MAYA’s first session of 2022 was a visit to the Iron Age hillfort and Norman motte and bailey at Castle Neroche.  We had a good turn-out of members who braved the early February cold weather!  After an introductory talk we started to explore the earthworks.  We had a printout of an earthwork survey of the site and talked about how archaeologists used this to record the 3-D banks and ditches on a 2-D piece of paper.

Castle Neroche has a hidden secret which we were able to introduce the MAYANS to… it is the site of a secret underground WWII radio station!  There is nothing left to see above ground now apart from wires sticking out of some of the trees which were the aerials for the radio station.  A geophysical survey had been carried out several years ago to locate the base and we were able to show the MAYANS the results.  We spent some time trying to spot all the wires in the trees before moving on to discover the Norman motte and bailey.

The motte has a very deep ditch around it which made it very impressive.  The view from the top was amazing and we talked about how difficult it would be to attack such a well defended location.  After a drink and a snack we made our way down through a series of small platforms and ridges to the far side of the motte where we discovered some amazing carving of dragons made out of fallen trees.

We then made our way back to the car park to thaw out in warm cars!  A big thank you to all the volunteers who came along to help and a special thank you to Mr Chris Webster from the South West Heritage Trust for all his help with the guided tour.