Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-5nwft Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-10T10:57:36.980Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Excavation of a Stone Alignment and Circle at Cholwichtown, Lee Moor, Devonshire, England

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

George Eogan  and
I. G. Simmons
I. G. Simmons
Affiliation:
The Durham Colleges in the University of Durham
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The site (National Grid Reference 3X584622) stands on a westward spur of the Penn Beacon ridge near the southern edge of Dartmoor. As is common throughout the moor the underlying rock is granite and in the neighbourhood of Cholwichtown this has altered to ‘china’ clay. There are a number of outcrops, but in most places the granite has a light covering of soil on which a thin layer of black raw humus, peat-like in appearance, has formed. This now produces coarse grass. From the evidence provided by the small dumps of upcast at socket no. 72 it appears that only a very thin layer of humus, about an inch in thickness, covered the soil at that point when the monument was constructed.

Excavation has shown that the structure consisted of an alignment 235 yards long and having originally at least ninety-one uprights and a circle 16 feet in diameter that originally had eight orthostats. Dr Simmons has shown (Appendix) that the monument was built in a clearing, then either grassland or heathland, among the woodland and scrub, but as he points out the pollen analysis does not give any indication of date: it is not known if these clearances were made by the people who constructed the alignment and circle or if the structure was built on land cleared at an earlier date.

The monument is not situated in a conspicuous position but, nevertheless, commands a reasonably extensive view, especially towards the south and south-west.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 30 , December 1964 , pp. 25 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1964

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Atkinson, R. J. C., Piggott, C. M. and Sandars, N. 1951. Excavations at Dorchester, Oxon., Part I (Ashmolean Museum, 1951).Google Scholar
Brailsford, J. W. 1938. ‘Bronze Age Monuments of Dartmoor’, Ant., vol. 12 (1938), pp. 444–63.Google Scholar
Bryce, J. 1861–1862. ‘An Account of Excavations within the Stone Circles of Arran’, PSAS, vol. 4 (1861–2), pp. 499–524.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Callander, Graham. 1927. ‘Recent Archaeological Research in Scotland’, Arch., vol. 77 (1927), pp. 87–110.Google Scholar
Case, Humphrey. 1961. ‘Irish Neolithic Pottery: Distribution and Sequence’, PPS, vol. 27 (1961), pp. 174–233.Google Scholar
Childe, V. Gordon. 1933. ‘Final Report on the Excavation of the Stone Circle at Old Keig, Aberdeenshire’, PSAS, vol. 68 (1933–4), pp. 372–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Childe, V. Gordon. 1935. The Prehistory of Scotland (London, 1935).Google Scholar
Childe, V. Gordon. 1940. Prehistoric Communities of the British Isles (London and Edinburgh, 1940).Google Scholar
Clark, J. G. D. 1936. ‘The Timber Monument at Arminghall, and its Affinities’, PPS, vol. 2 (1936), pp. 1–51.Google Scholar
Clark, J. G. D. 1940. Prehistoric England (London, 1940).Google Scholar
Collins, A. E. P. 1956. ‘A Stone Circle on Castle Mahon Mountain, Co. Down’, UJA, vol. 19 (1956), pp. 1–10.Google Scholar
Davies, Oliver. 1938. ‘Castledamph Stone Circle’, JRSAI, vol. 68 (1938), pp. 106–12.Google Scholar
Davies, Oliver. 1939. ‘Stone Circles in Northern Ireland’, UJA, vol. 2 (1939), pp. 2–14.Google Scholar
Fahy, E. M. 1959. ‘A Recumbent-stone Circle at Drombeg, Co. Cork’, JCHAS, vol. 64 (1959), pp. 1–27.Google Scholar
Fahy, E. M. 1960. ‘A Hut and Cooking-places at Drombeg, Co. Cork’, JCHAS, vol. 65 (1960), pp. 1–17.Google Scholar
Fox, Aileen. 1954. ‘Celtic Fields and Farms on Dartmoor, in the light of recent excavations at Kestor’, PPS, vol. 20 (1954), pp. 87–102.Google Scholar
Giot, P. R. 1960. Brittany (London, 1960).Google Scholar
Griffiths, W. E. 1960. ‘The Excavation of Stone Circles near Penmaenmawr, North Wales’, PPS, vol. 26 (1960), pp. 303–39.Google Scholar
Grimes, W. F. 1936. ‘The Megalithic Monuments of Wales’, PPS, vol. 2 (1936), pp. 106–39.Google Scholar
Keiller, Alexander and Piggott, Stuart. 1936. ‘Recent Excavations at Avebury’, Ant., vol. 10 (1936), pp. 417–27.Google Scholar
Kilbride-Jones, H. E. 1934. ‘An Account of the Excavation of the Stone Circle at Loanhead of Daviot’, PSAS, vol. 69 (1934–5), pp. 168–214.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
May, A. McL. 1953. ‘Neolithic Habitation Site, Stone Circles and Alignments at Beaghmore, Co. Tyrone’, JRSAI, vol. 83 (1953), pp. 174–97.Google Scholar
Ó Ríordáin, Seán P. 1951. ‘Lough Gur Excavations: The Great Stone Circle (B) in Grange Townland’, PRIA, vol. 54c (1951), pp. 37–74.Google Scholar
Ó Ríordáin, Seán P. 1954. ‘Lough Gur Excavations: Neolithic and Bronze Age Houses on Knockadoon’, PRIA, vol. 56c (1954), pp. 297–459.Google Scholar
Radford, C. A. Ralegh. 1952. ‘Prehistoric Settlements on Dartmoor and the Cornish Moors’, PPS, vol. 18 (1952), pp. 55–84.Google Scholar
Worth, R. Hansford. 1953. Dartmoor (Plymouth, 1953).Google Scholar
Dimbleby, G. W. 1961. ‘Soil Pollen Analysis’, J. Soil Sci., vol. 12, pp. 1–11.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simmons, I. G. 1962a. ‘An Outline of the Vegetation History of Dartmoor’, Trans. Devon Assoc., vol. 92 (forthcoming).Google Scholar
Simmons, I. G. 1962b. The Development of the Vegetation of Dartmoor. Thesis for the degree Ph.D. in the University of London.Google Scholar
Tansley, A. G. 1939. The British Islands and their Vegetation (Cambridge).Google Scholar