Tor cairn on Shell Top

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1011955
Date first listed:: 02-Dec-1991

The Missing Pieces Project

Share your view of unique places. Almost 350,000 photos and stories have been added so far.

Add your contribution

Location

Location of this list entry and nearby places that are also listed. Use our map search to find more listed places.

There is a problem

Use of this mapping is subject to terms and conditions.

This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale.

What is the National Heritage List for England?

The National Heritage List for England is a unique register of our country's most significant historic buildings and sites. The places on the list are protected by law and most are not open to the public.

The list includes:

🏠 Buildings
🏰 Scheduled monuments
🌳 Parks and gardens
⚔️ Battlefields
⚓ Shipwrecks

Find out more about listing

Local Heritage Hub

Unlock and explore hidden histories, aerial photography, and listed buildings and places for every county, district, city and major town across England.

Discover more

Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1011955
Date first listed:: 02-Dec-1991

Location

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:: Devon
District:: South Hams (District Authority)
Parish:: Shaugh Prior
National Park:: DARTMOOR
National Grid Reference:: SX 59761 63799

Reasons for Designation

Dartmoor is the largest expanse of open moorland in Southern Britain and because of exceptional conditions of preservation, it is also one of the most complete examples of an upland relict landscape in the whole country. The great wealth and diversity of archaeological remains provide direct evidence for human exploitation of the Moor from the early Prehistoric period onwards. The well-preserved and often visible relationship between settlement sites, major land boundaries, trackways, ceremonial and funerary monuments as well as later industrial remains, gives significant insights into successive changes in the pattern of land use through time. This tor cairn is a well-preserved example occupying a prominent position on Shell Top. Its relationship to other monuments of similar type indicates the wealth of evidence relating to the ritual side of life on this part of the Moor.

Details

Many examples of Prehistoric funerary monuments are preserved on Dartmoor, mostly dating from the Bronze Age (2500 - 500 BC). To celebrate or commemorate the dead, mounds of earth or stone were piled in roughly hemispherical shape over the burial, which was sometimes contained in a small rectangular structure, or cist, made of stone slabs. Some monuments also include kerbstones marking the outer edge of the mound and a surrounding ditch. This cairn is built around the granite outcrop on the summit of Shell Top, which rises above the cairn. It consists of a mound of small boulders 16.5m in diameter and 1.4m in height, with the natural outcrop of the tor rising a further 1.4m. There is a triangular cavity between the blocks of the tor. This measures 2.5m by 1.5m in length and width by 0.8m in depth and is considered to be a natural feature.

MAP EXTRACT The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract. It includes a 2 metre boundary around the archaeological features, considered to be essential for the monument's support and preservation.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:: 10614
Legacy System:: RSM

Sources

Other
Devon County SMR SX 56 SE-062,

Legal

This monument is scheduled under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 as amended as it appears to the Secretary of State to be of national importance. This entry is a copy, the original is held by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.