In the early 1970s most of the Leigham Estate was laid out and a number of Westcountry place names were used as the inspiration for the new, council-house lined thoroughfares. Prominent among them is the arterial Sheepstor Road, named after what is one of the nearest and probably best-known – to Plymothians – of the Dartmoor Tors.
The name itself was first recorded, back in the twelfth century, as Sitelstorra or Schetelstorre and this is thought to have derived from the Old English “scitels” meaning “dung” – hence we had dung hill. The suggestion is that this later evolved into the more innocuous sheep’s hill or tor, with the implication that the aforementioned dung was generated by the many sheep that have for centuries congregated on the slopes of this picturesque mound overlooking Burrator.
