Scorhill (pronounced ''Scorill'') Stone Circle is now the commonly known name for Gidleigh Stone Circle or Steep Hill Stone Circle, one of

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 ...

's biggest and most intact

stone circle A stone circle is a ring of standing stones. Most are found in Northwestern Europe – especially in Britain, Ireland, and Brittany – and typically date from the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, with most being built from 3000 BC. The ...

s, situated on

Gidleigh Gidleigh is a village and civil parish in the West Devon district of Devon, England. Located within Dartmoor National Park, the parish is surrounded clockwise from the north by the parishes of Throwleigh, Chagford and Dartmoor Forest. In 2001 it ...

Common near the village of Gidleigh in the north east of

Dartmoor Dartmoor is an upland area in southern Devon, England. The moorland and surrounding land has been protected by National Park status since 1951. Dartmoor National Park covers . The granite which forms the uplands dates from the Carboniferous P ...

, in the United Kingdom. It is an

English Heritage English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, medieval castles, Roman forts and country houses. The charity states that i ...

scheduled monument and has been described as Devon's finest stone circle.

Description

The circle was constructed in the

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 pri ...

. It is approximately in diameter, and the stones vary in height from to an impressive above ground. Gaps between stones vary in width between . There are currently 23 standing stones and 11 recumbent. Characteristic of others in the circle, the largest stone has a distinctive jagged point. It has been noted that, when viewed from the centre of the circle, the sun sets over the stone's tip on

Midsummer Midsummer is a celebration of the season of summer usually held at a date around the summer solstice. It has pagan pre-Christian roots in Europe. The undivided Christian Church designated June 24 as the feast day of the early Christian martyr ...

's Eve, indicating some purpose in

archaeoastronomy Archaeoastronomy (also spelled archeoastronomy) is the interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary study of how people in the past "have understood the phenomena in the sky, how they used these phenomena and what role the sky played in their cu ...

Several stones show scars and marks of

vandalism Vandalism is the action involving deliberate destruction of or damage to public or private property. The term includes property damage, such as graffiti and defacement directed towards any property without permission of the owner. The ter ...

by stone cutters including rows of holes on many, arranged in lines so the stones could be split with a wedge. Estimates for the original number of stones have varied between 51 and approximately 70 making it among Devon's widest stone circles with the tallest remaining

monolith A monolith is a geological feature consisting of a single massive stone or rock, such as some mountains. For instance, Savandurga mountain is a monolith mountain in India. Erosion usually exposes the geological formations, which are often ma ...

. Although badly damaged, Scorhill has not been subject to any form of restoration giving it a distinctly ancient atmosphere.

Archaeology

Flint artefacts from around the site on Gidleigh Moor date as far back as 8500 BC during the

Mesolithic The Mesolithic ( Greek: μέσος, ''mesos'' 'middle' + λίθος, ''lithos'' 'stone') or Middle Stone Age is the Old World archaeological period between the Upper Paleolithic and the Neolithic. The term Epipaleolithic is often used synonymo ...

period and are now held at

Torquay Torquay ( ) is a seaside town in Devon, England, part of the unitary authority area of Torbay. It lies south of the county town of Exeter and east-north-east of Plymouth, on the north of Tor Bay, adjoining the neighbouring town of Paig ...

Museum.

Folklore

Stone with a hole in it over the river at Scorhill - geograph

Scorhill is situated in a landscape of megalithic monuments and features in local stories about horses unwilling to pass through the circle. Some folklore links it to The Tolmen, a stone with a large, donut-shaped hole in it, overhanging a nearby stream. One story of the "faithless wives and fickle maidens" tells the tale of unfaithful women being made to wash themselves in a nearby pool, run around Scorhill three times and then pass through the Tolmen and pray in front of the stones for absolution. Unforgiven women were crushed by a stone, giving the eerie suggestion as to why so many stones have fallen.St. Leger-Gordon, Ruth E., ''The Witchcraft and Folklore of Dartmoor'', 1972, pp. 50-60; A. Sutton, ''Body, Mind & Spirit'', 1982. Reprinted by Peninsular Press, Newton Abbot, UK, 1994. Scorhill circle st

Literature

* Burl, Aubrey, ''The Stone Circles of Britain, Ireland and Brittany'' (Yale University Press) 2000.

References

External links

English Heritage PastscapeIllustrated entry in the Megalithic Portal
* {{European Standing Stones Dartmoor Stone circles in Devon