Reasons for Designation
Rounds are small embanked enclosures, one of a range of settlement types
dating to between the later Iron Age and the early post-Roman period. Usually
circular or oval, they have a single earth and rubble bank and an outer ditch,
with one entrance breaking the circuit.
Excavations have produced drystone supporting walls within the bank, paved or
cobbled entrance ways, post built gate structures, and remains of timber, turf
or stone built houses of oval or rectangular plan, often set around the inner
edge of the enclosing bank. Other evidence includes hearths, drains, gullies,
pits and rubbish middens. Evidence for industrial activities has been
recovered from some sites, including small scale metal working and, among the
domestic debris, items traded from distant sources. Some rounds are associated
with secondary enclosures, either abutting the round as an annexe or forming
an additional enclosure.
Rounds are viewed primarily as agricultural settlements, the equivalents of
farming hamlets. They were replaced by unenclosed settlement types by the 7th
century AD. Over 750 rounds are recorded in the British Isles, occurring in
areas bordering the Irish Seas, but confined in England to south west Devon
and especially Cornwall, where many more examples may await discovery. Most
recorded examples are sited on hillslopes and spurs.
Rounds are important as one of the major sources of information on settlement
and social organisation of the Iron Age and Roman periods in south west
England. Consequently, sites with significant surviving remains will normally
be considered to be of national importance.
The round south of Mount Pleasant has been the subject of both a geophysical
and an aerial survey which show it to be well defined and possessing a
diversity of features surviving as buried remains and slight earthworks. It is
also closely associated with a field system to the south. A further round 150m
to the north has been recorded by excavation.
Details
The monument includes a round, in the form of a roughly square defended
enclosure with an outwork, and part of a contemporary field system to the
south. These survive as a combination of slight earthworks and buried remains
recorded over the years through aerial photography and geophysical
prospection. The site of the round is on high ground facing south, 150m to the
south of another round which no longer survives. It occupies a position above
the shallow south-facing valley side of a small tributary of the River Kenwyn.
The round is defined by a double-ditch, or ditch and possible palisade,
enclosing a near rectangular interior of approximately 70m in diameter with a
rounded north west side; in the centre is a further small ditched feature.
Parallel ditches and a bank to the west and south form part of what appears to
be a defensive outwork. Another concentric line of an earthwork yet further to
the south defines the upper limit of the field system which was formed of
radial ditches extending from the earthwork to the valley bottom.
The immediate area around the monument includes other sites broadly
contemporary with Iron Age to Roman occupation including the round at
Threemilestone and that at Polstain, 150m north and 400m south west
respectively.
Excluded from the scheduling are all fencing and fence posts, a water-pipe and
cattle drinking trough in the north of the field, and a pumping sub-station in
the north west corner of the field, although the ground beneath these features
is included.
MAP EXTRACT
The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.
