Tag Archives: Dartmoor

The three military firing ranges encompass much of north Dartmoor and they have done for a very long time. Many of the structures associated with the military’s activities can be classed as ‘archaeological features’ which include target railways, butts, bound stones and the observation posts or OP’s as they are …

Ever heard the saying, “like using a hammer to crack a nut”? Well you won’t get a much bigger hammer than the ‘Nutcrackers’ and that’s for sure. At one time this must have been one of the finest balanced logan stones on Dartmoor. Basically a logan or logging stone is …

Whilst thumbing through John Chudleigh’s oft neglected book – An Exploration of Dartmoor’s Antiquities (1987, p.43), I came across the following passage: “Two tall granite stones on the Down above the bridge will strike our attention – one is 6 feet, the other 8 feet high, set up at the …

I bet more people have driven through Merrivale without knowing they have done so than those that did. Nobody could have driven from Princetown to Tavistock without wincing at the huge ‘bite’ taken out of the hillside above Merrivale. That gaping wound was known as Tor Quarry and in itself …

If a tor could talk then the one with the best story has to be Longaford Tor, sitting proudly on a moorland ridge the granite pyramid overlooks extensive vistas that over the millennia have been home to man. The granite outcrops have witnessed passing bands of Neolithic hunter gatherers in …

The Chinese built the ‘Great Wall’, the Romans built Hadrian’s Wall and on Dartmoor the Irish built the Irishman’s Wall and like all other great walls this fact is acknowledged by the Ordnance Survey map-makers. So who, where, when and why? Today the remnants of the wall run in a …

This is probably a very non-PC item to include but it is one that is a Dartmoor tradition and so I offer no apologies for its inclusion. Depending how sharp your eye you may notice a large angular boulder beside the intersection of the track that leads up to the …

‘The Man With No Name’  – this definitely puts me in the ‘old fart’ bracket with memories of the cigar chomping Clint Eastwood and his exploits which incidentally seem pretty tame by today’s standards. But what about ‘The Tor With No Name‘? Big deal, there are hundreds of unnamed tors …

‘The breeze was oozing through the network of boughs as through a strainer; the trunks and larger branches stood against the light of the sky in the forms of sentinels, giant candelabra, pikes, halberds, lances, and whatever else the fancy chose to make of them.’ Thomas Hardy – The Woodlanders. …

In the Perambulation of 1240 the following directions appear: ‘et inde linealiter usque ad vadum proximum in orientali parte capelle Sancti Michaelis … and thence in line to the next ford east of the chapel of St. Michael of Halgestoke.’ This is the first documented evidence of a chapel at …