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Vermin traps around Trowlesworthy Warren House

Grid ref: SX 5726 6466

  • Period: Medieval or post-medieval (the warren is recorded by 1651)
  • Status: Seven scheduled monuments (Historic England entries listed below)
  • Traps: Seven in these entries, out of about 40 on the warren as a whole

Animals approaching rabbits tend to follow cover, so the warrenders built walls that led them along a line to one trapping point. Here the walls are placed to use something already in the landscape: a rock face, a gully, an old boundary wall, the River Plym or the Lee Moor china clay leat, which suggests the predators were thought to use these routes into the warren.

Historic England measures these from Trowlesworthy Warren House; one is described from Legis Tor. The warren has about 40 vermin traps in all, and the ones near Great Trowlesworthy Tor have their own group listing.

The seven scheduled monuments

Historic England entryGrid referenceWhat survives
1014471SX 57713 64522A V-shaped trap near the summit of Little Trowlesworthy Tor pointing at a rock face (walls 4.8 m and 4.7 m), with a 35 m length of reave running south towards Great Trowlesworthy Tor.
1015746SX 56763 64292A V-shaped trap pointing at a gully, with arms 6 m and 7 m long and the trapping area marked by edge-set stones.
1014466SX 56558 64307A trap built against an older boundary wall in the Blacka Brook valley bottom, among tin streamworks, with arms 8 m and 5 m long and a 1.7 m trapping gap.
1014612SX 57426 65040A V-shaped trap pointing at the Lee Moor china clay leat, with arms 8 m and 7.7 m long, one ending at a large boulder.
1014613SX 57451 65062A V-shaped trap pointing at the leat, with arms 12 m and 4.5 m long.
1014464SX 57384 64258A V-shaped trap pointing at the leat, with arms 7.8 m and 3 m long.
1014463SX 57593 65225An X-shaped trap by the River Plym, at the foot of a river terrace, made of two V-shaped walls with arms of 8.5 m, 10 m, 7.7 m and 9 m. Described from Legis Tor.

Grid references are from the Historic England entries. Historic England's own titles give a distance from the tor which does not always match its grid reference (one pillow mound is titled 210 m east of the tor but its grid reference puts it about 130 m west), so use the grid reference.

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