Now that you know what tors are, I bet you can’t wait to find out how they were formed; and even if you couldn’t give a jot, I’m going to tell you anyway. Don’t worry, my knowledge of the earth’s bedrock only extends as far as Fred Flintstone’s cave, so there’s no need to start rummaging around for the latest edition of Geologist’s Monthly.

Basically, the story begins around 280 million years ago when Dartmoor granite was formed from the magma deep down inside the earth’s core. Consisting of minerals such as Feldspar, Quartz and Mica, the molten granite pushed up through the earth’s surface, and as it cooled, solidified into hardened rock.

As this igneous rock continued to cool, fractures began to appear allowing water and minerals to permeate into the cracks, but granite wasn’t the only ingredient to make up the landscape. Covering it was a layer of slate and sandstone up to 10,000 feet thick, but from a geological perspective, it didn’t take long for this top layer to be eroded away, allowing the underlying granite to expand upwards.

Around 60-30 million years ago, Britain was nearer to the equator than it is now and Dartmoor was covered in lush vegetation, but with the arrival of the last ice-age (between 2 million and 10,000 years ago) the tors started to take on the distinctive appearance that they’re well-known for today.

Weathering began to expose the granite rocks, but they were also subjected to a ‘freeze-thaw’ phenomenon, whereby water within the cracks froze and then thawed, gradually splitting the granite apart. Depending on the size of these cracks (or joints as they are technically known), the tors can either become monoliths (like Haytor) or, as is more common, a series of stacks that create a combination of shapes and sizes unique to each tor. Anyway, that’s it for today’s geology lesson, and it’s now time to move on to describe some of the individual tors.

I’ve already mentioned Haytor ( Google coordinates 50.580553, -3.7547589) and it’s as good a place to start as any. Not only is it one of Dartmoor’s most prominent tors, Haytor is also easily accessible (to the base at least). What this means of course is that it’s also very popular, and what makes it even more so, is the fact that there’s a hard-standing car park with a Dartmoor National Park Visitor Centre right next to it. It goes without saying therefore, that getting here early morning or late afternoon is preferable to other times of the day.

Haytor is known as an Avenue Tor, which means that the granite between the two main outcrops has been eroded away, and some people (such as rock climbers) refer to the smaller, western outcrop as the Lowman. Fortunately, you don’t need to be a rock climber to get to the top, and if you can make it up here, you’ll be rewarded with far reaching views extending towards the South Devon coast and the Teign Estuary, where ships at Teignmouth were once used to export Haytor granite.

The quarries on Haytor Down are still visible, but they ceased working in 1919. During their time of operation, a 10 mile long tramway was constructed using granite blocks to guide the horse-drawn wagons down to the Stover Canal at Teigngrace, and from there, canal boats took the granite down to Teignmouth. The Stover Canal was built by a man called James Templar for transporting local ball clay to the River Teign at Newton Abbot, and his son was responsible for building the granite tramway. An 18 mile footpath called the Templar Way has been created between Haytor and Teignmouth for anyone who would like an alternative walk to the open moorland around Haytor.

https://www.walkingenglishman.com/ldp/LDP/T/templerway.pdf

This post isn’t meant to be a ‘tour of tors’ as such, but the order in which I’m describing them will make sense if that’s what you want to do – and the next one we’re coming to is Hound Tor (50.5971646, -3.7786703) which really shouldn’t be missed.

This is another Avenue Tor and popular with rock climbers, but for many people it’s all about the legends associated with it, and if you’re of a nervous disposition, you probably won’t want to come here on one of Dartmoor’s frequent misty days.

The name Hound Tor is said to derive from the time a hunter called Bowerman interrupted a coven of witches with his pack of hounds. For his impudence, the witches filled their cauldron with a potion of unmentionable ingredients, stirred it around for a while, and chanted ‘Double double toil and trouble’ and proceeded to turn Mr Bowerman and his hounds into stone.

It’s all a load of nonsense of course, but Sir Arthur Conan Doyle used the story as the inspiration for his famous book, the Hound of the Baskervilles. Those of you who have read it will remember that Sherlock Holmes and his assistant Dr. Watson were involved in trying to solve the mystery surrounding the death of Sir Hugh Baskerville at his manor, Baskerville Hall on Dartmoor. Footprints of a large hound were found nearby, and as the plot unravels it comes to light that an ancestor of Sir Hugh was implicated in the death of a young woman on the moor. The plot thickens when it is claimed that he himself was killed by a ‘large demonic hound’, and it goes without saying, that this hound is still out there prowling around scaring people half to death.

Conan Doyle wrote several chapters of the book while staying at the Duchy Hotel in Princetown. The hotel is now the flagship Visitor Centre for the Dartmoor National Park, and includes information and a display about Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes – and the Hound of the Baskervilles.

Stories like this are bound to spawn a few other tales of questionable authenticity. People reckon that one of the rocks is shaped like a hound when silhouetted against the sky but I’ve never been able to make it out. On the other hand, there’s no doubting the fact that in 1995 a 500 ton stack called ‘The Hound’ came crashing to the ground, but as for all the other tales I just take ‘em with a pinch of salt. That said, when I was up here one late afternoon I heard a dog barking, and then another and another. It was obvious that it was only somebody out exercising their dogs, but as the noise got closer and louder, I packed my things up just in case. I headed back downhill to where I parked the car next to a chuck wagon called The Hound of the Basket Meals, but he’d gone home –  and I thought it was about time I was gone too.

Before leaving Hound Tor, you might want to check out the remains of a medieval village that lies between the tor and Greator Rocks, but a mile down the road towards Manaton is what remains of Bowerman the Hunter.

If you believe that Hound Tor is where Bowerman’s hounds were turned to stone then you’re bound to believe that this pile of rocks known as Bowerman’s Nose is where Mr Bowerman himself came to grief (50.610429, -3.780705).

The next tor I’m going to take you to might not look overly impressive from the road, but it’s one of Dartmoor’s most significant. Crockern Tor is located near Two Bridges, but if you search for it on Google maps, then you need to be careful because they’ve located it in the wrong position. Here are the correct coordinates 50.565459, -3.955940.

As we know, Dartmoor’s granite includes minerals, one of them being cassiterite, or tin oxide, as it’s more widely known. Along with Cornwall, Dartmoor had a plentiful supply of this ore that was smelted in order to extract the tin, and for hundreds of years, right up until the end of the 20^th century, tin mining was an important activity in the area. In fact, at one time, tin was deemed so important to the nation’s wealth that workers involved in the industry were granted special privileges.

Needless to say, there was no shortage of people wanting to become part of the business, and not just underground either. Four stannary (tin) towns were set up in Devon for the purpose of assessing, weighing, stamping and applying duty to the metal. The four towns were Tavistock, Chagford, Ashburton and Plympton, each of which covered a district of Dartmoor – and Crockern Tor is where these districts met.

In this unlikely location, a Stannary Parliament was convened to preside over various laws, petitions and other matters relating to stannary affairs. It also acted as a court, where those accused of breaking stannary laws were subjected to various penalties including being carted off to Lydford Prison.

Meetings were held over a 250 year period from 1495 until 1749, when the Lord Warden would summon 24 ‘jurates’ from each of the four stannaries’. The meetings probably lasted several days and evidence suggests that the representatives used tables and chairs made out of the tor’s ample supply of rock, but this got me thinking as to what would have happened to the minutes of the last meeting if a storm suddenly blew up. It isn’t uncommon on Dartmoor, and I can just picture hundreds of bits of paper disappearing over the horizon towards Princetown.

Haytor, Hound Tor (including Bowerman’s Nose) and Crockern Tor are all easily accessible from the road and are well known. I could have mentioned more, but there’s a lot of satisfaction to be had from discovering your own favourite tor. There are still another 886 to go, but obviously not all of them will be worth the effort, but at least you now know what those pile of rocks on the horizon are all about now.

I want to issue a word of caution before I go. If you decide to go wandering across the moor, do bear in mind that you need to take precautions. There are plenty of obvious things to do like wearing the appropriate gear and taking enough water, but there are also hidden dangers too. I once disappeared up to my waist in one of Dartmoor’s notorious bogs, and although the Hound of the Baskervilles may just be a figment of somebody’s imagination, I’m convinced that the ‘Beast of Dartmoor’ isn’t. You’ve been warned!