The Shaugh Moor project is concerned with an area of moorland in south Dartmoor north-east and north respectively of the villages of Shaugh Prior and Wotter (fig. 1). The physical threat to the evidence for settlement and land-use caused by the operations of the China Clay industry involved the Central Excavation Unit of the Department of the Environment from 1976 in a programme of survey, excavation and environmental studies related to the settlements, land boundaries, burial mounds and ceremonial structures that are to be found on this piece of moorland. The background to the project and its preliminary research strategy have been outlined in Paper I (Wainwright et al. 1979) and this publication describes the investigation of a stone-walled enclosure surrounding houses and other structures that was totally excavated in 1977 and 1978. Subsequent papers will describe the related archaeological and scientific investigations into the past environment and land-use of this block of moorland and its adjacent region.

The excavation of two adjacent round barrows at Trelystan, Long Mountain, Powys, in igjQ, has revealed a complex sequence of Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age funerary structures and traces of Late Neolithic settlement. The earliest structure was a large pit grave, dated to about 2400 be, which was superseded at about 2200 be by a settlement represented by stake-walled buildings associated with Grooved Ware. Following this some activity took place, possibly domestic, which is represented by sherds probably derived from several southern Beakers, which by analogy with sites elsewhere are to be dated to a period after about 1850 be. The subsequent Bronze Age cemetery, dated to between about 1800 and 1500 be (but possibly continuing later), presents a sequence of burial types and structures which can broadly be seen to illustrate a change from the concept of barrow cemetery to that of cemetery barrow. The earliest burials, which consist of cremations in pits and occasionally accompanied by a Food Vessel, were covered by separate small mounds of stone or turf, or a combination of the two. These were eventually overlain by and amalgamated beneath two larger turf barrows associated with Food Vessel Urns, which employed stake circles in their construction and which acted as repositories for additional cremation burials. The cemetery was sited along a pre-existing boundary fence, set up after the Late Neolithic phase, which was renewed at various times throughout the life of the cemetery in response to changes in its layout. A small undated cemetery of inhumation graves, possibly of the Early Christian period, was founded on the eastern side of the barrows at a later date.

The third phase of the Shaugh Moor Project comprised survey and excavation work on the Saddlesborough Main reave and Wotter Common (fig. 1). Following the decision of the china clay companies not to develop the area immediately around Saddlesborough (Area Y), Watts, Blake and Bearne & Co Ltd and English China Clays Ltd embarked upon a joint tipping programme which will eventually destroy the terminal reave east of Saddlesborough and most of the monuments on Wotter Common (fig. 2).The area to the north of Saddlesborough was surveyed in 1976 and limited excavation was undertaken early in 1977 (Site 10, Wainwright et al 1979). An enclosure, 1 km to the north-east of Site 10, was totally excavated in 1977 and 1978 (Site 15, Wainwright and Smith 1980). In 1979 and 1980 the area threatened by the quarry extensions was surveyed and a programme of limited excavation was undertaken on the Saddlesborough Main reave and Wotter Common (Site 208).

No abstract

For five years from 1976 to 1980 the archaeology and environment of a block of landscape centred around Shaugh Moor on south-west Dartmoor were analysed prior to the destruction of some of the evidence by china clay working. The investigations began in 1976 with a survey of the field monuments and the initiation of soil, vegetation, small mammal and phosphate studies in addition to the search for peat deposits of sufficient antiquity. From 1977 the programme was determined by the encroachment of the quarries and other works, so that early in that year a group of cairns were excavated (site 10) and subsequently the first of two seasons work on a walled enclosure (site 15) was initiated. The excavation of the enclosure was completed in 1978 and in that year it was also necessary to undertake a small investigation near the northern edge of the project area on the Trowlesworthy cross-dyke (site 202) and near its southern edge on Wotter Playground (site 201). Settlements and field systems were surveyed and excavated on Wotter Common in 1979 and these investigations were completed in 1980 when the Saddlesborough Reave, which crosses the centre of the project area from east to west was also surveyed in detail and sampled by excavation.More field work could have been undertaken on threatened areas and indeed a limited operation was undertaken in 1981 on the Saddlesborough Reave to confirm some points of detail. Instead, it was thought best to conclude the project after five years, to complete the publication of the results and to allow mature consideration of these so as to generate a new set of questions.At an early stage the decision was taken to publish the work as a series of annual reports in theseProceedingsrather than as a single monograph. The first report (Wainwrightet al.1979) set out the simple research design for the project and contained accounts of the 1976 survey and of the excavation of the cairn group.