THE CELTIC AND OTHER ANTIQUITIES OF THE LAND'S END DISTRICT OF CORNWALL.

By RICHARD EDMONDS, Junior, Esq.,

Secretary for Cornwall to the Cambrian Archæological Association.

CHAPTER VII.

Ancient British_Villages-Churches and Dwelling-Houses, what originally-British Huts-British Villages-Old BossullowHigher Bodennar Cave-Boleit Cave-Higher Bodennar Crellas-Old Chyoster and its Cave-Remarkable Cave at Chapel Euny-Carn Yorth Circles-Conclusion.

ALTHOUGH the words pro aris et focis are so commonly used to express attachment to our churches and homesthe altar being the chief part of the former, and the fireplace of the latter-it has never, perhaps, occurred to my readers that, as a church was at first simply an altar surrounded by a wall, and covered with a roof; so a dwelling-house may have been originally nothing but a fire-place similarly enclosed. Afterwards a kitchen was constructed, the fire-place being at one end, as far from the door as possible. As civilization advanced, bedrooms and parlours were added. Most of the rural habitations of this district, sixty years since, might have suggested this idea; and, in many of our farm-houses and cottages at the present day, the fire-place at one end of the kitchen is the bare earth, (or "hearth" as it is now called,) 5 or 6 feet square, in the centre of which the fire is kindled, so that the inmates may stand or sit literally around it.

The detached huts of the Britons seem to have been generally mere oval or circular excavations, 3 or 4 feet deep, and 8 or 10 feet in diameter, edged with low walls of earth, or stones, upon which was raised a conical roof of poles, or branches of trees, covered with reed or turf. Remains of what appear to have been such huts are still to be seen in this district. But when granite slabs 3 or 4 feet long were at hand, they were set upright in a circular form on the unexcavated ground, to serve as walls

for the huts. I have elsewhere1 described some of the latter kind of huts which I observed close to large ancient residences at Truen and Carn Kenidjack.

In this district also are remains of some of the villages of the ancient inhabitants. Thus 4 miles north-west-bywest of Penzance, and about two furlongs north-east-byeast of Ch'ûn Castle, are the remains of "Old Bossullow," which, although referred to in some histories of Cornwall, were never described until 1849. "On this spot," says Miss Matilda Millett, in the Transactions for that of year the Penzance Natural History and Antiquarian Society, p. 286,"may be traced the ruins of upwards of 30 enclosures, of a rude circular form, varying from 8 to 40 feet in diameter: some of the larger ones appear to have been originally divided and subdivided: the walls or hedges are composed of unhewn stones without cement, and vary in elevation from 5 feet to mere foundations. Not a vestige of iron or metal is to be found, nor the mark of any tool; there are no windows nor chimneys, and the entrances, where most perfect, are very narrow, averaging but 2 feet and a half." From the centre of one of these huts, earth and stones to the depth of one foot were removed, and beneath was found "a thin layer of unctuous black mould, in which was a small quantity of charred wood," (the stems of the furze or whins, ulex Europaeus, which has always been the most common fuel here,) "a great number of burnt stones, and as many fragments of pottery as filled a small basin." In an adjoining hut, "a foot below the surface, some flat stones appeared to have been placed on the clay, forming a sort of rude pavement." To this account I will only add that many of these huts seem to have been built around a common central area. One such area, or enclosure, I particularly noticed, with a strong and well preserved entrance into it, 8 feet wide, facing the south-south-east. A well preserved and strongly made entrance into a

1 Reports of the Penzance Natural History and Antiquarian Society for 1848 and 1849, pp. 246, 346.

second large enclosure is about 5 feet wide, and also faces the south-south-east. Of similar enclosures I shall have

presently to speak.

Borlase notices the remains of another supposed British village in Sancreed, called the "Crellâs," 4 miles westnorth-west of Penzance. Its site is immediately above the small village of Higher Bodinnar, or Bodennar, as it is vulgarly called.

"In the southern part of this plot," says that author, "you may with some difficulty enter a hole faced on each side with a stone wall, and covered with flat stones. Great part of the walls, as well as covering, are fallen into the cave, which does not run in a straight line, but turns to the left hand at a small distance from the place where I entered, and seems to have branched itself out much farther than I could then trace it, which did not exceed 20 feet. It is about five feet high, and as much in width; called the Giants' Holt."

Borlase imagined this cave (which is now completely destroyed) to have been a private way into the supposed British town or village; but it seems more probable that the cave itself was one of the dwellings. Within an adjoining enclosure, as ancient perhaps as the village itself, my nephew when with me found, in a mole heap, a fragment of the upper part of a vessel of coarse dark pottery, the diameter of the vessel (judging from the fragment) having been about 12 inches. The top, which is much thicker than the rest, has a flat brim projecting horizontally over the outside: it is without ornament, and has no glazing; but the outside is partially coated with a black polish, proceeding apparently from the pulverizing of some particles of its substance, by the friction of a rope used for its conveyance. This discovery of ancient pottery, on what Borlase regarded as the site of a British town, tends to confirm the conjecture of the learned antiquarian.

A cave still perfect, similar to that described by Borlase,

2 Antiquities, p. 273.

3 The fragment is now in the Museum of the Penzance Natural History and Antiquarian Society.

is on an eminence in the tenement of Boleit (Boleigh), in St. Buryan, and about a furlong south-west of the village of Trewoofe (Trove). It is called the " Fowgow," and consists of a trench 6 feet deep and 36 long, faced on each side with unhewn and uncemented stones, across which, to serve as a roof, long stone posts, or slabs, are laid, covered with thick turf, planted with furze. The breadth of the cave is about 5 feet. On its north-west side, near the south-west end, a narrow passage leads into a branch cave of considerable extent, constructed in the same manner. At the south-west end is an entrance by a descending path; but this, as well as the cave itself, is so well concealed by the furze, that the whole looks like an ordinary furze brake without any way into it. The direction of the line of this cave is about north-east and south-west, which line, if continued towards the southwest, would pass close to the two ancient pillars called the Pipers, and the Druidical temple of Dawns Myin, all within a half of a mile. Borlase, who noticed this cave, gives a full description of another ancient cave close to Pendeen House, in St. Just, and says that many other caves of descriptions not very different from the preceding were "to be seen in these parts" in his time, and some had been destroyed by converting the stones to other uses.

4

The ancient dwelling-place next to be described may have been the most northern part of the British village at Higher Bodennar, called the Crellâs, referred to by Borlase, and if so, it may be a fair specimen of what the rest of the village now destroyed had been; for the cave which he saw at the southern end of the village, as already described, was evidently of a very different character from the buildings of which it chiefly consisted. This dwelling-place, of which a ground-plan is given below, consists of two circular or oval enclosures, formed by very thick, low walls, covered with furze. The smaller enclosure, extending internally 21 feet from north to south, has no opening except into the larger. Inside, and

4 Antiquities, p. 274.

concentric with the larger wall, is another wall, with an intervening ditch from 4 to 5 feet wide. This ditch, when roofed and divided into apartments (by transverse walls), may have been an habitation for a large family, while the grass plot in the centre (about 40 feet from north to south, and 36 from east to west) may have served for the recreation of its occupants, when not required for their cattle. One of the transverse walls, dividing the

space between the two concentric walls into apartments, may still be seen, 4 feet thick, and in good preservation, opposite the only entrance from the external grounds. Other transverse walls may have been at the sides of this entrance, which is about 6 feet wide, faces south-southeast, and is nearly at the bottom of the lower or larger enclosure. This entrance leads straight through the outer and inner walls. Borlase speaks of a similar passage through both walls on the northern side also, but there is no opening in that direction, except through the inner wall into the space between it and the outer wall. There were probably other similar entrances into the spaces