50 Fun Facts About Cornwall

What is the Cornish-language name for Cornwall?

Cymru is Wales and Breizh is Brittany, its fellow Brittonic-speaking cousins. Dumnonia was the post-Roman kingdom that covered Cornwall and Devon.

Which river forms most of the border between Cornwall and Devon?

King Æthelstan fixed the boundary there in 936 after pushing the Britons west. Brunel's Royal Albert Bridge and the Tamar Bridge carry the main crossings at Saltash.

What is Cornwall's only city?

It gained city status in 1877, a year after the Diocese of Truro was created. Bodmin had been the county town from 1838 but lost its functions to Truro.

Truro Cathedral was the first new-site Anglican cathedral built in England since which one, in 1220?

John Loughborough Pearson's Gothic Revival design went up between 1880 and 1910 on the site of St Mary's parish church.

Which headland is the southernmost place on mainland Great Britain?

Cornwall is both the westernmost part of the South West Peninsula and the UK's southernmost county. The Lizard is also famous for its carved serpentine rock.

Land's End sits on which peninsula at the western tip of Cornwall?

It is the most westerly point of mainland England and the start of the famous end-to-end route to John o' Groats. The Longships lighthouse stands on rocks just offshore.

Which granite tor on Bodmin Moor is the highest point in Cornwall?

Rough Tor is the slightly lower neighbour. Dozmary Pool on the moor's southern slopes is one claimed resting place of Excalibur.

Who is generally regarded as the patron saint of Cornwall?

Michael the Archangel probably held the title in Norman times and the Anglican Church still calls him Protector of Cornwall. Piran is also patron saint of tin miners.

According to legend, how did Cornwall's patron saint arrive from Ireland?

Irish pagans supposedly rolled him off a cliff tied to the stone; the sea calmed and he drifted ashore at Perranzabuloe, where he built a tiny oratory in the dunes.

What does Cornwall's flag, the banner of its patron saint, look like?

In heraldic terms, 'sable, a cross argent'. The earliest written description dates only from 1838; the same design is the arms of a Breton family from Cornouaille.

Cornish belongs to which branch of the Celtic languages, alongside Welsh and Breton?

All three descend from Common Brittonic, once spoken across Great Britain. Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx are the Goidelic branch.

In 2010 UNESCO reclassified Cornish from 'extinct' to what?

The language had died out as a community tongue by the end of the 18th century; a 20th-century revival made the old label inaccurate.

In what year were the Cornish granted national minority status under a European framework convention?

The announcement on 24 April gave the Cornish the same recognition as the Scots, Welsh and Irish within the UK.

Since 2011 the name 'Cornish pasty' has held which legal protection in Europe?

It took the Cornish Pasty Association a nine-year campaign. Under the rules the pasty must be D-shaped and crimped on the side, never the top, which is the Devon way.

Besides beef, potato and onion, which vegetable belongs in a traditional Cornish pasty?

Confusingly, Cornish people call swede 'turnip'. Emigrating miners carried the pasty to Mexico, Australia and the American Midwest.

Stargazy pie, with fish heads poking through the crust, comes from which Cornish village?

It is eaten on Tom Bawcock's Eve, 23 December, celebrating a fisherman who braved a storm to save the village from starvation. The pilchards gaze at the stars.

Which local product has Protected Geographical Status and cannot legally be made outside the county?

The cream is made by slowly heating full-fat milk until a thick crust forms. The jam-or-cream-first argument with Devon remains unresolved.

The Eden Project near St Austell was built inside what?

Its two biome domes are made of inflated ETFE hexagons on steel frames; the larger holds one of the world's biggest indoor rainforests. The full site opened on 17 March 2001.

What share of Cornwall's visitors did the Eden Project draw in 2004?

China clay extraction had become a major Cornish industry as tin and copper declined, leaving the pits the project reclaimed.

Which 12th-century writer first named Tintagel as the place where King Arthur was conceived?

In his Historia Regum Britanniae, Merlin disguises Uther Pendragon as Gorlois, Duke of Cornwall, to reach Igraine. The actual castle was built by Richard, Earl of Cornwall, in the 13th century.

St Michael's Mount is linked to which town by a causeway passable at low tide?

The tidal island in Mount's Bay has been home to the St Aubyn family since about 1650 and is now managed by the National Trust.

Who built the open-air Minack Theatre on the cliffs at Porthcurno?

She bought the headland for £100 after the First World War. The first production, The Tempest in 1932, used the Atlantic as its backdrop.

Which Shakespeare play opened the Minack Theatre in 1932?

Cade's village players had staged A Midsummer Night's Dream in a meadow in 1929 and wanted a more dramatic setting for their shipwreck story.

The Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in which year?

UNESCO later considered putting it on the danger list over plans to reopen South Crofty mine and build a supermarket at Hayle Harbour.

Where did Cornishman Richard Trevithick's locomotive make the first railway journey in 1804?

It hauled a train along the Penydarren Ironworks tramway on 21 February. Trevithick was born between Camborne and Redruth in the heart of mining country.

Cornish chemist Humphry Davy is best remembered for inventing what?

He also isolated potassium and sodium in 1807 and discovered that nitrous oxide made him laugh. His assistant was a young Michael Faraday.

Cornwall became a duchy in which year?

Edward III created it for his son the Black Prince. The monarch's eldest son still becomes Duke of Cornwall automatically; the current duke is Prince William.

Who automatically holds the title Duke of Cornwall?

He gains it at birth or when his parent takes the throne, but cannot sell duchy assets for personal gain. From 1993 the then Prince Charles voluntarily paid income tax on the surplus.

The Cornish rebellion of 1497 is attributed to the grievances of which workers?

Led by Michael An Gof and Thomas Flamank, the rebels marched on London to protest taxes for a Scottish war. The 1549 Prayer Book Rebellion followed two generations later.

Winston Graham's Poldark novels were adapted by the BBC in 2015 and in which earlier year?

Robin Ellis played Ross Poldark first; Aidan Turner took over the scything duties forty years later. Graham published the books between 1945 and 2002.

Daphne du Maurier lived at Menabilly, near which Cornish town?

The house became Manderley in Rebecca. Jamaica Inn, Frenchman's Creek and My Cousin Rachel are among her other Cornish-set novels.

The real Jamaica Inn on Bodmin Moor was built in 1750 as what?

It was a staging post for changing horses near Bolventor and acquired a reputation for smuggling, which du Maurier turned into her 1936 novel.

Which Cornish town is the base of the title characters in a Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera?

The Pirates of Penzance premiered in 1879. The real town has the Jubilee Pool, one of Britain's oldest surviving Art Deco lidos, and was Humphry Davy's birthplace.

Helston's Furry Dance is traditionally held on which date?

Dancers wear lily of the valley, the town's flower, to mark the end of winter. It is one of the oldest customs still practised in Britain.

The Obby Oss May Day festival belongs to which Cornish port?

Two hobby horses, the Old and the Blue Ribbon Oss, dance through the town. The port is also nicknamed 'Padstein' for chef Rick Stein's restaurants.

Cornish hurling, played with a small silver ball, survives in St Ives and which other town?

The Townsmen play the Countrymen on Shrove Tuesday and again eleven days later. Goals are two miles apart.

In Cornish wrestling, what do competitors wear so opponents can grip them?

All holds must be taken on the jacket. The aim is to throw your opponent flat on their back, scoring a 'back' with all four pins touching.

Which bird, red-billed and red-legged, recolonised Cornwall in 2001 after 50 years' absence?

The chough appears on Cornwall's coat of arms and, in legend, carries the soul of King Arthur.

Goonhilly's first dish, nicknamed Arthur, was built in 1962 to link with which satellite?

The Lizard peninsula site was once the world's largest satellite earth station with more than 30 dishes. It now partners Spaceport Cornwall at Newquay.

Which north-coast town was Cornwall's most populous built-up area at the 2021 census?

Famous for Fistral Beach surfing, it now also hosts an airport and Spaceport Cornwall. The largest conurbation overall is Redruth and Camborne.

Which artists' meeting in 1928 laid the foundation for the St Ives School colony?

Self-taught fisherman-painter Alfred Wallis inspired Ben Nicholson and Christopher Wood. Tate St Ives opened above Porthmeor beach in 1993 on an old gasworks site.

Tate St Ives also manages a museum and sculpture garden dedicated to which artist?

The Tate took over her Trewyn Studio in 1980, five years after she died in a fire there. The gallery itself was built between 1988 and 1993.

How many inhabited islands make up the Isles of Scilly?

Six if Gugh is counted separately from St Agnes, plus around 140 rocky islets. Most Scillonians live on St Mary's, and nearly half in Hugh Town.

The Isles of Scilly were technically at war with which country for 335 years?

The disputed conflict dated from the English Civil War, when Royalist Scilly harassed Dutch shipping; a peace treaty was finally signed in 1986.

Which mythical lost land is said to lie between Land's End and the Isles of Scilly?

Tristan is supposed to have been a prince of it. The Seven Stones Reef and the Longships rocks are cast as its drowned peaks.

Falmouth was founded in 1613 by which family, near Pendennis Castle?

Henry VIII had built Pendennis in 1540 to guard Carrick Roads. The town is now home to the National Maritime Museum Cornwall.

Which 1549 law forced an English prayer book on Cornish people who spoke no English, sparking revolt?

The rebels' manifesto declared 'we the Cornyshe men, whereof certen of us understande no Englysh, utterly refuse thys newe Englysh'. Reprisals killed an estimated tenth of Cornwall's civilians.

From the early 19th to the mid-20th century, which form of Christianity was dominant in Cornwall?

John Wesley preached repeatedly in the county, and chapels still dot every mining village. Before his missions, dissenters in Cornwall were very few.

Which American singer-songwriter lives in north Cornwall, not far from Bude?

She recorded several albums at her Martian Engineering studio there. Bude, like Newquay, is one of the county's surfing towns.

The '-wall' in Cornwall comes from an Old English word meaning what?

Wealh meant foreigner, slave or Brittonic-speaker, the same root that produced 'Welsh'. The 'Corn-' part comes from the Cornovii tribe.