tenon? This could make the assembly easier.

Hi Tim,

I have just found that that this picture can be enlarged (click on picture) and yes indeed it does look like a free tenon. I also note that it has 2 sawn through peg holes on the end and so this could be a piece of old dry material used to make a repair to a damaged tenon. Some inside knowledge obtained directly from the Babcocks or the museum might help in this respect.

Jim, can you help here please ?

Regards

Ken Hume

Hi Ken;

Your information about Scottish buildings is much appreciated. I was aware most Scottish buildings were stone and cruck framing was used, but I was not aware it was so common.

This post/plate/tie intersection in this framing is a rare example of reverse assembly where the plate is on top of the tie beams rather than normal assembly where the tie beams are on top of the plate. It looks like the assembly requires the bents tipped up with the ties in place but then the ties would need to be elevated so the plate would slip onto the tie beam tenon. In the U.S. we also have what was dubbed the triple bypass joint where the assembly sequence also requires lowering assembled tie/plate connection down onto a flared post as seen here:

http://www.tfguild.org/joinery/part2.pdf
This is a link to a PDF file, look for figures 28-30.

I have no additional information about this framing.

No offense, but Richard Babcock's books often present information in the Eric Sloan style of not being documented and possibly presenting speculation or opinion as fact so I am careful to double check information from the Babcocks. I was wondering if the attribution of this framing type to Scots or Scots-Irish immigrants was well founded.

Jim

As per the free tenons...

The website text explains this, claiming that originally there were integral tenons, but at one point long ago the barn was disassembled and moved. They say that at this point, the carpenters were baffled by this construction, and settled on sawing out the original tenons and replacing them with free tenons later in order to take the frame apart.

My thought all along was that this barn does seem to be primarily English in character, but I was waiting for the Englishman to voice his opinion first, since he (Ken) would know far more about this than me. English framing is, admittedly, out of my realm of expertise.

It is entirely possible that this barn could have been built by an English carpenter or inspired by English designs, even if it was a Scotsman that first owned it. Thus, while being the property of a Scotsman, the barn may be English in its carpentry. To me, this seems to be the likely case.

It to me brings up memories of various references to things such as 'German barns' or 'Swiss Barns' that are built in decidedly non German or Swiss ways. The classic 'Swiss Barn' style is mostly of English techniques, with a few Germanic elements, notably the jettied floor and ramp entrance which come from Switzerland, however the prototypes in that country are framed much differently.

A good example is a barn not far from me in the Swiss Mennonite settlement at Berne Indiana. Here there is a huge barn called the "Swiss Bern". This barn was a second or third generation structure, built with distinctly American methods. It stands in contrast to the few older buildings built in the typical Swiss and German Fachwerk style.

My thought, then, is that this 'Scottish' barn may be of English design...

DLB

Hi DLB,

I just received the following (edited) note from Bill Krattinger who is an architectural historian and preservationist interested in the early architecture of Washington County, NY, which he informs me was settled in the pre-1800 period by significant numbers of Scots and Scots-Irish, some of whom came directly from Europe, others after a generation or so in New York's Hudson Valley and the Connecticut River Valley of Massachusetts.

"A number of us have been studying early English barns of this region, where the term "Scottish barn" crops up semi-regularly, we suspect due to the influence of Richard Babcock, whom it seems enjoyed placing ethnic qualifiers on barns that he was engaged to work upon. The barn was cited by Babcock as a "Scottish" barn in his "Barns of Wolftrap" pamphlet, where he suggests that this was built by Scots builders, is a 4-bent English barn employing all dropped tie beams -- the earliest barns that we have yet encountered in this region, some of which were built for early Scottish settlers, either using English tying joints or a similar tie-at-plate solution for the end bents, with dropped tie beams for the interior/aisle bents. While we remain alert to learn about features or methods of construction which might have Old World precedents, we have continued to view these as English barns built for Scottish settlers, and not Scottish barns."

I think that this clears up the attribution issue.

Anyone requiring sight of the Wolftrap pamphlet (6mb) please drop me a PM.

Regards

Ken Hume

Jim, had the pleasure of working on similar joinery on a barn in Ohio in 2000 or so. Monster oak tie beams, 12x18 posts or so, gunstocked in the direction of the plate.

Raised bents, then blocked up the tie beams. Plates slid onto tenons, then the entire assembly was to be dropped down (2", more? can't remember the details) or so. We burned alot of crane time setting the plates, and in the end, cut off several of the tenons as things just would not go...



Can't find anymore images. Pretty sure I have a stash of slides of all parts of this thing somewhere...

Thank you Ken, that clears this all up!

Thanks guys. I hear their may be some of this framing in Massachusetts too.

Ken;

Do you see reverse assembly in England?

Thanks again;
Jim

Hi Jim,

Reverse assembly is a very early technique that might typically be found in large buildings dating from the 11/12 & early 1300's).

Notable buildings with which you are probably already familiar include the barns at Cressing Temple and Great Coxwell.

This technique probably has its roots embedded in mainland European monastic and eclesiastic framing practice.

Regards

Ken Hume

Hello,
Jeez, I started typing and it came out in Chinese. I have also heard that some people, after getting a stroke, or a nasty bump on the head wake up speaking Croatian.

That's all beside my point though which is this reverse assembly. I've used it once because it allowed me to free up placement of tie beams in relation to certain, lets say constraints and wishes. Otherwise, what is the rationale behind doing the plate like this anyway, particularly in buildings with rectilinear floor plans? Is there more to it that just being more free in situating tie beams?

Hi Don,

The picture does not appear to show reverse assembly.

The order for reverse assembly would be post - tie - plate whereas what you show above is post - plate - tie.

Regards

Ken Hume

Hello,

Yes, that's correct, post, plate, tie. Although, nominally the configuration would be post with tie beam morticed and tenoned on top of that and then the plate. In other words, and the conception of this little lean to construction, post, tie beam & brace assembly, or bents, raised up and the plate connecting one bent to the other(s). Traditional?

I use assembly as a noun, but reading the glossary of the Timber Framers Guild it seems to be used as a verb.

Greetings,

Don Wagstaff

Hi DOn;

I agree that your photo does not show the reversed assembly we are talking about.

Ken;
It makes sense that reverse assembly is found on large buildings so they can be raised in bents.

Several sources lead to Richard Babcock as the source of calling some barns in the US Scottish barns, reverse assembly or not.

Thanks;
Jim

Hello,
Ok, so the nomenclature is a bit more clear to me and now that I look at the barn here where I'm living, which is typical, I see that the reverse assembly is the standard way these barns are put together and normal assembly would be a deviation, at least in Holland. I always knew these folk were a bit skewed. Anyway that's clear now and I didn't mean to steer things off course by any means other than to say, it does suggest, as Ken Hume writes, that reverse assembly could have origins in Europe.

Greetings,

Don Wagstaff

Hi folks.

Just a few years ago before Richard Babcock stopped doing frames.

He told me about "secret joinery",that is how certain frames were "locked together", come Hell or High waters.

You had to lift a corner to assemble the frame, or to take it apart. Otherwise it was "locked together".

What he told me made sense.

Jack was working for him back then.

I have friends that were too, but but they were mostly grunts. Regardless, I will ask.

Hi Tony,

The tie / plate / post joint on the Nipmoose Scottish barn is not secret joinery as the entire configuration of this joint can be fully understood by external examination of the joint.

Secret joinery is something that is only reveealed upon disassembly of the joint e.g. as in the case of secret notch lap brace joints or maybe end of tie beam taces.

Regards

Ken Hume

What's a tace?

Hi Brad,

The term "tace" might well be another Cecil Hewett invention.

Check out his fig no 286 on page 276 of English Historic Carpentry.

He lists 2 examples for this end of tie beam joint but I can add a third which is in the Bishop's Camera roof at Farnham Castle, Surrey and this tie beam has now been dendrodated by Moir with a date range of between 1306 and 1338 (Moir, 2006) which is almost midway between Hewett's proposed date range of 1200 - 1400.

Regards

Ken Hume