Traditions and Hearthside Stories of West Cornwall, Second SeriesBottrell, William
General
Traditions and Hearthside Stories of West Cornwall, Second Series
Bottrell, William
Cornwall (England : County) -- Social life and customs; Legends -- England -- Cornwall (County)
A few years ago, a person digging close to the Tolven, discovered
a pit in which were fragments of pottery, arranged in
circular order, the whole being covered by a flat slab of stone.
Imagining that he had disturbed some mysterious place, with
commendable reverence he immediately filled up the pit again.
Taking the proximity of the barrow in connection with the pit,[282]
it seems most probable that the Tolven is a sepulchral monument,
stones of this kind being erected perhaps to a peculiar class of
personages.
It is well known that the Circle is an ancient symbol of
eternity, and it was sometimes adopted as typical of Deity itself.
The triangular form of the stone may not be accidental. The
holed stones at Madron also form part of a triangular arrangement.
Whether a significant connection was intended in this
union of the circle and the triangle is perhaps worthy of consideration.
Though holed stones are sometimes found near what
are termed Druidic Circles, I perceive no traces of monuments
of that description near the Tolven. The holed stones at
Kenidjac, St. Just, are near ancient circles; and the two holed
stones at Bolleit are not more than 100 yards from the well-known
stone circle, called 'Dawns Myin.'"
[283]
The Garrack Zans (Holy Rock.)
Within the memory of many persons now living, there was to
be seen, in the town-places of many western villages, an unhewn
table-like stone called the Garrack Zans. This stone was the
usual meeting place of the villagers, and regarded by them as
public property. Old residents in Escols have often told me of one
which stood near the middle of that hamlet on an open space where
a maypole was also erected. This Garrack Zans they described
as nearly round, about three feet high, and nine in diameter, with
a level top. A bonfire was made on it and danced around at Midsummer.
When petty offences were committed by unknown persons,
those who wished to prove their innocence, and to discover the
guilty, were accustomed to light a furse-fire on the Garrack Zans;
each person who assisted took a stick of fire from the pile, and
those who could extinguish the fire in their sticks, by spitting on
them, were deemed innocent; if the injured handed a fire-stick
to any persons, who failed to do so, they were declared guilty.
Most evenings young persons, linked hand in hand, danced
around the Garrack Zans, and many old folks passed round it
nine times daily from some notion that it was lucky and good
against witchcraft.
The stone now known as Table-mên was called the Garrack
Zans by old people of Sennen.
If our traditions may be relied on, there was also in Treen a
large one, around which a market was held in days of yore, as
mentioned at page 77.
There was a Garrack Zans in Sowah only a few years since,
and one may still be seen in Roskestal, St. Levan.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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