The Ancient & Modern Archaeological Heritage of Bodmin Moor

Bodmin Moor is a truly remarkable part of Britain, in that it still retains its long and fascinating history recorded and still visible in the landscape. Bodmin Moor has never been subjected to modern designs, and the concrete invasion of urban development. Here on Bodmin Moor is a rich and varied heritage of both cultural and industrial life, and a unique archaeological record.

Climb to the summit of Stowe's Hill near Minions, and you have left the 21st century behind. For more than 6000 years man has lived, worked and died upon Bodmin Moor, and he has left evidence of his passing on every tor, and in every valley, that you can see. Six millennia ago in 4000 BC, the view before you would have been very different. Ancient woodlands of Birch, Oak and Hazel trees would fill the valleys, and much of the exposed moorland would be covered with scrubby Hazel.

Around this time at the dawn of our ancient history, nomadic Mesolithic hunter-gatherers were moving in, and you would be able to see columns of smoke rising above the treetops, from their tented camps. After another thousand years or so, and you would hear the sound of stone axes on timber. Gaps in the woodland were then appearing, as early Neolithic man settled down and started to clear away the trees in order to provide pastures and fuel to burn. All around you, on the hilltop, he would have been busy building the large fortified stone ramparts of an enclosed settlement (Stowe's Pound), about 3 metres (10 feet) high, the remains of which you can still see today. Inside he would have been clearing away stone platforms for about 100 wooden huts, and in the distance, similar hill-forts and enclosures would have been taking shape on Roughtor, Tregarrick and other tors and locations on and around Bodmin Moor.

From 2500 BC, stone tools were replaced with metal implements, and man no longer had to build just for shelter, but also built for his sacred and tribal rituals. To the west and south of Stowe's Hill, down on Craddock Moor, teams of labourers erected circles of standing stones - the Hurlers - for important occasions, though whether these were ritual, celebratory, or religious, the reasons are lost in time and many historians and archaeologists have speculated. Other settlements did the same, and ceremonial stones were erected all over Bodmin Moor... on King Arthur's Downs, around Roughtor and Garrow Tor, and on Trehudreth Downs. Many of them were positioned in line with sacred hills and valleys. Due south of Stowe's Hill can be found the chieftain's burial mound of Rillaton Barrow; inside would have been found a stone cist containing a skeleton, a bronze dagger, and a ribbed cup of gold - the now famous Rillaton Gold Cup, a replica of which can be seen in the Cornwall Museum in Truro. The original was sent as treasure trove to William IV, and later turned up in King George V's dressing room, being used as a receptacle for his collar studs!

By 1000BC Bodmin Moor was being extensively farmed... thousands of thatched round houses, with outbuildings and walled fields, are scattered around Roughtor and Louden Hill, on Craddock Moor to the west of Stowe's Hill, and on the slopes beneath Sharp Tor. A reconstruction of such a village can be seen up on the moor at Trewortha. But there was a change in the air... the climate was getting colder, and the soil was becoming less fertile. The farms were being abandoned, and the moor became used only for summer grazing. Activity shifted to the river valleys, where you can still see the gullies of old tin streaming works.

Fast forward again to the Middle Ages, and a few farmers had started returning to the moor; building hamlets along the Witheybrook stream below Stowe's Hill. The new farmers had now started farming in strip fields, and good examples of these can still clearly be seen on Bray Down and Brown Willy. Many of these farms have remained occupied through hundreds of years, and well into the 21st century. But many of these farms have themselves been committed to history, and abandoned farmsteads can be seen falling into ruin in the more remote parts of the moor. The old farm house below Garrow Tor is but one mid-20th century example.

By the mid-18th century, Bodmin Moor had become busier - and noisier. All around the Stowe's Hill and Caradon Hill area, man had started digging for tin and copper. First in surface workings, and then in the 19th century, the emphasis had changed to the deep shaft mines of Phoenix and Caradon, and many others in the area. They were topped with smoking and clattering engine houses and tramways, with a noise that had never been heard on the moor before or since. The marsh at Witheybrook turned copper-coloured, with women and children washing ore, and nearby and cutting into the very heart of Stowe's Hill, the new Cheesewring quarry-workers were blasting and hammering away at the granite up until the 1930s.

Tinners and Miners have left their mark on Bodmin moor since late medieval times, and these "Old Men" as they are known, have left long scars and cuts on the landscape where they have dug down and along the surface tin deposits, where they have worked narrow, open-cast mines and "lode-back pits" to stream for the veins of tin deposits. With the advent of steam power in the 19th century, deep shafts and levels were later blasted and hacked away using hand drills, dynamite and picks into the granite to reach the deeper and richer veins of tin and copper. On the surface, the massive beam engines were put to use for pumping water from the deeper levels, bringing ore to the surface, and for crushing the ore using noisy drop-hammer "stamps".

The extensive Cornish Mining industrial remains on the south-east corner of Bodmin Moor have now been recognised as a World Heritage Site; and these now form a part of the Cornwall and West Devon Mining World Heritage Site. These valuable examples of the 19th century, and earlier, tin and copper mining industry in Cornwall will now be protected for future generations to witness and remember.

For a more detailed introduction to Bodmin Moor and its rich heritage, why not order our excellent new book "An Introduction to Bodmin Moor" by Mark Camp!