Andrew Gough's Arcadia

As a province, the sanctity of Cornwall’s Land's End peninsula is unsurpassed in Britain. So why has its significance been overlooked? I believe the answer lies in its name.

Land's End, Cornwall – England

Nestled precariously on Cornwall’s inhospitable Atlantic coast, the Land's End peninsula is imprinted with thousands of years of myth and legend. Its shores are peppered with romantic coves and secluded beaches while its windswept fields preserve the memory of more dignified times. Today, megalithic monuments, Celtic shrines and ancient tin mines dot the Landscape, recalling the day when pagan princesses, pirates and smugglers roamed the land. The place is special, and has been so for a very, very long time.

The sanctity of Land's End: Lanyon Quoit

In 1998, a team of Russian scientists set out to identify the most likely location for the lost antediluvian civilisation of Atlantis. After considerable analysis they set their sights on Land's End and a stretch of sea 100 miles offshore called the Celtic Shelf. The land, which had been submerged since the last Ice Age, lies just beyond the neighbouring Isles of Scilly. The Russians could be forgiven for believing this was Atlantis; after all Plato quite clearly stated that the fabled city was located just beyond the Pillars of Hercules – or the Straits of Gibraltar, and this is where the Celtic Shelf resides.

Atlantis in Land's End: © BBC

The Russian scientists were likely to have been influenced, or at least romanced, by the legend of Lyonesse; a sunken kingdom with Arthurian connections believed to have been connected to Land's End in the distant past. The English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson commemorated the legend in his Arthurian epic, Idylls of the King:

Then rose the King and moved his host by night
And ever pushed Sir Mordred, league by league,
Back to the sunset bound of Lyonesse
A land of old upheaven from the abyss
By fire, to sink into the abyss again;
Where fragments of forgotten peoples dwelt,
And the long mountains ended in a coast

Here, Tennyson describes Lyonesse as the site of the final battle between Arthur and Mordred. This is not surprising, as traditional mythology associates the Kings of Lyonesse with legendary Arthurian characters, such as Tristan.

Tristan and Iseult (Herbert Draper: 1864 -1920)

As an aside, Tennyson’s work also featured Tintagel, the dramatic and ancient cliff side ruins on Cornwall’s north coast, alleged to have been Arthur’s birth place. Just a couple of miles from Tintagel, in Rock Valley, exists an even more interesting site; a seven ring classical labyrinth carved on a rocky outcrop. The symbol of the labyrinth was prevalent across the ancient world and is thought to represent spiritual pursuits and otherworldly realms. The design dates back millennia, and some argue, all the way back to the time of Atlantis.

The Arthurian Tintagel...

...and the nearby Labyrinth at Rock Valley, Cornwall

However, most believe that the association of Lyonesse with Atlantis is merely a folk memory of the flooding of the region around the Scilly Isles. But does that confirm or invalidate the historical context of the myth? Take for instance the Trevelyan family of Cornwall, who derive their coat of arms from the story of when Lyonesse sank beneath the waves and the sole survivor - a man named Trevelyan - escaped on a white horse. Based on the legend, the family adopted a shield with a horse rising above the waves. Regardless of its authenticity the memory of a cataclysmic flood and a surviving flood hero appears to have been retained in the folklore of the peninsula and its people, like it has in so many ancient lands.

The Trevelyan Family Crest: A horse running from a flood

Not far from where Lyonesse is said to have flourished - and ultimately perished, Saint Michael's Mount sits stoically on a jagged grey hill across the bay from Penzance. At low tide the majestic castle is joined by a natural causeway with Marazion, a town believed to be the oldest in Cornwall, and as we shall see, some would argue the oldest in all of Western Europe.

Causeway leading from Marazion to Saint Michael's Mount at low tide

The Cornish name for Saint Michael's Mount means "the grey rock in the wood". A forest once populated Mount Bay and the dramatic outcrop of grey granite could be seen rising above the tree line.

As with many sites revered by ancient pilgrims and modern-day spiritualists, an apparition or religious vision occurred at Saint Michael's Mount. Legend tells us that the Archangel Saint Michael appeared in 495 A.D. and a church was promptly erected in his honour. A few centuries later, a Celtic monastery was established and presided over by Benedictine monks.

A local tale popular with tourists recounts how a giant named Cormoran terrorized the Mount before being tricked and slain by a farmer’s son named Jack. The giant’s heart was removed, preserved and incorporated into the cobbled stone pilgrim’s path leading to the Mount. The stone immortalizes the memory of Cornish man’s victory over evil, and the beast with the ‘heart of stone’.

The giant’s heart on the pilgrim’s path leading up the Mount

Any review of the legends of Saint Michael's Mount would be incomplete without mention of the Saint Michael's ley line that runs northeasterly from Mount Bay across the country for several hundred miles, intersecting ancient edifices dedicated to Saint Michael in its path. Real or imagined, this granddaddy of ley lines runs through sacred sites such as St Michael's Church Brentor, St Michael's Church Burrowbridge, St Michael's Church Othery, St Michael's Church, Glastonbury Tor, and Stoke St Michael before coming to an apparent end in Bury Saint Edmunds, Norfolk.

Research by authors Hamish Miller and Paul Broadhurst has identified another ley line that intersects the Saint Michael line – at Saint Michael's Mount. The line starts in Ireland at the monastery of Skellig Michael before connecting to Saint Michael's Mount in England, France's Mont Saint Michel, and then onto a variety of sacred sites, such as Sacra di San Michele, Assisi, Delphi, Athens, Rhodes and ultimately Mount Carmel in Israel. Whether one attributes these alignments to serendipity or conscious design, they certainly add to what is undoubtedly a magical legend.

Land's End – the intersection of the Michael and Apollo Ley Lines
© Owen Waters

A special relationship exists between Saint Michael's Mount in England, and Mont Saint-Michel in France. The sites are effectively mirror images of each other, i.e. name, setting, history, etc. and their visual similarities are striking. Curiously, even the most callused visitor can sense the extraordinary energy they produce.

Saint Michael's Mount - England

Mont Saint Michel - France

The two centres of worship also share the same apparition; Saint Michael is said to have appeared in a vision at the French Mont St Michel in 715 A.D., and at the Cornish St Michael's Mount, as previously noted, in 495 A.D.

The list of similarities between the two lands just goes on. Another interesting, inverse relationship between Cornwall and France is their flags. The Cornish flag is a white cross on a black background while the former Breton (Brittany) flag is a mirror of the Cornish.

The Cornish Flag and the French Breton Flag – mirror images

The Cornish flag is called the banner of Saint Piran; the patron saint of tin-miners. Cornwall, as we shall discuss in some detail, was a major tin mining centre in the ancient world and Saint Piran is alleged to have adopted the flag’s color and design after witnessing the white tin in the black coals during his discovery of tin. Oddly, both flags are known by the same name; Kroaz Du, meaning Black Cross. The Black Cross is said to have been the flag used by the first Crusaders, and symbolizes the light of truth shining through the darkness of evil.

The Cornish Coat of Arms represents another Crusader reference; its shield depicts 15 gold coins (bezants) in the shape of a triangle and includes the motto One and All. The story goes that the Saracens had captured the Duke of Cornwall and were holding him ransom in exchange for 15 gold coins. In order to save their hero, Cornish people from all walks of life rallied together and raised the necessary money to free the Duke, hence the motto, One and All.

Not surprisingly, the Cornish Coat of Arms is enclosed by a frame of waves – much like the county itself is enclosed by water, echoing the memory of Lyonesse. Above the shield is a Chough, a member of the Crow family of birds, and a local legend in Cornwall. The Chough was once quite common on the cliffs of Cornwall, but was extinct for 50 years until conservationists re-established it through breeding in captivity near Land's End. Cornwall without the Chough is similar to the Tower of London without the Raven, and its return, albeit through controlled means, is viewed as highly auspicious. Standing on either side of the Chough are a tin miner and fisherman, symbolizing Cornwall’s two most important trades, historically.

Cornwall’s Coat of Arms and the Cornish Chough

There are still further similarities between Cornwall and Breton, such as their flood mythology. Like the legend of Lyonesse, Breton has its own version of a sunken kingdom in the tale of the Cité d'Ys, which was submerged as a result of its wantonness. As in the story of Lyonesse, the Breton flood myth ends with a sole survivor - King Gradlon – who manages to escape on a horse.

There are also similarities between the Cornish and Breton languages, no doubt stemming from a common Celtic Past. Clearly, the parallels reinforce the belief that in ancient times the two lands where connected in special ways, now largely forgotten.

The ancient village of Marazion connects Saint Michael's Mount to the Land's End Peninsula via a tidal walkway. The place is special in Cornish traditions; John Wesley preached there and the first Quaker meeting house in Cornwall was established there over 300 years ago. However its true place in history goes back much further, still.

Marazion, Land's End Peninsula

The name ‘Marazion’ is an amalgamation of two adjacent villages that have merged into one; Market Jew (Marghas Yow, or ‘Thursday Market’) and Marazion (or Marghas – or ‘Little Market’). Both names are Cornish, and local historians are quick to point out that neither implies a connection with Jews or Zion. Still others translate Marazion as ‘Zion by the Sea’, and as we shall see, this is not as farfetched as it first appears.

Marazion may well be the oldest town in England and possibly all of Western Europe. This is due to the belief of some historians that Marazion is the Mictis of the historian Timaeus and the Ictis of Diodorus Siculus; the author of each work studied the lost texts of Pytheas, an ancient Greek geographer who visited Britain in the 4th century BC.

Certainly the stone carvings in the cemetery of All Saints church (formerly Saint Hilary’s, which burnt in a fire in 1853) confirm an ancient origin, as several date from the 4th century and one even pays tribute to Constantine the Great. Another stone is inscribed with ‘NOTI NOTI’, which has been translated as the mark of Notus, however accompanying the inscription are symbols whose meaning remains a mystery.

There is ample evidence of the presence of Jewish communities in Land's End in modern times. Just down the road from Land's End point, in Sennen Cove, the 1876 Round House contains a Star of David carved in a roof beam. The house was constructed to allow fishermen to dry and mend their nets before trips.

Star of David in Land's End fisherman’s house (Sennen Cove)

Still one must ask what proof exists to confirm a Jewish occupation in Cornwall in ancient times. Cornwall’s Red Book of the Exchequer, circa 1198, contains a clause referring to every "man or woman, Christian or Jew." However to find earlier references we must turn our attention to more speculative accounts of fabled biblical characters and England’s most enduring legends – those of Christ on its shores.

Read Part 2