Tregiffian Vean Chambered Cairn near Land's End
The fact that there is a better known Tregiffian neolithic long barrow close to the Merry Maidens in the Lamorna area confused me for a long while. So in April 2008, when doing a walk from Land's End, I looked at the OS map, saw that 'chambered cairn' was shown between Higher Tregiffian and Tregiffian farms, and decided to include it in my walk. It was easy to find, in a long field through which a path runs between the farms and, despite its small size, visible from quite a distance. When I got to it, my first thought was that this was no chambered cairn at all but just a heap of stones that a farmer had piled in a field. However, when I got home and looked it up on the web I found a posting by Pure Joy on The Modern Antiquarian , quoting Craig Weatherhill's book Belerion, Ancient Sites of Land's End as follows: "This barrow has suffered dreadfully and it is only a shadow of the fine and unusual monument excavated by W.C.Borlase in 1878. It was then a kerbed mound 6.4m in diameter, containing a rather odd-shaped chamber. This was 2.4m long, 0.9m wide and just 0.5m high, but its inner end opened out to a width of 1.2m and a height of 1.0m. Like the tomb at Tregeseal the entrance was blocked by a single slab. The roof of the chamber consisted of three slabs and the tomb contained ashes and an urn". Sad that an important ancient monument - it is of the Scillonian type - should have been allowed to be so badly damaged.
You can probably ask permission to park at Higher Tregiffian
Tregiffian Chambered Cairn - On Land's End Trail
More in Antiquities
Treryn Dinas Cliff Castle
This must be the largest of Cornwall's cliff castles. Depending on who you believe, there are either three or four lines of ramparts. I make it three. A massive landward rampart (right on the coast path) as much as twenty feet high, an inner double bank and ditch, and a small seaward rampart, which is approached by a 'bridge', just before the incredibly rocky headland. There are said to be remains of two hut circles beyond this seaward defence. I find this a puzzling place. Why should anyone who could build the vast outer defences risk being trapped between their tiny final rampart and this rocky headland, with no way to escape. Is it possible that 2000 years have seen massive erosion here, changing the headland beyond recognition. Whatever the reason, it is a most impressive place. It is worth climbing the rocky headland to find the famous Logan Rock - I couldn't make it in the high winds of late March 2008. The National Trust has made a fair job of clearing the site and there is an easy level path from Treen village. For once I disagree with Craig Weatherhill's thoughts on place names. Treen may not mean 'the farm by the fort', it more likely means 'the farm by the (bank and) ditch'. But I do agree that the cliff castle's name is now derived from the village name - 'the fort by Treen'.
Trethevy Quoit Portal Dolmen
Trevethy Quoit is the best example in Cornwall - and one of the best that you will find anywhere - of what the archaeologists describe as a neolithic portal dolmen, a massive 4000 year old burial chamber of stone construction that would once have been covered in earth. Quoit is the Cornish word for this kind of monument. Seven vast slabs of Trethevy Quoit survive of which one has fallen into the tomb, causing the great capstone (it weighs around ten tons) to slope at an angle that adds character, as does the neat hole drilled through one corner - one suspects that this may have been done in Victorian times in order to put the slab back on top after it had fallen. Another oddity is that the upright 'closure' stone has a bottom corner cut away, apparently in order to allow the chamber to be entered. When looking for Trethevy Quoit, you will find it poorly signed. When you make the designated turn in Darite village, you will then need to make an immediate unsigned right to find it.
Trevelgue Head Iron Age Promontory Fort
If you look at the Modern Antiquarian you will find some confusion about Trevelgue Head Promontory Fort at St. Columb Porth. Phil's fieldnotes are immaculate but a number of photographs have been posted of quite a different site, the pair of bronze age barrows on the cliff top above Fruitful Cove, more than half a mile to the north. Trevelgue headland is now split in two, its parts now joined by a small wooden footbridge. One wonders whether the gap had to be bridged when the fort was in use for around 800 years from the 3rd century BC. Consensus seems to be that sea erosion created the gap more recently. Fortifications - still impressive banks and ditches - date from iron age occupation and are on both the mainland and the island. But the site must have been occupied from long before the iron age; archaeologists have found some evidence of metal working from the bronze age and the discovery of flint chips may suggest neolithic occupation. Indeed, there is still a fairly impressive bronze age barrow, though others have been robbed out, probably by modern day farmers in search of building stone, as they did on Barrowfields not far away in Newquay. Trevelgue Head can be seen from the barrows above Fruitful Cove and from those at Barrowfields so there is more than likely a bronze age tribal connection. I sought out all three sites during a walk on the Coast Path between Watergate Bay and Newquay.