Mysterious little window

[1610ness]

Can anyone tell me what this mysterious little window next to the window on the left side of my cottage would be for? This photo is approx 100 years old and the window has long been bricked up. The house is now rendered on the front but inside when we removed the plaster you could see different coloured bricks where it once was.
The room it was in originally had a small inglenook in it if that has any bearing on it.

 

[numberwang]

My childhood home had a similar window like that in the larder. I think at one point had metal grille also.

 

[MikeG]

I agree. It's likely a larder "window" (it wouldn't have been glazed).

 

[Minkeycat]

What a lovely house.

We have a similarly sized window in a similar location. It's in the larder which is just off the kitchen that used to be a dairy. Does your house face North(ish) - we were told that larder windows were often in the North facing wall for cooling purposes.

 

[1610ness]

Yes it does face north, so I believe you are all correct! It is amazing the transformations these old house go through. The room with the larder originally had an inglenook but that was made smaller to accommodate a smaller fireplace with sandstone surround before being completely bricked up and plastered over. So the larder was probably added after it was bricked up? There is no other evidence left on the walls of a larder though as at the minute we're stripping it back to get it lime plastered.

 

[numberwang]

Ours was on north wall too. Maybe look for evidence of shelves if you're stripping stuff back. Ours had rows of narrow wooden shelves on 2 of the 3 walls, not the window side.

 

[Socksitis]

I Know this is now an old post, but I wonder if this little window would have been in the fireplace to help the fire draw. I have read of windows within the fireplace.

I was reading this post after searching for stripping old paint - better get back to the original search!