The photo is from the upper floor. The property has always been built on (since the church opposite is over 1,000 years old, it is assumed that the property has been built on for just as long). We used the building lines that my great-grandfather drove into the slope. Whether I would want to do the earthworks nowadays - I don't think so. The regulations would be a bottomless pit. In the past, people just did it. Although probably pickaxe and shovel provided a natural boundary between what was possible and what wasn't. The whole side of the street was built into the slope like this, although we have a more benign property.