On the Real Watership Down
The Big House at the Bottom
Tales From Watership Down mentions a large house underneath the hill. But which one?
They say, you know (began Dandelion), that long ago El-ahrairah lived from a time on these very downs. He lived as we do, as merrily as could be, eating the grass and making occasional expeditions to the grounds of the big house at the bottom to steal flayrah.
His happiness would have lasted forever if he had not begun to feel, little by little, a change in himself. He knew well enough what it meant. Gradually, he was getting old.
Tales From Watership Down; Chapter Two—The Story of the Three Cows
Within Tales From Watership Down Richard Adams makes a string of references to a ‘big house’ underneath the Down. The first comes in Chapter Two, The Story of the Three Cows in reference to Dandelion’s tale of El-ahrairah’s time on Watership Down. Further references come in Chapter Seventeen, Sandwort, a chapter named after the headstrong young buck who finds himself hopelessly caught in a ‘man-made pit.’
Quarry Cottages seen from the top of Watership Down; September 2025.
It is never entirely clear which house Adams is referring to, though there are a few possibilities. I have seen it suggested online (though I can’t remember exactly where) that it may have been one of the Quarry Cottages just west of Sydmonton Crossroads. However, I consider this unlikely as they are not large dwellings. The second building is the now demolished—and soon to be replaced—Shepherd’s Cottage, just over the lane from the foot of the Down. Third, is the large, modern house in woodland along the road to Kingsclere. Finally, there are the conjoined Fossicks Cottages on the Ecchinswell Road, constructed on the site of what once was New Barn Farm.
An image showing the now flattened Shepherd’s Cottage in the foreground, with Fossicks Cottages behind. Photograph © Oswald Bertram (cc-by-sa/2.0).
In Chapter Seventeen, a little more information on the house is provided, as Adams details how Hazel, Fiver and Blackberry venture to find Sandwort:
The three rabbits made their way to the foot of the Down, ran across the empty cornfield and the road, and went cautiously through the hedge into the big garden.
This description seems to rule out the Quarry Cottages and Shepherd’s Cottage. Of the remaining pair, the rabbits would not have passed from the field under Watership Down into the garden of the house out towards Kingsclere, but the neighbouring woodland. The house and its garden are further east. This leaves us with Fossicks Cottages. Their location a short distance up the Ecchinswell Road means the rabbits would have passed into another field before entering the garden.
Perhaps Richard Adams’ house never really existed, maybe he misremembered it, or even chose to idealise the house and its garden and precise location for his narrative. It is likely we will never know.
If I was forced to choose, I would lean towards Fossicks Cottages as the location of the ‘big house’. My reasoning? The cottages are part of a large single structure, rather than being separate buildings. I certainly didn’t realise this wasn’t a solitary home when viewed from on top of and underneath Watership Down. Furthermore, Fossicks is less of a geographical outlier than the alternative.
