It is thought that the church may be on the site of a mediaeval religious enclosure. A survey during the 19th Century recorded a circular earthwork was still present around the church and the curved side of the current churchyard may well be the remains of this.
The oldest part of the present church building is 14th Century. The tower was added when the church was rebuilt in the 15th century. It was also extensively restored in 1870. The piscina with a carved basin is thought to date from the 14th Century.
The Romans and Greeks played games which are thought to resemble football with air-filled balls and there is a report of a Roman man being killed whilst being shaved by a barber when a ball was kicked through the window.
A game involving running with a ball became popular at Rugby school in the 1830s and by the 1850s Rugby School football was spreading across the UK. In 1863, the Football Association was formed which formalised the rules of "soccer" (a late 19th Century Public School slang abbreviation of "association"), distinguishing it from "rugger".
In Cornwall, the Celtic sport of hurling was already popular and may be why rugby was so enthusiastically adopted in the 19th Century.
Crows are one of the more common birds on farmland such as this.
The collective noun for a group of crows is a "murder". The term has been traced back to around the 15th Century, originally as a murthre (which was a Middle English word that meant "murder"). It is thought that the expression may be based on crows scavenging carcasses.
The magpie is a member of the crow family and like other crows is omnivorous, feeding on pretty much anything it can find although it prefers high energy foods. Magpies spend most of their life in a 6 mile radius of where they were born and live in loose social groups. They will form gangs and use complex social strategies for hunting and tackling predators. Names for a group of magpies include a "tiding", "charm" and "chatter" (the latter reflecting their social communication).
According to folklore, it's unlucky to bring bluebells into a house and also unlucky to walk through bluebells as it was thought that the little bells would ring and summon fairies and goblins.
The first trees evolved about 360 million years ago which were a bit like tree versions of mosses. Seeds hadn't evolved at this point and so they reproduced via spores. After the arrival of the seed came conifers which were the dominant form of trees for nearly 200 million years. The flower evolved around 100 million years ago and following this, broadleaf trees appeared and eventually out-competed conifers in many habitats.
The streams on the route are all tributaries of the River Kennall which joins the Carnon River at the head of Restronguet Creek opposite Devoran.
A foundry, later known as the Hammer Mills, was in existence before 1811 and was last recorded working in 1889. The hammer in question is likely to have been a trip hammer (a metal weight raised by a waterwheel and then dropped under gravity) used to beat the softened metal into shape. The foundry manufactured (Cornish) shovels.
If there are sheep in the field and you have a dog, make sure it's securely on its lead (sheep are prone to panic and injuring themselves even if a dog is just being inquisitive). If the sheep start bleating, this means they are scared and they are liable to panic.
If there are pregnant sheep in the field, be particularly sensitive as a scare can cause a miscarriage. If there are sheep in the field with lambs, avoid approaching them closely, making loud noises or walking between a lamb and its mother, as you may provoke the mother to defend her young.
Sheep may look cute but if provoked they can cause serious injury (hence the verb "to ram"). Generally, the best plan is to walk quietly along the hedges and they will move away or ignore you.
The name buzzard is from mediaeval English buisart which itself came from the Old French word buson. It is based on the Latin word for hawk or falcon buteo hence its scientific name is Buteo buteo.
The Kennal Vale gunpowder mills were located in the woodland on the left at the bottom of the valley. The walk will take you down there shortly...
Gunpowder was discovered by accident by Chinese Alchemists attempting to make an elixir of life to render themselves immortal. A text from the 9th Century documented the event which quite literally backfired:
smoke and flames result, so that their hands and faces have been burnt, and even the whole house where they were working burned down.
German miners (whose traditional outfits now appear on garden gnomes) introduced the use of gunpowder for mine blasting in Cornwall in 1689 (as well as gnomes). This was first carried out in one of the mines of the Godolphin estate, quite possibly Great Work Mine.
Gunpowder represented a great technological breakthrough, as beforehand, rocks had to be cracked by heating and rapid cooling, or by soaking wooden wedges in water. An amount of granite that would take 6 days of work to break with a pick could be broken in one blast.
Gunpowder was imported into Cornwall until 1808 when the first Cornish gunpowder factory opened at Cosawes Wood, Perranarworthal, about 5 miles from Falmouth, followed by another at nearby Kennall Vale in 1813. By 1836, the consumption of this was considerable with 30 tonnes being used in Cornish mines. By the 1860s the three largest mills were in Kennall Vale, Herodsfoot and the infamous Trago Mills.
Secluded river valleys were chosen as the sites for gunpowder mills for their distance from population, shielding provided by trees and the availability of water power. In the event of an explosion, the trees also shielded the process buildings and storage magazines from one another, reducing the chance of a chain reaction. The roofs of the buildings were also designed to blow off relatively easily so the force from the explosion (and any fragments of occupants) would be vented upwards, minimising the damage to the building.
The reason that mills were required for gunpowder manufacture is that the finer the particles of the three ingredients, the more explosive the mixture. An ultra-fine dry dust would be far too dangerous both to manufacture or use so the ingredients were ground down into a fine paste using water. The paste was then broken into granules before being dried out. Any dust was removed from the granules as it would have been disastrous to have suspended particles of gunpowder within the air of a mine where metal tools and candles were being used. Finally, the dried granules were coated in graphite to make them flow more easily and also more water-resistant.
The Kennall Vale gunpowder factory was immediately successful and by 1819 it was thriving: "Here are situated waterwheels constantly employed, two of which keep 14 tons of marble constantly turning (three tons and a half in a block), making four to five thousand barrels of gunpowder annually; some of the mills have occasionally blown up, but no life has been lost; it employs a fine fall of water of eighty four feet".
The Kennall Vale Company continued to expand, eventually taking over the rival works at Cosawes Wood. By 1860, the company was employing about 50 men. When high explosives came onto the market in the 1880s, the factory declined and closed in the first decade of the 20th century.
Each stage of the multi-step process of gunpowder production was carried out in a different building. Each of the buildings dotted around the valley had a very specific role.
The first stone building on the left just after the fork in the path was the packing house where wooden casks were filled with the finished product.
The path to the left leads to an area overlooking the quarry pit.
The granite quarry was opened in the early 20th Century and the concrete buildings nearby are from this period (whereas the Victorian buildings for the manufacture of gunpowder are built from stone).
The building ahead in front of the wall was the Corning House where fragments of gunpowder "cake" were sieved into standard sizes using parchment meshes. The word "corning" was used as a synonym for "granulating".
The high brick wall behind this is a blast wall designed to contain any explosions.
The stone foundations of small building part-way up the valley to the left was where gunpowder granules were graded and dust was removed. It is thought that the main part of the building was built from wood.
Several small buildings dotted around the site were powder magazines for storing gunpowder. There were strict limits on how much gunpowder could be held within the main processing buildings so any extra was spread across these. These included the building to the right before the river and one higher up the valley to the left behind the dusting house.
The elevated structure that looks like it once spanned the river is the remains of a bridge. The building on the opposite side of the river from this was the glazing mill where the finished granules of gunpowder were rounded off and coated in graphite.
The tall buildings along the river were known as incorporating mills where the powdered ingredients were combined with water and ground into a paste of fine particles. The amount of water had to be carefully regulated as too much would wash away the soluble saltpetre and too little would leave a dry powder which would likely result in an explosion. This part of the process was the most dangerous and the reason there were so many incorporating mills is that the amount of gunpowder in each was strictly limited to reduce the size of explosions. The thick stone walls contrasted a light roof which was designed to allow the force of an explosion to be vented upwards.
The building just before the final junction was the change house where workers put on special woollen suits designed to avoid creating sparks.
The building beside the junction with the track was the mixing house where the ingredients were combined before being transferred to the incorporating mills.
The small stream is actually a leat that predates the gunpowder mills and was used to carry water through Ponsanooth to power the mills there. Look out for the mill-related names of buildings as you pass through Ponsanooth later on the walk.
As you make your way out of the reserve, you can trace the leat running below the track. The stream running beneath the track was also used to top up the leat. A metal sluice controls the amount of water retained in the leat and released into the stream below.
Kennall House was built some time before 1840 for the manager of the gunpowder works and is sheltered behind a natural rock outcrop from any explosions that occurred in the works. This area is now private property and includes some other remains of the gunpowder works. Outbuildings that have been converted include a foreman's office and a cooperage to make the barrels that the gunpowder was packed into. A large chimney also remains from the drying house where the tiny clumps of wet gunpowder paste dried out and hardened into granules.
The first recorded fatality at the mills was in 1826 when an old woman brought a basket of roast potatoes for the men working in the mixing house. A spark ignited the gunpowder mix and both the woman and one of the men were killed.
In May 1838 the spacing of the incorporating mills was found to be inadequate when there was a major series of explosions in which one man was seriously injured and another killed. A newspaper reported: "Five mills blew up in succession, and part of a roof was found a mile from the premises. The reports were most terrific and created the greatest alarm over an extensive tract of country". Future explosives works such as the National Explosives Works in Upton Towans were subsequently designed to avoid chain reactions such as this by isolating each building in a sand bunker within the dunes.
The West Briton in 1841 records that John Martin "was seen to go into the glossing mill to bring out some more powder, and presently afterwards the mill was blown up in the air with a tremendous explosion which was heard many miles around, and shook the houses a considerable distance off… The head of the deceased was discovered about a quarter of a mile from the spot, and other parts of his body were afterwards collected from different places."
The massive gain in efficiency by breaking rocks with explosives rather than hand tools resulted in increased profits for the mine owners but it was less good for the miners themselves. When gunpowder burns, it produces copious amounts of acidic sulphurous gasses which attack the respiratory system - far from ideal in the poorly-ventilated confined space of a mine. A quill or reed filled with gunpowder was used as a fuse which worked most of the time but burnt at an unpredictable rate, and burning material from the fuse could drop and prematurely ignite the main body of gunpowder. Consequently there were many horrific accidents and fatalities.
In 1830, William Bickford devised a way of making blasting safer, based on his observations of the activities of a rope maker. His safety fuse consisted of a core of gunpowder surrounded by twisted yarns, bound in twine and sealed with tar to make it waterproof. Since gunpowder contains everything it needs to burn without the need for oxygen from the air, it would burn reliably inside its waterproof container at a predictable rate of 30 seconds per foot.
During winter, from November to March, winter heliotrope is visible along the edges of roads and paths as carpets of rounded heart-shaped leaves.
The leaf shape of winter heliotrope is similar to its close relative butterbur, but the leaf edges are more rounded than butterbur and the leaves are evergreen whereas butterbur puts up flowers before it has any leaves. Both plants spread via rhizomes (underground stems) and their broad leaves can crowd out other plants making them potentially invasive.
Bamboo is a member of the grass family. Like grass, it can spread through underground stems. This combined with its dense growth makes it able to out-compete many other species. The largest species of bamboo can grow over 100ft tall!
The Ramblers Association and National Farmers Union suggest some "dos and don'ts" for walkers which we've collated with some info from the local Countryside Access Team.
Do
Don't
The Romans used to soak bandages in daisy juice as an antiseptic for sword wounds. Other common names include bruisewort and woundwort which also imply use for treatment of injuries.
The word "stile" is based on an Old English word stigel for ladder. This in turn came from an old Germanic word stig meaning "to climb" and the word "stair" also came from this.
Conversely, the word "style" (now used for fashion etc. but originally for literary style or a writing tool i.e. stylus) is from French origins (naturally!). This came from an Old French word stile, derived from the Latin stilus. It's thought the "i" might have been changed to a "y" for snob value to be more like the (unrelated) Greek word stylos (for pillar).
Whilst moles look a little like mice, they are not rodents and are highly adapted to digging and living in tunnels. Using their curved claws, they can dig 15 feet of tunnel in an hour and typically extend their network by around 60 ft per day. Moles also have twice as much blood as mammals of a similar size and a special form of haemoglobin that allow them to tolerate high levels of carbon dioxide in the low-oxygen environment within their tunnels.
The Tremenhere longstone is nearly 10ft tall and thought to date from the Bronze Age. There is an iron peg in the stone which is somewhat more recent. Being located fairly close to the farm house, this was a handy spot to attach the other end of a washing line! The name Tremenhere was first recorded in 1297 and means "longstone farm".
There are nearly 400 miles of public bridleway in Cornwall, marked with blue waymarks, which are also open to horses and cyclists, although there is no obligation to make them navigable by any means other than on foot.
Celandine flowers close each night and open each morning. This is controlled by a circadian rhythm, so they really are "going to sleep" at night and "waking up in the morning". It is likely that this has arisen to protect the internals of the flowers from any frost during the night as they begin flowering in March when frosts are still common.
Hawthorn's red berries, also known as haws, are abundant in September and October. These are an important winter food for birds such as thrushes and small mammals such as dormice and wood mice.
In sheltered places, hawthorn trees can reach 20-40ft in height and live up to 400 years. In harsher environments such as the coast and moors they can be as little as 5-6ft tall.
When you reach Velandrucia Bridge at the bottom of the valley before Stithians, the road crosses over two streams. The second is the River Kennall and the first was a mill leat for Tregonning Mill situated further upstream. The first part of the name "Vellandruicia" is probably derived from the Cornish for "the mill" an velyn.
The first record of the settlement of Stithians is from 1268. The name is thought to derive from the name of the female saint to whom the church is dedicated.
Around 400 million years ago, green algae made its way from the sea to the land and the first liverworts appeared. These ancient, very simple plants are still around today. DNA studies suggest that all land plants and mosses may have originally evolved from early liverworts.
Liverworts are found in damp, shady places but form flat structures that almost resemble soft corals. Their name is based on the appearance of the leaves which was thought to resemble an animal liver. Like mosses, liverworts don't produce flowers but instead reproduce via spores.
Most primroses tend to be pale yellow but in residential areas, extensive hybridisation occurs with pink and purple garden primulas to create all kinds of weird and wonderful mutants, with some even shaped like cowslips. However, there is a pale pink variety of primrose (known as rhubarb and custard) that is thought to be a naturally-occurring variant of the pale yellow (rhubarb-free) version as it has been found miles away from any domestic plants.
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