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Summary

A partly-enclosed settlement with horseshoe-shaped enclosure measuring 100m north-south by 60m east-west, with one subdividing wall. Enclosure walling is on average 2.0m thick, 1.0m high. Within the enclosure are five hut circles, two of them built on to the enclosure wall. Their average internal diameter is 5.3m. Surveyed by the Ordnance Survey in 1977.

Location

Protected Status

• Scheduled Monument 1012783: Enclosure with hut circles north of Bala Brook intake
• SHINE: Walling remains of a Bronze Age settlement east of Bala Brook, comprising a sub-circular enclosure with several internal hut circles and fragments of walling associated with the settlement to the east

Other References/Statuses

• National Monuments Record: SX66SE28
• National Record of the Historic Environment: 441843
• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX66SE/129
• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX66SE/59
• Old SAM County Ref: 381
• Old SAM Ref: 10622
• Old SAM Ref: 10623

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• ENCLOSED HUT CIRCLE SETTLEMENT (Constructed, Bronze Age - 2200 BC (Between) to 701 BC (Between))

Full description

Ordnance Survey, 1880-1899, First Edition Ordnance 25 inch map (Cartographic). SDV336179.

Enclosure and one hut circle shown on 19th century map.

Royal Air Force, 1946 - 1949, Royal Air Force Aerial Photographs (Aerial Photograph). SDV342938.

Enclosure clearly visible on aerial photograph.

National Monuments Record, 1976, NMR SX6763 (Aerial Photograph). SDV169271.

Ordnance Survey Archaeology Division, 1977, SX66SE28 (Ordnance Survey Archaeology Division Card). SDV178427.

(16/12/1977) SX 6703 6307 This partly-enclosed settlement on the east bank of the Bala Brook lies on a south west facing slope at approximately 267 metres OD. The enclosure is horse-shoe shaped, measuring 100 metres north to south by 60 metres east to west, with one subdividing wall: the walling is on average 2.0 metres in thickness and 1.0 metre in height, of mainly orthostatic construction. Within the enclosure are five hut circles, two of them built on to the enclosure wall. Their average internal diameter is 5.3 metres and thickness of wall 1.3 metres.
The easternmost hut at SX 6706 6303 has a rectangular annexe on its south east side measuring 5.3 metres by 3.7 metres. Outside the enclosure at SX 6699 6309 is a small rectangular enclosure measuring 4.5 metres by 3.0 metres, the wall 0.3 metres in height; its purpose cannot be deduced from the visual evidence. At SX 67045309 is a small cairn, diameter 2.8 metres, consisting of a mound of stones retained by a rough kerb. Surveyed at 1:10 000 on PFD.

National Monuments Record, 1977, SX6762, 2/307-8 (Aerial Photograph). SDV177951.

Photograph taken on 14th April 1977.

Robinson, R., 1977-1979, South Brent Parish Checklist, Sketch (Worksheet). SDV151046.

Site visited in May 1979. The pound is very faint and difficult to trace consisting of a drop in level or lynchet with a few stones showing. It can be more or less traced as a complete circle with a hut circle included on its course, although the southern half of the enclosure is omitted in the Ordnance Survey 6" Revision map. There are four hut circles all on the periphery of the enclosure and just near it . Two others lie about 20 metres south-east of the enclosure.

Robinson, R., 1984, List of Field Monument Warden Visits 1984 (Un-published). SDV343082.

Site visited on 19th March 1984. Part of an agglomerated enclosure with a triple hut circle in the centre and one incorporated in ajoining wall.

Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England, 1985, Aerial Photograph Project (Dartmoor) - Dartmoor Pre-NMP (Cartographic). SDV319854.

Visible on 1977 aerial photograph.

Butler, J., 1993, Dartmoor Atlas of Antiquities: Volume Four - The South-East, 103-4, Map 57, Figure 57.2 (Monograph). SDV337765.

Enclosure 'B' at 'Zeal Hill South' was sparingly occupied. Walling joins the two large Huts '12' and '13' at the centre forming a paddock between them but this group has suffered some later interference by the tinners. A corbelled chamber has been built into the wall of Hut Circle '13' and what was probably originally a third smaller Hut '14' between them has also been converted into a tinners' cache. Yet another chamber '15' was built into the adjacent boundary wall but here retains its roof of a pair of slabs propped tent-like over the cavity. Presumably these were tinners' caches, somewhere to store their tools and few possessions and perhaps their share of ore. They may well have lived in the nearby tinners' hut built on to Hut Circle '16' which seems to have been refurbished. It may have been intended to surround this hut by an extension to the enclosure but the circuit was never completed, the upper arm ending abruptly at Hut Circle '17' and the lower in a band of clitter above the river bank. Two or three more small Huts '18' were built into the boundary wall and a larger building '19' across from it. Hut Circle '20' is isolated in the upper corner of the enclosure where the boundary wall was 2.4 metres thick.

GeoInformation Group Ltd, 2010, 1:625 2010 Colour (12.5cm resolution) (Aerial Photograph). SDV346026.

Settlement fairly clear on the aerial photography.

Ordnance Survey, 2013, MasterMap (Cartographic). SDV350786.

Eastern section of the enclosure is relatively accurate on MasterMap and has been used to digitise this monument. The western section is less accurate. Map object partly based on this source.

Historic England, 2020, National Heritage List for England, 1012783 (National Heritage List for England). SDV363414.

D-shaped enclosure north of Bala Brook containing four hut circles and has one immediately outside the north wall. There are three tinners' caches in the enclosure and one immediately outside.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events: none recorded

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