A VOLUNTEER archaeological con-servation project on Dartmoor has won a prestigious national award.

The Marsh Award was presented by the Council for British Archaeology to the Dartmoor Cairns Project in recognition of high quality archaeological work being carried out to sustain and transmit knowledge and cultural heritage to future generations.

Since 2005, the Cairns Project, jointly operated by the Dartmoor Preservation Association, English Heritage, and Dartmoor National Park Authority, has surveyed and repaired 49 Bronze Age cairns on Dartmoor.

The cairns are some 4,000 years-old and are scheduled ancient monuments. Although the purpose of the cairns is unclear, it is considered that their primary function was to mark burials or territories.

Over time, people have added stones to the cairns or removed them, creating hollows within the cairn itself. If the hollows continue to develop, it leads to the exposure of potential surviving buried archaeological features and their subsequent destruction.

The Cairns Project has undertaken sensitive repair work using volunteers working under the guidance of Dartmoor National Park Authority archaeologist and historic environment field adviser, Andy Crabb.

At the same time, detailed surveys of the cairns have been completed, the results written up, and drawings made which will be digitised shortly, providing a detailed historical record.

The Marsh Award was won against strong competition from other projects across the UK.

James Paxman, chief executive of the Dartmoor Preservation Association, said: 'It is very welcome recognition of the impressive results that can be achieved by different organisations working together.

'The volunteers have shown great levels of organisation and commitment to achieve these results over a five year period.'

Anne Whitbourn, volunteer project coordinator for the DPA, said: 'We were told we would need external funding to pull this off. However, we took the view that we did not want the project to be driven by the constraints of funding applications.

'Our methods and tools are simple but effective and have mostly been provided from our own resources. The most expensive element was buying the train tickets to go to London for the presentation of the award!'