A tor cairn is a prehistoric cult site occurring in the

British Isles The British Isles are a group of islands in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner and Outer Hebrides, the Northern Isles, ...

, especially in

Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlantic ...

and

Devon Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devo ...

but also in

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

. It consists of a circular enclosure of stones or a platform of loose rocks surrounding a natural

tor Tor, TOR or ToR may refer to: Places * Tor, Pallars, a village in Spain * Tor, former name of Sloviansk, Ukraine, a city * Mount Tor, Tasmania, Australia, an extinct volcano * Tor Bay, Devon, England * Tor River, Western New Guinea, Indonesia Sc ...

, sometimes encircled by a ditch. The diameter of the roughly 35 tor cairns ranges from 12 to over 30 metres and their height varies from 0.5 to 4.0 metres. There is usually an entrance to the enclosed area and pits in the ground between the rock outcrop (tor) itself and the enclosure.Darvill, Timothy (2008). ''Oxford Concise Dictionary of Archaeology'', 2nd ed., Oxford University Press, Oxford and New York, p. 464. . Finds of

flint Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...

tools, pottery, gravel, quartz and bronze weapons and jewellery have enabled the sites to be dated to the early 2nd millennium B.C., i.e. the early

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...

. Examples are the tor cairns of: Alex Tor, Catshole Tor, Corndon Tor, Cox Tor, Hameldown Tor, Limsboro Cairn, White Tor (

Peter Tavy Peter Tavy () is a village along the A386, North-East of Tavistock, Devon, England; it is named after the River Tavy The Tavy () is a river on Dartmoor, Devon, England. The name derives from the Brythonic root "Tam", once thought to mean ...

Rough Tor Rough Tor (), or Roughtor, is a tor on Bodmin Moor, Cornwall, 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. Top ...

, Tolborough Tor, Top Tor, Tregarrick Tor and

Yes Tor Yes Tor is the second highest point on Dartmoor, Devon, South West England, at above sea level. It is one of only two wholly English peaks south of the Peak District National Park—the other being nearby High Willhays—that are above . It l ...

References

Literature

* Frances Lynch: ''Megalithic tombs and Long Barrows in Britain''. Shire, Princes Risborough 1997, (''Shire archaeology'' 73). * Elizabeth Shee Twohig: ''Irish Megalithic tombs''. Shire, Princes Risborough 1990, (''Shire archaeology'' 63). * Jürgen E. Walkowitz: ''Das Megalithsyndrom.'' Vol. 36 in Beiträge zur Ur- und Frühgeschichte Mitteleuropas, 2003, .

External links

Description

{{Prehistoric technology Megalithic monuments in England Archaeology of the United Kingdom Megalithic monuments in Wales

See also

References

Literature

External links