 The southern row looking uphill from the terminal standing stone |
 The
Drizzlecombe complex of monuments stand on a spur of land sandwitched
between the stream of Drizzle Combe and the River Plym to the southwest
of Dartmoor in an area rich with prehistoric remains which was obviously
a focus of much activity during the Bronze
Age. This spur which leads southwest downhill from Hartor Tor contains
five enclosed settlement sites
and huts as well as many cairns
and a cist
but it is the three stone rows and their tall terminal stones that dominate
the landscape today. All three rows run gently uphill along the spine
of the spur in a roughly southwest to northeast direction with their
terminal stones at the southern end and a cairn marking their northern
limits. The terminal stone of the eastern row is said to be the largest
on Dartmoor and stands 4.2 metres tall after it was re-erected in the
late 19th century and is a curiously shaped thin monolith sometimes
know as the 'Bone Stone' although it could also said to resemble a flag
or the tail of a fish. From the Bone Stone a single stone row emerges
consisting of about a dozen small uprights all less than half a metre
tall that lead to a damaged cairn surrounded by a circle or kerb of
low stones. This cairn is nothing spectacular and measures 9-10 metres
in diameter and about a metre high with a crater in its summit as evidence
of possible antiquarian excavation or rifling for treasure. A few metres
to the northwest is another robbed cairn of almost identical size but
with a kerb consisting of just seven stones which marks the northern
limit of the northern row. This is also a single row but with about
seventy stones stretching out over 150 metres is more substantial than
its neighbour although the stones here are smaller and more overgrown
in places with a shorter southern terminal that stands about 2.4 metres
tall and as such it is less distinct in the landscape. The final row
of the three (the southern row) starts a short distance from the southern
end of the eastern row, again this is marked with a robbed cairn measuring
about 7 metres in diameter and nearly a metre tall but with its kerb
of stones partly covered with earth from the mound. The row that leads
150 metres southwest from the cairn starts off as a single, then becomes
a double before returning to just a single again, all the stones are
fairly small at less than half a metre and there are reckoned to be
about seventy standing with a further half dozen fallen - the row terminates
with a narrow 3 metre tall blocking stone (see photograph above).All three rows are presumably fairly contemporary with each other but one monument that stands close-by seems out of place. Just to the southeast of the gap between the eastern and southern rows is a massive cairn known as the Giant's Basin (bottom left photograph) that has a diameter of 22 metres and stands about 3 metres tall. This huge rubble mound was obviously a tempting target for early excavators or treasure seekers as a large crater extends into the centre which must have removed nearly a metre from its height and what, if anything, was found is not recorded. The Giant's Basin seems at odds with the rest of the cairns in the surrounding area and the stone rows are not aligned on it which could point to it being a later addition to the Drizzlecombe landscape. |
 The southern row looking southwest |
  Left: The eastern row looking southwest with the Giant's Basin cairn to the upper left and terminal stone upper right. Right: The 'Bone Stone', the terminal stone of the eastern row. |
  Left: Giant's Basin cairn. Right: Possible cist to the south of the rows. |
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