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The two stones pictured can now be found in North Cornwall Museum at Camelford. They were taken there in 2008 after spending time at a locals school. They had originally been excavated at Starapark in the 1950s where they made up part of the kerb of the barrow. It is thought there were more than the two stones originally but the others have been lost or destroyed.
The two stones are rare examples of cup marked stones in Cornwall and do not have any recognisable pattern.
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These five uprights have been wedged into a natural fault in the rock at the western end of Hawks Tor. They provide a barrier from anything approaching along the ridge from the west as you either have to climb over them or descend down some distance and traverse around below.
I can find no mention of them in any history books so have no idea what age they belong to..but see no reason why anyone would put them there in 'modern times'.
Hawks Tor can be accessed from a footpath that heads left from the road up to Trewortha Farm from Berriobridge.
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9 May 2009
Small and lonely hut circle found whilst descending from Ben More. Too shattered and wet to do much investigating but there did not look to be any other circles in the area.
To find it take path from road on waters edge up past house and through gate. The circle is probably about 11 o'clock from the gate...sorry cant be any clearer!
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On Mull to climb mountains and drink....not go looking at stones. Still, we had a few hours before the ferry back so I managed to convince my fellow travellers to take the road from Tobermory to Dervaig to see these monsters.
A parking space with viewpoint out over the sea to Tiree and Coll gives access to the stones. The sign confused me at first, I thought it meant it was a 1.7 km walk to the stones....but looking back I think thats how far it was to toilets. I think I would have disappeared behind a tree before then.....
Anyway, a short walk across some rather boggy grassland leads to the gate into the plantation and there you are. It is interesting to compare the photo in THA with how things are now...the trees have grown somewhat...when will they be felled and the stones returned to there rightful place overlooking the bay?
Somewhere I read that they line up with the hill to the south...hard to say with the trees all around....perhaps soon we will find out.
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Crossing writes in his Guide to Dartmoor that the cairn got its name after a baby was found on Stall Moor and adopted by local people. He was given the name Hillson and after a while moved up onto the hill and built himself a house amongst the stones of the cairn. Here he made a living making clocks...out of what it doesn't say, but it does say that a Mr Hillson who lived in Cornwood in the mid 1800s had one of these clocks.
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As can be seen from the images posted there are several cairns in the vicinity of the Stalldown Row...the trouble is, the row is so mighty that the cairns are insignificant in the scope of things!
Usually i would take my time to search them all out but i was just so enthralled with the light playing on the stone row that I only photographed one....sorry!
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Having visited this area about three years ago..or was it four? I decided it was time to return. Last time, after walking up the east side of the Erme, I had decided against the climb up onto Stalldown whilst heading back down the west side and so missed this mighty stone row.
This time I chose a route starting on the west side of the Erme, crossing Harford Bridge and taking a path along the river that soon petered out into several animal tracks and nothing else. Going 'off piste' I found my way to Tristis Rock then picking up the stone row directly behind it crossed the moorland northwards to Stalldown.
It is this route that Crossing suggests in his Guide To Dartmoor, Excursion 33 but I have to say the route from Torr along the waterworks track may be easier!
Reaching Stalldown you can not see the row and must head off in a northwesterly direction uphill. You find yourself on a spur of the main ridge and at last get a view of the row ahead and over to the left. It is still a bit of a walk across boggy moorland to reach the southern end of the row, but once there all that remains is to follow its majestic stones to the summit and beyond.
There are a number of small low cairns to be seen along the rows length, but the main one, which gives the hill its name is across the plateau to the east.
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March 20th 2009
At last, after being stuck inside during several days of sunshine I get a chance to leave the office and escape onto the moors. Having dropped my father at the hospital on the outskirts of Plymouth I ventured a short distance onto the south west edge of Dartmoor.
Saddlesborough seemed the easiest place to access and having parked the car at the little junction where the lane from Shaugh Prior meets the road going to Cadover Bridge I walked the short distance to the cross beside the road.
Crossing the road here it is not long before you reach a tumuli, a grass covered mound of stones with one large stone sitting just off the mound.
A quick photo and then I headed uphill to where I could already make out the star topped post. Between tumuli and post I thought I might have discovered a circle of stones, all recumbent but creating at least three quarters of a circle about 18 meters across..
As Pure Joy has said before, there are so many stones, it is easy for the mind to imagine things...
The Stone Row when I reached it had recently been cleared of any long grass or gorse and so my walk along it was easily traced. Plunging downhill it ends just before the waste tip of the nearby china clay pit. There is no evidence to suggest it ever went further, but one does wonder.
From the bottom of the row I headed east to discover the hut circles and enclosures lying along the north facing slope of the hill.
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Axe heads kept at Cornwall museum
A collection of rare Bronze Age axe heads discovered in Cornwall has gone on display in Truro after a campaign to keep the relics in the county.
The 3,000-year-old artifacts were found in perfect condition, buried in a clay pot at Mylor near Falmouth during a search using metal detectors.
The collection would have gone to the British Museum but the Royal Cornwall Museum raised about £10,000 to keep it.
The find is believed to be the biggest of its type in Cornwall.
Conservator Laura Ratcliffe said: "All finds like this would normally go to the British Museum, but they were so special we wanted to keep them for Cornwall.
"To get such a large collection in one place is pretty unusual.
"It's the biggest hoard to come out of Cornwall by a long shot."
The axe heads, all found in pristine condition, are thought to have been buried on purpose thousands of years ago.
Ms Ratcliffe said: "It could have been for security purposes or ritual, we just don't know."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/england/cornwall/7828042.stm
Published: 2009/01/14 10:50:45 GMT
© BBC MMIX
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Cookham appears to have had civilization for the last 4,000 years. There is a little Bronze Age site, set in the northern bend between Marlow and Cookham. At Cockmarsh there are 3 barrows still visible, one just as a crop mark. The biggest is about 3m high, with a bit of a ditch left on the north side.
Cookham has its roots in prehistory you will find two megaliths, the Cookham Stone and the Tarry Stone
from www.cookham.com
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Visited on a clear but very cold January day, the settlement at Catshole requires a bit of hunting. From the western side of the outcrops look for the remains of a square enclosure and ruined building (all very low), the settlement is to the north of them.
There are supposedly 12 hut circles/storage buildings in the complex, myself and Mrs Hamhead found five without looking too hard...and were too cold to search for the rest. The huts make great use of the natural rocks as walls..but this also leads to confusion over which are huts and which are just natural formations.
The two most westerly huts I thought to be cairns, they are just a collection of stones with a few uprights around the edges and would have been very small buildings.
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Mr Hamhead started as a doodle on a scrap of paper many years ago.....then he became a submariner in a series of poems that I am writing. When I needed a name for this site he just sort of popped up.
In the real world I go under the far less interesting title of Mark Camp, keen walker, historian and tourist guide.
I am lucky enough to live in Cornwall, a mile from the south coast and within half an hours drive of Bodmin Moor. Hence the sites I have contributed.
My first love up on the moors (and Cornwall in general) is industrial history, but you are never far from a lump of granite and through research for walks I have become interested in all things ancient.
It has helped that I have been listening to Mr Cope since buying Reward as a young student and have followed his career from the far west where musicians seldom come to play.
As I have said before on the site, if any TMA contributors are in the area and fancy a walk on the moor, get in touch, I will be happy to share my knowledge of everything the moor has to offer.
oh yes ..my website is at http://www.walkaboutwest.co.uk
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