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Summary

A chapel of St Nighton referred to in 1470 and 1503 and described c1600.

Protected Status: None recorded

Other References/Statuses

• National Monuments Record: SW 85 NW 8
• National Record of the Historic Environment to Historic Environment Records data transfer
• National Record of the Historic Environment: 429002
• OS No. (OS Quarter-sheet and OS No.): SW85NW 8
• Primary Record No. (1985-2009): 25042
• SMR No. (OS Quarter-sheet and SMR No.): SW85NW 4

Monument Type(s):

• CHAPEL (Medieval - 1066 AD to 1539 AD)

Full description

Site of the Medieval St Nighton's Chapel. Henderson (1, 2) undertook detailed historical research, as well as extensive fieldwork, but was unable to identify remains of the chapel beyond a possile altar slab at Rejerrah.

Documentary references to chapel are limited to small bequests to the store of St Nectan in 1470 and 1503, with the main source of information being Roscanock, writing in c. 1600. He recorded that chapel had a yard, in the northwest corner of which were four small stones on a little mound or hill, where the crosses and relics of St Piran, St Crantocke, St Cuthbert, and St Newlyn were placed in the Rogation week until the time of Queen Mary. One stone was removed in 1580, and made into a cheese press, but later returned. All traces and traditions of the chapel were lost after Roscarrock's time, but it is mentioned as a boundary point in the bounds of the parishes of Crantock (1613) and Cubert (1630).

Road improvements in the area identified by Henderson led to a small rescue excavation in 1968, identifying the probably western end of the chapel building. Finds included slates, mortar and fragments of pottery ridge tiles, the letter suggesting a C14 or early C15 date (3, 4). Unfortunately the site was never fully published.

In 1970, the OS surveyor found that the site of the chapel is now overlain by a new road (5).

<1> Henderson, C, 1955-60, Ecclesiastical Antiquities of the 109 parishes of West Cornwall & Ecclesiastical History of the 4 Western Hundreds, (NS) VOL 32, 367-369 (Article in Journal). SCO3499.

<2> Henderson, C, 1914, Notebooks of Parochial Antiquities, VOL 1, 443-445 (Unpublished document). SCO3503.

<3> Anon, 1968, Excavation News 1967-1968: St Nighton's Chapel, Newlyn East, VOL 7, 83 (Article in Journal). SCO718.

<4> Thomas, AC, 1968, Title Unknown (Article in Serial). SCO7993.

<5> Field Investigator's Comments, OS/Fletcher, MJ. 1970 (Survey). SCO29739.

<6> Adams, JH, 1972, The Medieval Chapels of Cornwall (Unpublished document). SCO2720.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events

• ECO1242 - St Nighton's Chapel, Newlyn East: Excavation, 1968
• ECO3662 - Trelaske Farm wind turbine, Cubert: Assessment, 2012 (Ref: 2012R056)

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