Leat

A leat (/ˈliːt/; also lete or leet, or millstream) is the name, common in the south and west of England and in Wales, for an artificial watercourse or aqueduct dug into the ground, especially one supplying water to a watermill or its mill pond.

Other common uses for leats include delivery of water for hydraulic mining and mineral concentration, for irrigation, to serve a dye works or other industrial plant, and provision of drinking water to a farm or household or as a catchment cut-off to improve the yield of a reservoir.

Leats generally start some distance (a few hundred metres/yards, or perhaps several miles/kilometres) above the mill or other destination, where an offtake or sluice gate diverts a proportion of the water from a river or stream.

[citation needed] There are many leats on Dartmoor,[1] mostly constructed to provide power for mining activities, although some were also sources of drinking water.

[2][3] Many such leats on the moor are marked on the 1:50000 and 1:25000 Ordnance Survey maps, such as that serving the now-defunct Vitifer mine near the Warren House Inn.