Pig's House - Deep Swincombe - Dartmoor Granite on Waymarking.com

The ore of Tin - Cassiterite has been mined one way or another all over Dartmoor since Prehistoric times (Bronze age). Between the 14th and 18th centuries there was an upsurge in the demand for Tin and it was massively alluvially worked in virtually all the river valleys on Dartmoor. (This is very evident today when walking on Dartmoor as a walker will not fail to see the mounds of Tinner's rubble (Waste stone) in many of the valley bottoms).

The ore was taken to a number of Granite built Blowing houses around the moor where it was crushed into a powder by water power and then smelted into the white metal.

After smelting the liquid tin was poured into mould stones and ingots weighing between 100 to 200 lbs were made. The mould stones were cut from Granite and often lie outside the ruins of the Blowing houses.

The ingots were then either transported to one of the four Stannary or 'Coinage' towns of Plympton, Tavistock, Ashburton or Chagford for assaying and payment of Royal taxes.

Ordnance Survey map reference (10 figure) if within DNP – If outside the Park, add N/A: Not listed

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Date Logged Log User Rating   12/31/2006 Brentorboxer visited it

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