Clevedon Court

Clevedon Court
Location within Somerset
General information
Town or city	Clevedon
Country	England
Coordinates	51°26′27″N 2°50′01″W / 51.4407°N 2.8335°W / 51.4407; -2.8335Coordinates: 51°26′27″N 2°50′01″W / 51.4407°N 2.8335°W / 51.4407; -2.8335
Completed	14th century
Client	Sir John de Clevedon

Clevedon Court is a manor house on Court Hill in Clevedon, North Somerset, England, dating from the early 14th century. It is now owned by the National Trust. It is designated as a Grade I listed building.

The house was built and added to over many years. The great hall and chapel block are the earliest surviving parts of the structure with the west wing being added around 1570, when the windows and decoration of the rest of the building were changed. Further construction and adaptation was undertaken in the 18th century when it was owned by the Elton baronets. The house was acquired by the nation and was given to the National Trust in part-payment for death duties in 1960. The Elton family is still resident in the house, which is now open to the public.

In addition to the main house, the grounds include a selection of walls and outbuildings, some of which date back to the 13th century. The gardens are listed (Grade II*) on the National Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.

Much of the present house was built in the early 14th century by Sir John de Clevedon. There is speculation that it may lie on the site of a Roman building, based on excavations to the south of the house in 1961/62. The house incorporates remnants of a 13th-century building which lie at an angle to the rest of the house. It was situated nearly two miles inland from the parish church of St Andrew, which stands on the coast.

After the Norman Conquest of 1066, the manor of Clevedon was granted by the King to Matthew de Mortagne, who in turn granted it to his sub-tenant, Hildebert. It is thought that Sir John was a descendant of either Matthew or Hildebert. Perhaps because of the distance to the parish church, the manor house included a chapel dedicated, in the 1320s, to Saint Peter. The house has undergone considerable change since it was built, almost every century seeing structural alterations, but it still retains many features of a mediaeval manor house.