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![]() Main standing stone | |
Location | Dartmoor |
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Region | England |
Coordinates | 50°29′10″N3°59′06″W / 50.486°N 3.985°W |
Type | Stone rows, menhirs, cairns, kistvaens |
History | |
Periods | Neolithic, Bronze Age |
Site notes | |
Public access | Yes |
Drizzlecombe or Thrushelcombe is an area of Dartmoor in the county of Devon, England, containing a number of Bronze Age stone rows, cairns and menhirs.
There are three principal stone rows each with an associated barrow and terminal menhir. Most of the artifacts are on the southwest slope of Hartor Hill. The tallest menhir, which at 14 ft (4.3 m) high is the largest on Dartmoor, was re-erected by Sabine Baring-Gould, R. Hansford Worth and others in 1893. [1] [2]
Drizzlecombe is located on the western side of Dartmoor, about 4 miles (6.4 km) east of the village of Yelverton, to the west of the upper reaches of the River Plym.
Nearby is the large but damaged cairn known as Giant's Basin; many of its stones were removed by warreners to build their rabbit-warrens at Ditsworthy, lower down the river. Higher up the slope and overlooking these monuments is a village of stone hut circles, akin to the one at Grimspound. To the north-east lie the extensive remains of Eylesbarrow tin mine and north-west is the concentric Yellowmead stone circle. The area also includes the Neolithic Dartmoor kistvaens, or tombs.
Bodmin Moor is a granite moorland in north-eastern Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is 208 square kilometres (80 sq mi) in size, and dates from the Carboniferous period of geological history. It includes Brown Willy, the highest point in Cornwall, and Rough Tor, a slightly lower peak. Many of Cornwall's rivers have their sources here. It has been inhabited since at least the Neolithic era, when primitive farmers started clearing trees and farming the land. They left their megalithic monuments, hut circles and cairns, and the Bronze Age culture that followed left further cairns, and more stone circles and stone rows. By medieval and modern times, nearly all the forest was gone and livestock rearing predominated.
Dartmoor is an upland area in southern Devon, South West England. The moorland and surrounding land has been protected by National Park status since 1951. Dartmoor National Park covers 954 km2 (368 sq mi).
A menhir, standing stone, orthostat, or lith is a large upright stone, emplaced in the ground by humans, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age. They can be found individually as monoliths, or as part of a group of similar stones. Menhirs' size can vary considerably, but they often taper toward the top.
Okehampton is a town and civil parish in West Devon in the English county of Devon. It is situated at the northern edge of Dartmoor, and had a population of 5,922 at the 2011 census. Two electoral wards are based in the town. Their joint population at the same census was 7,500.
A clapper bridge is an ancient form of bridge found on the moors of the English West Country and in other upland areas of the United Kingdom including Snowdonia and Anglesey, Cumbria, Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Lancashire, and in northern Wester Ross and north-west Sutherland in Scotland. It is formed by large flat slabs of stone, often granite or schist. These can be supported on stone piers across rivers, or rest on the banks of streams.
The Erme is a river in south Devon, England. From its source on Dartmoor it flows in a generally southerly direction past some of the best-preserved archaeological remains on the moor. It leaves the moor at the town of Ivybridge and continues southward, passing the settlements of Ermington, Modbury and Holbeton. Near Holbeton it becomes a ria and empties into the English Channel in Bigbury Bay, between the rivers Yealm and Avon.
A stone row or stone alignment is a linear arrangement of megalithic standing stones set at intervals along a common axis or series of axes, usually dating from the later Neolithic or Bronze Age. Rows may be individual or grouped, and three or more aligned stones can constitute a row.
Belstone is a small village and civil parish in the West Devon District of Devon, England.
Abergwyngregyn is a village and community of historical note in Gwynedd, a county and principal area in Wales. Under its historic name of Aber Garth Celyn it was the seat of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd. It lies in the historic county of Caernarfonshire.
Goonhilly Downs is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) that forms a raised plateau in the central western area of the Lizard peninsula in southern Cornwall, England. It is one of 229 English national nature reserves designated by Natural England with an area of almost 1,270 hectares.
The Black Mountain is a mountain range in South, Mid and West Wales, straddling the administrative boundary between Carmarthenshire and Powys and forming the westernmost range of the Brecon Beacons National Park. Its highest point is Fan Brycheiniog at 802 metres or 2,631 ft. The Black Mountain also forms a part of the Fforest Fawr Geopark.
The Carnac stones are an exceptionally dense collection of megalithic sites near the south coast of Brittany in northwestern France, consisting of stone alignments (rows), dolmens, tumuli and single menhirs. More than 3,000 prehistoric standing stones were hewn from local granite and erected by the pre-Celtic people of Brittany and form the largest such collection in the world. Most of the stones are within the Breton municipality of Carnac, but some to the east are within neighboring La Trinité-sur-Mer. The stones were erected at some stage during the Neolithic period, probably around 3300 BC, but some may date to as early as 4500 BC.
Rough Tor, or Roughtor, is a tor on Bodmin Moor, Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The site is composed of the tor summit and logan stone, a neolithic tor enclosure, a large number of Bronze Age hut circles, and some contemporary monuments.
The Dartmoor crosses are a series of stone crosses found in Dartmoor National Park in the centre of Devon, England. Many of them are old navigational aids, needed because of the remoteness of the moorland and its typically bad weather. Some mark medieval routes between abbeys. Other crosses were erected as memorials, for prayer, as town or market crosses, in churchyards, and as boundary markers. The crosses were erected over a long period of time, some as recently as 100 years ago, the earliest probably almost 1,000 years ago.
In recent years, many megaliths have been discovered in the Urals: dolmens, menhirs and a large megalithic cultic complex on Vera Island.
In archaeology, a hut circle is a circular or oval depression in the ground which may or may not have a low stone wall around it that used to be the foundation of a round house. The superstructure of such a house would have been made of timber and thatch. They are numerous in parts of upland Britain and most date to around the 2nd century BC.
Porlock Stone Circle is a stone circle located on Exmoor, near the village of Porlock in the south-western English county of Somerset. The Porlock ring is part of a tradition of stone circle construction that spread throughout much of Britain, Ireland, and Brittany during the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, over a period between 3300 and 900 BCE. The purpose of such monuments is unknown, although archaeologists speculate that the stones represented supernatural entities for the circles' builders.