The landscape of the East Devon Pebblebed heathlands, whose bedrock is composed entirely of water-rounded pebbles, is geologically unique in the UK. Today they form a low ridge forming the watershed between the river Otter to the east and the Exe estuary to the west. The ridge is approximately 13 km long N–S, extending inland from the coast; it is 2–3 km wide and almost continuous. It is broken up today by pockets of improved agricultural land. The heathland soils are thin, poor and acidic and most of the area has never been cultivated. The western side of the Pebblebeds are defined by a distinct scarp slope about 20 m or so high rising up quite steeply from the undulating lowlands that extend to the Exe. The highest point on the western scarp is marked by the Iron Age hillfort of Woodbury Castle (183 m). The heathlands dip away gently to the south and the east toward the Otter valley and the sea. To the north they run down into the Clyst valley. The overall dip of the land across the greater part of the heathland area is from the northwest (high) to the southeast (low). At the base of the western scarp there is a spring line. To the east the sloping heathlands are broken up by small valleys. These sometimes originate in broader and boggy irregular basins. The heathland area is highly porous and drains quickly. Small east to west or northwest to southeast fast-flowing perennial streams now occur in the valleys where the water has cut down to underlying clays and marls. Further up beyond the surface streams, there are dry valleys formed in permafrost conditions during glacial periods. Wherever the surface mantle of vegetation is absent or disturbed, along the stream beds, on exposures on the often steep sides of valleys, and on paths and trackways crossing the heathlands, pebbles are exposed at the surface (Figure 1.1).

The Pebblebed heathlands are surrounded by rich pasturelands on clays and marls and arable fields on the surrounding Otter sandstones. The boundary between these lowland areas and the heath itself, on which the vegetation is gorse and heather, pine and birch, is abrupt and distinct. Today it is mostly marked by hedged banks and fencing. Contemporary farms and villages are sited along the stream courses where they emerge from the heathland habitat. Parish boundaries typically extend from the rich pastureland and arable fields up on to the heathlands, formerly common land both to the west up the scarp slope and to the east up the dip slope, ensuring that each had its share of fertile agricultural land as well as uncultivated grazing land. Although few animals graze the heaths today, in the past they provided important and substantial areas of rough grazing during the summer months. The heathland habitat is a mosaic of dry heath where the principal vegetation is gorse and heather and the lowland heath characterized by bog valley plant communities, birch and alder. Substantial areas of the dry heath have been afforested with conifers since the 1920s. The natural woodland cover of the heath is deciduous. Pine trees were introduced in the late eighteenth century as landscaping features (see Chapter 10).

This area of Devon has long been noted for its long, warm summers and mild winters. Today during the summer months temperatures reach on average 20 degrees C or more during July and August. Given the proximity of the sea, winters are mild with little snow and few frosts. Temperatures range between 3 and 8 degrees C. Situated in the rain shadow of Dartmoor, with prevailing winds being southwesterly, the area is relatively dry. The rainfall average is about 800 mm, peaking during the winter months.

Looking out to a world beyond

Standing on the western high scarp of the Pebblebeds there is a magnificent and panoramic view of the surrounding landscape. To the west one looks across the course of the Exe estuary to the unbroken ridge of the Haldon Hills running along its eastern edge (Figure 1.1; Figure 1.2). Further west still, over the line of the Haldon Hills, there are glimpses of the tor-crowned high peaks of Dartmoor. High Willhays and Ugborough Beacon are just visible some 48 km distant. To the northwest, the Raddon Hills, capped by a Neolithic causewayed enclosure and later Iron Age hillfort, frame the near landscape. To the north, the line of the Blackdown Hills is prominent, with another Neolithic causewayed enclosure and Iron Age hillfort at Hembury occupying a prominent southern spur. Way beyond the highest point on Exmoor, Dunkery Beacon, some 58 km distant, and the Quantock Hills can be seen on a clear day.

To the northeast, the hill island of Dumpdon (Figure 1.3) crowned by a hillfort and possibly another Neolithic causewayed enclosure is prominent in the Honiton gap created through the Blackdown Hills by the river Otter. To the east the landscape is framed by the broad Otter valley and the almost unbroken line of the East Hill and Peak Hill ridges, which block any view further in this direction (Figure 1.15a). Between these two ridges there is a prominent gap through which the sun rises at the equinoxes. This is a prominent landscape feature visible for long distances from the west and north, as far away as the southern edge of Exmoor to the northwest (Figure 1.15b). To the southeast, High Peak, with its distinctive triangular-shaped profile, is a dominant coastal landmark (Figure 1.4). Beyond it there are more distant views across LymeBay to the Isle of Portland 70 km distant – glimpses into other worlds and different landscapes.

But for the most part, views out from the remaining and lower areas of the Pebblebed ridge are strikingly restricted by the higher hills that surround it: the unbroken line of the Haldon Hills to the west, the more irregular line of the Blackdown and Raddon Hills to the north, and the East Hill and Peak Hill ridges to the east. These all rise up fairly abruptly above river valleys and are flat-topped. The eastern scarp slopes of the Haldon Hills and the western scarp of the Peak and East Hill ridges appear remarkably uniform from the Pebblebeds. This contrasts markedly with their appearance from the other side, where all these ridges are deeply indented with coombes and valley systems. Their most uniform and regular scarp slopes face towards the Pebblebeds and are framed by the surrounding hills, creating a sense of interiority and difference: a landscape that is peculiarly distinctive, framed and bounded, a world apart. When the Otter and Exe valleys fill with mists, the ridge and the hilltops are dramatically transformed, appearing to be islands enveloped in a grey sea.

What makes this landscape so special is not only the local presence of the Pebblebed heathland but also the hills that physically and visually hem it in with the significant gap on the eastern side. None of the surrounding ridges and hills have any Pebblebed outcrops or exposures. To the west, the Haldon Hills are covered by grey and white flinty gravels. The Blackdown Hills to the north and the East Hill and Peak Hill ridges to the east are capped with substantial layers of clay with flints and chert derived from the underlying greensand (paradoxically grey to grey-brown to yellow in colour), as is High Peak to the southeast (Woodward and Ussher 1911: 62ff.). All these surrounding hills thus contrast greatly with the much lower, rolling Pebblebed heathlands in terms of their far greater height, their much more pronounced scarp slopes and the sharp, angular and jagged stones that cover them. Sensorially encountering the bones of this landscape, we move from the smooth and rolling heathlands covered with smooth, rounded and multicoloured pebbles, to higher flat-topped hills with steep scarps covered with brittle, irregular and jagged material of fairly uniform and dull colour, an important series of visual, tactile and colour contrasts (Figure 1.5).

Another contrast occurs between the stones that may be observed along the ridges and the hills and those exposed along the rivers. The numerous river cliffs that occur along the lower course of the Otter are all exposures of the red Otter sandstones, as are those found along the Exe estuary at Lympstone. Along the Exe there are very limited exposures compared with those along the lower course of the Otter. Immediately to the north and south of Ottery St Mary these are grey-green in colour. Beyond here all the way to the south to the sea, where the river passes the Pebblebed heathlands to the west, these river cliffs are all bright red in colour. They occur along the Otter’s eastern side except in a short stretch between Newton Poppleford and Colaton Raleigh, where they are on the western side. By contrast, nowhere along the course of the Otter can the exposed stratum of the Pebblebeds be seen.

Walking north, east or west off the heathlands, one notes that the pebbles rapidly disappear under the surrounding marls. None are exposed along the sands and muds of the Exe. Redeposited material down-washed from the Pebblebeds occurs locally in the river bed along the Otter river valley, particularly in its lower stretches from Ottery St Mary southward to the sea at Budleigh Salterton. In the upper reaches of the river the pebbles are few and the river bed is largely made up of angular gravels derived from the clay with flint capping of East Hill. Lower down the river in some places between Tipton St John and Colaton Raleigh, Pebblebed material locally dominates. Newton Poppleford is named after the ford crossing the pebbles, or ‘popples’, derived from the Pebblebeds, that are numerous here along the river course. Everywhere in the surroundings of the heathlands, pebbles are numerous in arable fields and gardens, down-washed into the soils formed on the surrounding red Otter sandstones.

The geology of the Pebblebeds and its significance

There are very few natural inland rock exposures in this area of East Devon, and none are very large. The only places where the underlying rocks can be seen occur in the river cliffs along the Otter and the Exe valleys and along a few valleys with streams flowing east into the river Otter. The Steamer Steps cliffs to the west of Budleigh Salterton rise up sharply from the beach in a series of staggered ledges to West Down Beacon (129 m), the highest point before the land drops to the west and the Exe estuary. The cliff exposure here provides a dramatic and huge cross-section through the landscape – elsewhere almost always mantled in soil and covered in vegetation. An inspection of the sea cliffs thus permits a unique glimpse of another concealed world, the hard structure, or the ‘bones’ of the land beneath the constantly changing soft, damp and fleshy surface (Figure 1.6).

From Exmouth eastward, the cliffs and headlands are composed of the relatively soft and warm red-coloured Devonian New Red Sandstone formation. West Down Beacon marks the point where the geologically famous Triassic Budleigh Salterton (or Bunter) Pebblebeds first outcrop and attain their maximum thickness in the cliff face of up to 26 m (Selwood et al. 1984: 96). This strip of pebbles dips diagonally down through the otherwise red sandstone cliffs in a distinctive band, dipping and narrowing to the east. It finally disappears in the cliff face near to the edge of a small valley cut down to the beach by the stream at Budleigh Salterton. It marks the eastern limit of the Pebblebed outcrop.

The contrast between this band of pebbles and the New Red Sandstone appearing both above and below it could not be greater. The fine-grained red sandstone is smooth and uniform in colour. The only variation in its surface appearance is caused by localized honeycomb wind weathering creating numerous rounded hollows eating into the cliff’s face. The Pebblebed formation in the middle is dense and infinitely varied in terms of texture and the forms and colours of the stones. They are composed of well-rounded spherical or oval, clearly water-worn pebbles bedded in a coarse and gritty or finer and sandier matrix. Within the sand and grit lenses, pebble-filled channels can be observed, proof of the riverine origins of these formations.

The Pebblebeds were laid down by a huge river that flowed north through a hot red sandy desert about 240 million years ago (Figure 1.7). The direction of river flow is based on the discovery of fossils in the pebbles: brachiopods, bivalves and trilobites, whose probable origin was in the mountains of Brittany, northern France (Vickery 1864; Audley-Charles 1970: 52; Audley-Charles 1992). This river (or rivers) was huge, stretching from East Devon as far east as the Isle of Wight. Side streams probably flowed into it from Dartmoor, south and north Wales, bringing down material. Mountains lay to the west and north of what is now Devon and Somerset, forming part of the supercontinent Pangaea. It flowed from Brittany and Normandy and northward extensions of these areas in the English Channel, across the middle of England. The delta of the river, where it entered what may have been an open sea, was in the Cheshire basin/north Midlands. Almost all its course is only known today through geological bore holes and quarries. The only area where part of the river channel, now upraised, is exposed at the surface is the East Devon Pebblebed landscape.

The river consisted of braided channels and alluvial fans, was subject to flash floods and fast flowing. The large size of some of the pebbles is evidence for this and the fact that they are well rounded suggests a long transport history. The climate of the British Isles throughout the Triassic was hot, with alternating dry and wet seasons, and was tropical to sub-tropical in character.

Larger and smaller pebbles embedded in a coarse to fine gravel and sand matrix comprise the Budleigh Salterton Pebblebed formation that in the area of Black Hill quarry on the western scarp attains a maximum thickness of 31 m (Selwood et al. 1984: 96). Metaquartzite pebbles and cobbles up to 0.45 m in diameter make up the greater part of the material (up to 90 per cent). Other pebbles and cobbles of schorl, vein quartz (up to 7 per cent), porphyries, tourmaline, feldspathic conglomerate and sandstone are present. There is little variation in the relative proportion of these types of pebbles throughout the exposures. Pebbled strata are commonly interleaved with horizontally bedded red-brown gravel and silty sand layers. These are more frequent towards the top of the formation. The frequency of pebbles to matrix varies between 80 per cent and 20 per cent (Henson 1970: 175).

The quartzites are the product of low-level regional metamorphism. In other words, the sand grains of which they are composed have been comparatively little altered by subsequent heat and pressure. The pebbles are poorly sorted, so very large ones and smaller ones may be found side by side. The mean size of the pebbles declines northwards along the Pebblebed heathlands from about 16 cm at the coast to 10 cm inland to the north (Henson 1970: 97; Edwards and Scrivener 1999: 88) and from the lower to the upper strata of the exposure (Ussher 1913: 89).

At the top of the Pebblebed formation, visible in the cliffs at Budleigh Salterton, there is a striking bright-yellow band of sandstone appearing immediately beneath the Otter (new red sandstones) (Figure 1.8). Below this there is a thin black deflation layer including ventifacts up to 7 cm thick. These are wind-faceted and polished pebbles with two or more smooth faces with a distinctive ridge between them, and one rough face. Some, termed dreikanter, have a very distinctive triangular appearance with three facets at the top; others have four or more. The dark colour of these pebbles when newly exposed is only a surface varnish caused by desert weathering. When split open they are ordinary quartzites like the others (Perkins 1971: 130; Leonard et al. 1982). They lay exposed on the floor of the Triassic desert and were wind-polished. The side of the pebbles that lay on the desert floor is typically rough and unpolished with shatter pitting of the surface, while the faces exposed to the polishing actions of the desert sands are beautifully smooth.

The pebbles seen on the beach at Budleigh Salterton are all derived from the cliffs above. Long shore drift and violent storms have swept them eastwards into a substantial ridge backing up to Otter Point and Otter Ledge to the east of the mouth of the river Otter and almost blocking its passage to the sea. Formerly a port, mud flats and marshes have formed behind the great pebble ridge. The beach is approximately 40 m wide and up to 3.5 m above high-water mark.

Despite the derivation of the pebbles on the beach from those in the cliffs there are substantial differences. First, many of the cliff pebbles have numerous shatter marks originating in the transport of the pebbles along the river course. These are rapidly removed and scoured by the waves. Second, while the cliff pebbles are ungraded, with smaller and large pebbles occurring next to each other, those on the beach are sorted by wave action, with smaller pebbles occurring next to the sea and the largest ones higher up the beach nearer to the cliffs with mean pebble size decreasing to the east. Third, the surfaces of the pebbles in the cliffs are stained brown by the gravel and sandy matrix in which they occur. Those on the beach are scoured clean by wave action and the salt and are much more brightly coloured. Many of the pebbles in the cliffs are fractured or broken. Those on the beach are smoother and well rounded, with wave action removing any rough, fractured edges. Fourth, the beach pebbles tend to be flatter and more rounded in form, again a product of abrasive wave action. Statistical sampling has shown that mean roundness values are lowest for cliff samples, with little variation along the beach (Carr and Blackley 1975: 306). By contrast, length variation was considerable, varying from sample to sample, reflecting the composition of the Pebblebeds themselves.

Bunter, the term for this geological formation, derives from the German for ‘brightly coloured’. The variation in colours of the pebbles is quite extraordinary, although curiously somewhat little remarked in contemporary geological accounts. All the colours of the rainbow and more are here. The pebbles range in colour from pure black to pure white. Brown, red, green, yellow, blue and grey pebbles all occur. Some have mottled surfaces with many different colours. Others have striking and intricate quartz veins and inclusions. This, above all, is what makes the pebbles of the Pebblebed formation on the beach and throughout their inland distribution so distinctive compared with beach pebbles found elsewhere throughout Britain.

The modern rational geological account of the Pebblebeds, referred to above, is of recent date, little more than a hundred years old. Like the modern geologist, the prehistoric cosmologist might have attempted to understand what was under his or her feet by asking some ‘geological’ questions and making similar observations. Observing fallen pebbles from the cliffs, the origin of those on the beach might have been easily deduced. But why the great uplifted ridge of pebbles running inland and also seen in watercourses and exposed patches so distant from the sea? What were their origins, when smooth, rounded pebbles are normally only found by the sea? The logical premises for interpretation would, of course, have been radically different, but the answer might have been the same: these were the remains of an ancient river or beach thrust up towards the sky.

The Mesolithic and Neolithic (9500–2400 BC)

Mesolithic and Neolithic finds from the Pebblebed heathlands consist of a few finds of Neolithic axes and mixed surface flint scatters near to Blackhill on the western scarp, containing both Mesolithic and Neolithic material and two Mesolithic flint scatters to the south and southwest of Woodbury Castle (Smith 1956; Wymer and Bonsall 1977). These are all on the highest areas of the heathlands. Beyond the heathlands Mesolithic material was recovered from the excavations at Hembury of the Neolithic causewayed enclosure and Iron Age hillfort (Berridge 1986).

Figure 1.9 shows the distribution of all known flint finds from the heathlands and along the Otter valley to the east. These range from the Mesolithic to the Iron Age and very few are broadly dateable diagnostic finds. There are concentrations along the lower Otter valley but they also occur all over the landscape from the highest points of the heathlands to the surrounding lowlands. Given the character of the heathland vegetation, making the collection of flints impossible except in disturbed areas, it is interesting to note that the frequency of find spots is nevertheless as common as in arable land to the east, illustrating their extensive prehistoric visitation and use.

It is worth mentioning here in a book concerned with pebbles and their significance one class of ceremonial artefact long held as being diagnostic of the Mesolithic: pebble maceheads with hour-glass perforations. These are recorded across all of southern England from Cornwall to Kent. In Wymer and Bonsall’s (1977) catalogue 10 are recorded from Cornwall, three from Devon, 16 from Dorset, 22 from Wiltshire and between 4 and 12 in other southern English counties. Sometimes, as at Portland in Dorset, they form part of excavated Mesolithic assemblages (Palmer 1999). In other cases they are isolated finds.

They represent the first direct evidence that we have of an interest in and ceremonial use of pebbles. Although some are recorded from coastal sites, others are found far inland and at a considerable distance from the sea. They must represent long-distance movement or exchange between hunter-gatherer groups, something that is also known from the widespread distribution of Portland chert across southern England during the Mesolithic (Palmer 1970). None are so far recorded from East Devon. The sources of the pebbles used, their colours and characteristics (see Chapter 5) would clearly repay further study.

Neolithic flint scatters are recorded along the coast to the west of High Peak and to the south and north of Otterton, on Mutter’s Moor, part of the Peak Hill ridge, at Patterson’s Cross just to the north of Ottery St Mary, and a series of others much further north along the Exe valley around Nether Exe (Griffith and Quinnell 1999b; Miles 1976; Pearce 1979). In addition to these surface flint scatters, Neolithic settlement and ritual deposition in pits is documented from the A30 excavations at Castle Hill and Long Range (Fitzpatrick et al. 1999), at Hayes Farm, Clyst Honiton and at Pixie’s Parlour, Ottery St Mary (Mudd and Joyce 2014). A pit at Hayes Farm contained 16 clay loom weights, sherds from a carinated bowl, burnt sheep/goat bones, parts of a bird and charred plant remains (Hart et al. 2014: 7–9). At Pixie’s Parlour a 5-m-long and 2-m-wide pit interpreted as a possible tree-throw hole contained 57 sherds of earlier Neolithic pottery with a wide variety of different fabrics, some as far away as the vicinity of Dartmoor, and 56 pieces of worked flint (Mudd and Joyce 2014: 17).

A house structure together with possible enclosures (for animals? The land was never ploughed) on top of the Haldon Hills (Gent and Quinnell 1999b; Willock 1933, 1937) has long been known at Haldon Belvedere. Recent excavations on the outskirts of Ottery St Mary carried out ahead of a housing development have provided additional rare evidence of Early Neolithic occupation. Around 40 pits and post pits, some of which were arranged in arcs, were associated with pot sherds, many of which were from carinated bowls (DAS Newsletter 2013: 6–7).

There are three known Neolithic causewayed enclosures and/or hilltop settlements on High Peak, and at Hembury and Raddon, a much greater distance away to the northwest (Gent and Quinnell 1999b). There is the possibility that another may exist under the Iron Age hillfort of Dumpdon in the Honiton gap to the northeast of the heathlands.

High Peak (Figure 1.4) is the highest and most distinctive point along this stretch of the East Devon coastline. Although it is considerably lower (157 m) than either the Peak Hill or East Hill ridges (highest point 246 m) to its north it appears both higher and more prominent because of its relative isolation, distinctive triangular shape and coastal situation. Excavations on High Peak revealed traces of a possible Neolithic causewayed enclosure on top of the hill, virtually all of which has been subsequently destroyed along with the ramparts of an Iron Age/Dark Age hillfort by coastal erosion. The Neolithic remains included a short ditch segment rock-cut in its lower part through the greensand and underlying chert beds with a primary fill that included charcoal, bone fragments and flint flakes with pottery in the upper fill (Pollard 1966: 41). Pollard also identified ‘cooking areas’ with flint and pottery scatters and three pits. The pottery recovered included sherds of gabbroic ware originating in the Lizard peninsula, Cornwall but this seems to have been rare, constituting only 3 per cent of the total assemblage (Quinnell and Taylor in Rainbird et al. 2013: 37) compared with 10 per cent of this material at Hembury (see below) (Quinnell and Taylor in Rainbird et al. 2013: 37). A few sherds contained temper with a granite (Dartmoor) source and the bulk was manufactured locally: some of the clay was of Lias origin, the nearest source being the Devon/Dorset border to the east (Quinnell and Taylor in Rainbird et al. 2013: 37). Most flints were of local material but they included two pieces of Portland chert and black flint derived from Beer (Pollard 1966: 47–8; Tingle 1998). Among the groundstone axe fragments there is more exotic material: a jadeite piece with an Alpine origin and a picrate piece from Callington, Cornwall. Other groundstone axes were made from the local greensand. A number of pebbles, some showing signs of usage, from the Budleigh Salterton Pebblebeds, were found among the Neolithic material (Pollard 1966: 52). Recent excavations in 2012 recovered 22 pebbles derived from the Pebblebeds and local beach deposits, one of which with faint polishing may have been used as a rubber (Taylor in Rainbird et al. 2013: 42).