Black Hill

Nearest town:
Ashburton (8km S)
OS reference:
SX761787
OS sheet:
191
Latitude:
50° 35' 39.33 N
Longitude:
3° 45' 2.59 W
Added to TMA by

Images

Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

Western cairn... toward the main northern.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

Central cairn, southern group.... the western can be seen beyond

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

Highlighting the very substantial footprint of the eastern cairn (southern group)... toward Haytor Rocks

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

My favourite of Black Hill’s quintet of cairns: the eastern of the southern trio.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

Haytor Rocks loom on the skyline across the footprint of main northern cairn. There is a trio of large cairns not too far that-a-way.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

Main northern cairn from the northern-most..

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

The northern-most cairn... possessing a wondrous outlook. There’s a stone row and another cairn – heavily disguised by Nature from the passing attentions of holidaymakers in her own – down there, too. Not easy to find in high summer 2017.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

Main northern cairn showing the grassy base.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017
Image of Black Hill (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by GLADMAN

The main northern cairn... loose stone piled upon a significant grassy footprint, the latter betraying the ancient pedigree.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Jul 29, 2017

Articles

Miscellaneous

Black Hill
Barrow / Cairn Cemetery
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Feb 17, 2018

Black Hill was never high on my list of ‘must visit soon’ sites upon Dartmoor. In retrospect.. and with the unforgiving clarity of hindsight... that statement is rather odd, to say the least. But there you are. Seeing is believing, as they say. In fact it was the only the mention of ‘stone row’ – that genre of monument archetypal of these bleak, windswept uplands – upon the map that, eventually, brought me within striking distance. That old devil called Curiosity did the rest, bless it to bits. Never been much of a fan of the felis catus anyway.

Arguably the easiest approach to the summit plateau is from the minor road traversing Trendlebere Down to the north-east.. hey, from the stone row itself, perhaps? If so, a pair of cairns will be encountered upon the initial spur [detail from Field Investigators Comments F1 NVQ 19-APR-60]:

SX 76277895 – a ‘tumulus’ which “is a cairn 0.4 m. high, mutilated in the top.”

SX 76297898 – “another cairn with a maximum height at the rim of 0.5m with a probable retaining stone in the west. The centre of the cairn has been dug out ”

The summit of Black Hill lies some way to the approx south and is crowned by a further trio (count ‘em) of substantial cairns:

SX 76157872 – “This is a cairn 0.6 m. high, mutilated by a hollow, 12.0 m. wide and 0.5 m. deep, in the top”

SX 76167862 – “A cairn, badly mutilated, particularly in the north west quadrant. It has an average height of 0.7 m.”

SX 76217859 – “with a few retaining stones visible in the circumference”

Sites within 20km of Black Hill

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