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CHILDES TOMB

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Remains of a cairn circle containing a cist surmounted by a cross. All "restored" and known as "Childe's Tomb". A cross, standing in this vicinity in the 17th century could not be found by Crossing. The present cross was erected about 1910. It is said to now include some original material and stands in its original position, (See SX 67 SW 30).

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(SX 62577029) Childe's Tomb (NAT) Remains of (NAT)

Cross on Cairn & Cist (NR). (1)

Remains of a cairn circle containing a cist surmounted by a
cross. All "restored" and known as "Childe's Tomb".

A cross, standing in this vicinity in the 17th century could
not be found by Crossing. The present cross was erected about
1910. It is said to now include some original material and
stands in its original position (2) (See SX 67 SW 30) The cross
is erected in a square socket stone on a rough pedestal with
chamferred top edges. A broken socket stone lies close by (3).
The cross allegedly commemorates Childe, a local folk lore
character who supposedly froze to death on the moors in the reign
of Edward III (1327-1377). ("Childe" is now inexplicably
ascribed to the cist). (2-4)

The remains of a cairn containing a cist, known as Childe's
Tomb, situated on a north-facing slope west of the River
Swincombe at 365.0m OD. A restored cross, set in a socket stone,
has been mounted on a pedestal, over the cist. See photograph.

The cairn averages 9.5m in diameter and 0.4m high and is
encompassed by a kerb circle. The cist measures 1.4m by
0.5m internally. The broken socket stone referred to by
Masson Phillips could not be seen.

Surveyed at 1:10 000 on PFD. (5)

(SX 62577029) Childe's Tomb (remians of) (NR) Cross (NR) on (NR) Cairn and Cist (NR). (6)

Additional bibliography. (7-8)

It has been suggested by Crossing and by some recent writers that the head of the original cross on Childe's Tomb might be that which for a time, lay at the foot of the standing cross in Fox Tor Newtake. It later disappeared but photographs show it to have been of the usual Dartmoor type of roughly rectangular section, and consequently of an earlier period then the surviving fragment of the original socket-stone which lies near the restored monument. This indicates that the missing cross from Childe's Tomb would have been of octagonal section. If, as Finberg (9) has shown, Childe was the 11th century Ordulf II of Tavistock, then the cross was a postumous, not a contemporary, memorial and the so-called tomb was in fact a cenotaph. (9-10)

SX 62577029. A much disturbed cairn, 9m in diameter and 0.3m high with a modern 'kerb' of blocks and slabs, 5.8m in diameter and 0.5m high, set upon the mound. At the centre is a well built cist 1.4m long, 0.5m wide and 0.6m deep. Over this is a two tier pedestal of eight well trimmed blocks, of three different lengths; a further half buried block lies S of the monumenet. Upon this is a replacement socket stone and cross, cut at Holne in 1885 (7), with a total height of 1.4m. Near a large block, 5m E of the cairn, is the broken socket stone of the original cross. (11-12)

SOURCE TEXT

( 1) Ordnance Survey Map (Scale / Date)

OS 6" 1963

( 2) General reference

Devonshire Studies 1952 40-58 (HPR FInberg)

( 3) General reference

T Devon Ass 69 1937 309-10 (E Masson Phillips)

( 4) General reference

Ancient Crosses of Dartmoor 1887 60-1 (W Crossing)

( 5) Field Investigators Comments

F1 JGB 12-AUG-77

( 6) General reference

OS 1:10000 1981

( 7) General reference

High Dartmoor 1983 344,359-61 (E Hemery)

( 8) General reference

Dartmoor Crosses 1983 36-37 (F H Starkey)

( 9) General reference

Childe's Tomb 1946 265-280 (H P R Finsberg)

( 10) General reference

T Devon Ass. 116 1984 144-145, 150. Illus. Plan (E N Masson-Phillips)

( 11) General reference

RCHME APP Dartmoor 1985: RAF/CPE/UK/1890 4389 10-DEC-1946

( 12) Field Investigators Comments

F2 SAJP 8-JUN-88

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