Aerial photography set to uncover historic Exmoor sites

UNDISCOVERED sites of archaeological interest on Exmoor could be revealed by a new project being funded by English Heritage.
Two national park authority archaeologists will be examining Exmoor’s past from an unusual perspective by using aerial photographs to increase understanding of the moor’s historic landscape.
The major new survey forms part of English Heritage’s National Mapping Programme and the archaeologists will examine thousands of aerial photographs.
Cain Hegarty, aerial survey officer for Exmoor’s National Mapping Programme Project, said: “We expect to record hundreds of previously unknown archaeological sites as well as adding new details to known sites.”
Similar surveys elsewhere in England have recorded a diverse range of archaeological sites including prehistoric settlements and Second World War military defences.
On Exmoor, such information should provide the park authority’s conservation service with a valuable tool for the future management of the historic environment.
Park authority archaeologist Rob Wilson-North described the new project as ‘a fundamental step forward in helping us to understand Exmoor’s past, and in so doing, to better protect it.’
Anybody wishing to know more about the project should contact Cain Hegarty by emailing cain.hegarty@english-heritage.org.uk or telephoning 01392 824901.
Or, to view the project’s progress or find out more about the wider National Mapping Programme, they can visit the aerial survey web-pages at www.english-heritage.org.uk.

• Our photographs show (top) the earthworks of an Iron Age hillfort at Cow Castle, in the Barle valley, with the remains of early iron mining in the foreground, and (bottom) field banks, ridge, and furrow and an old trackway forming the remains of medieval farming at Room Hill on the slopes of the Exe valley, near Exford. Photos by Rob Wilson-North/ENPA.