Visited 11.4.10.
Across the road from Lanyon Quoit - not visible from the road. There is no public right of way to the site so I had to do a 'sneaky' to get a look!
As you drive from Lanyon quoit towards Lanyon farm you go through a hairpin bend. On the left in the middle of the bend is a farm gate - park here. I entered the field and walked, half- crouched (not to be seen from farm) following the right hand side field boundry hedge. When you get to the far right hand side corner of the field the quoit is visible to the right - a couple of hundred yards away, across a couple of fields. It is approx 150 metres from the field gate to the corner of the field where the quoit is visible from.
Managed to get here last Friday, on a glorious day (heavy rain was forecast but never appeared).
Builders were working on the farm buildings, the first time in many vists that I've seen anyone here. I asked them for permission to visit, they thought I wanted Chun, or Lanyon Quoit. As the farmer wasn't around, and I had a copy of the map from Magic, they were happy for me to whizz across and take a look.
Into the field to the right of the farmhouse, and over the gate to the rear. On into the next field back from the farm (another gate), then turn right to the bottom of the long field. Over the last gate, and the quoit remains are in the field. Basically, two large stones, one leant against the other with many packing stones at the base.
Magic shows a 'settlement' in the corner of this field also, but before I could investigate, a brief shower started up. As I was carrying my camera without a bag, I hurried back to the car before it could get too soaked.
This is a bit of a cheat really, as we didn't actually make it to West Lanyon Quiot. We had been at Lanyon at the end of a loooong day (with "stone virgins" in tow, not quite as enthusiastic as we were when it comes to walking across even more fields to look at old stones!) and were about to head back to Perranporth when we decided it was worth just having a "quick look" for this site.
We left the others in the cars and head towards the field opposite from Lanyon (cross the road and head to the far corner where there is a farm gate). Stood on the gateway and tried to work out where it may be and the pull was just too strong, so over the gate and into the field. At the far end of the field were some pretty big stones, built into a wall, so we headed over and as we climbed up it, we spotted West Lanyon, about 3 fields away.
It looked lovely, the capstone fallen but still impressive. Unfortunately 2 of the fields had bullocks in them and the combination distance + bullocks + tired friends waiting in the cars = abandoned trip! Hopefully, I will be back down to Cornwall in the not-too-distant future and will get to see this site up close....
"The person who pulled down this cromlech is said to have brought a number of misfortunes about him in consequence; thus his cattle died and crops failed, which left a warning impression on the minds of his neighbours."
From an 1861 source quoted in Grinsell's 'Folklore of Prehistoric Sites in Britain'.
Within a tumulus 3 1/2 miles (by the map) N.W. by W. of Penzance, and in the parish of Madron, a Cromleh [sic] was discovered in 1790, of which the following account, by the late Rev. Malachi Hitchins, was published in the Archaeologia:-
"The gentleman who owns the estate of Lanyon, happening to be overtaken by a shower, took shelter behind a bank of earth and stones; and remarking that the earth was rich, he sent his servants to carry it off, when having removed near one hundred cart-loads, they observed the supporters of a cromleh, from which the covering stone was slipped off on the south side, but still leaning against them."
This covering-stone is about 13 1/2 feet long by 10 1/2 broad. The south supporter, on which it still leans, is 6 feet high and 5 wide: that on the west is nearly of the same height and about 9 feet wide. The east supporter (since cleft and carried away) was 10 1/2 feet wide, and , with the other two, formed almost a triangular kistvaen with a space of about a foot, at the north end, uninclosed.
"As soon as the gentleman observed it to be a cromleh, he ordered his men to dig under it, where they soon found a broken urn with ashes; and going deeper they found half a scull, the thigh bones, and most of the other bones of a human body, lying in such a manner as fully proved that the grave had been opened before, and the flat stones which formed the grave had been all removed out of their places."
The quote comes from Archaeologia v14. The other remarks are from a piece in the 1851 Penzance Nat. Hist. and Antiq. Soc. Transactions.
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