SETTLE landmark The Shambles goes under the hammer at public auction next month.

The distinctive building which dominates Settle Market Place with its ground floor arches, shops and cottages has a guide price of £550,000. The auction, by Feather, Smailes and Scales, takes place at the Cairn Hotel in Harrogate on Thursday March 6.

"We have had a massive response, a huge amount of interest in what is probably the most prominent and unusual building in Settle," said Charles Smailes, senior partner in Feather, Smailes and Scales. "It has been owned by a Yorkshire family, the Greenwoods, for more than 30 years and during their ownership they have tried to smarten it up.

"They have removed the various advertising hoardings and paid attention to the stonework. They arranged to use TV aerials on the nearby town hall so that all the unsightly aerials and satellite dishes could be taken off The Shambles, making it look better.

"There have also been internal alterations. There used to be more tenants and smaller units, now there are four tenants. The cottages have also been improved over the years," said Mr Smailes.

There is uncertainty over The Shambles' origins.

Mr Smailes said it was believed to have been built in the early 18th century when an unusual land deal was struck. The land for the building was leased for 5,400 years from 1719, but no rent was payable and now nothing survives to say who owns the freehold.

Local theories go that The Shambles was built to house butcher's shops, just like the street of the same name in York.

Settle historian Phil Hudson found evidence that the building was originally an open market hall with barrel vaulted cellars, built around 1675.

"Later that century it was enclosed and the arches added, with a slaughterhouse and other workrooms in the basement, butchers and other shops on the ground floor. In 1888/89 a second floor was added to the dwellings above," he told the Herald.

The building passed into the ownership of the Settle Market buildings Co Ltd in 1887. It consisted of local worthies and well known Settle names including solicitor T Brayshaw and Dr CW Buck, friend of the composer Elgar. Mill owner Hector Christie was also a shareholder. Today The Shambles is home to a fish and chip shop, card shop, video rental business and clothing shop.