Hound Tor, Throwleigh

• Parish: Dartmoor Forest (on the edge of Throwleigh parish)
• Height: 495 m
• Grid reference: SX 6288 8899
• Rock: Granite
• Also called: Round Tor

Hound Tor at Throwleigh is a low, grass-topped outcrop of granite at 495 m, on the high ridge that runs between Cosdon and Hangingstone Hill, roughly halfway between the two. The tor itself is small and covers a modest area, and it looks more striking from a distance, where from the south it can pass for a dark mound. The steepest drop is on the east side, an elongated outcrop with repeated horizontal joints, with a large TP cut deep into the face, a mark of Throwleigh parish. That mark is why Throwleigh is in the name: the tor stands on open moor, a good way from Throwleigh village.

Eric Hemery called it Round Tor, a name he said local moormen use. The Perambulation of 1240 names a forest bound as parva Hundetorre, the little Hound Tor, and writers disagree about where it was. William Crossing and Tors of Dartmoor say it was this tor. A Devonshire Association paper of 1892 argued that a little Hound Tor implies a greater one, which would be this tor, so the bound was a smaller hill nearby. The Ordnance Survey puts the name Little Hound Tor on Little Whit Hill, about 1 km to the north.

From the top you can follow almost the whole course of the Walla Brook, and Steeperton Hill and Rival Tor are in view.

This is not the Hound Tor near Manaton, the popular tor beside the deserted medieval village, which lies about 15 km to the south-east.

This is a location on Dartmoor that has a namesake. Read more about this: Dartmoor Places With the Same Name