Cornwall's Hidden History Blog
For many visitors and local people alike the little lake known as Swanpool just outside of Falmouth is a favourite place for a stroll. For generations it has been a popular spot to bring the little ones to feed the ducks and to stretch your legs before heading to the beach. However, this coastal lagoon […]
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For hundreds of years damaged reputations were avenged and arguments were settled with a duel. Whether with sword or pistol challenging your enemy to a one on one contest was thought by many to be an honourable way to assuage your hurt feelings and answer a perceived slight. After coming across a couple of almost […]
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It’s a familiar story . . . an isolated and ancient country house where a ghostly figure is said to haunt the corridors and glide through the moonlit gardens. This particular version takes place at Godolphin, one of Cornwall’s best-known manor houses and involves the Godolphin family who once lived there and were amongst the […]
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The hamlet of Golden near Probus consists of little more than a farm and a Tudor manor house. Tucked away down a narrow dead-end road at first glance there seems little reason to visit. In fact, I was only drawn there by chance having seen a medieval ‘chapel’ marked on the OS map. Stepping out […]
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Legends of sea serpents and strange creatures from the deep are found across the globe. In Cornwall, a region surrounded by water, those stories of sea monsters date back hundreds of years. But it appears that there have been certain periods in history and certain locations where sightings have been much more frequent. This article […]
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When Francis Basset, Baron de Dunstanville, died in Knightsbridge in London in 1835 he was one of the wealthiest landowners in Cornwall and the head of one of its most ancient families. There had been Bassets in Cornwall for nearly 900 years and his death came as a shock to his friends and family and […]
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For over 300 years Barbary pirates preyed upon the coasts of the south west of England. Thousands of the ordinary folk were taken captive and held for ransom or sold as slaves in markets in North Africa. Those most at risk were fishermen and merchant sailors whose unarmed boats made easy targets, as Owen Phippen, […]
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Beside a busy road in the centre of Redruth the shell of a once elegant building goes mostly unnoticed by the passing traffic. But some say that this old ruin actually marks the beginnings of the town. You see, this was once the site of St Rumon’s Chapel one of the Redruth’s first buildings, most […]
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In medieval Cornwall, as in the rest of Britain, the majority of ordinary folk were unable to read and write. Bible stories and Christian teachings were learnt and understood through oral repetition in church services, watching religious plays such as the Ordinalia and through colourful, attention-grabbing wall paintings. While most of these ancient murals have […]
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Much of prehistory is a complete mystery to us. There are so many unanswered questions. Practically everything we know about the Neolithic comes from the few objects that have survived the intervening centuries, and how we have subsequently interpreted those finds. But if we had to choose just one object to be the iconic symbol […]
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