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THE RUDE STONE MONUMENTS OF CORNWALL. 



By R. N. worth, F.G.S., Cor. Mem. 



Preliminary. 



Althougli so mucli has been said and written on the 

 fascinating topic of the Eude Stone Monuments of Cornwall, 

 the subject is very far from being exhausted. Indeed it cannot 

 be said, even after centuries of more or less accurate observation 

 and investigation, that all the materials are yet to hand. True, 

 most of these monuments have long been known. True that, 

 for the most part, they have been carefully examined and 

 described. Still, fresh facts and illustrations are always coming 

 to light ; and there are directions in which further research 

 seems likely to be fruitful of very important results. 



Under the head of Eude Stone Monuments, for the present 

 purpose I include : 1 — stone circles ; 2 — menhirs ; 3 — kistvaens ; 

 4 — cromlechs or dolmens ; 5 — holed stones. Of the large stone 

 circles and of cromlechs, Cornwall contains more examples than 

 any other county in England. Whether it possesses also examples 

 of the stone rows, which are more common on Dartmoor than in 

 any other part of the world, so far as is known to the antiquary, 

 is a point as yet unsettled. 



My special object is to endeavour to ascertain, as far as may 

 be, what these monuments have to say for themselves. There 

 have been abundant speculations, a most plentiful crop of 

 hypotheses, a wideness and wildness of suggestion often 

 bordering upon the ridiculous. Many a plausible theory has 

 rested on no sounder basis than an erroneous description, or 

 the insistance on the essential character of an isolated peculiarity. 

 There has been too great readiness, also, to press into service 

 traditions which by no conceivable means could be made to 

 synchronise ; to regard statements as authoritative which merely 

 embodied the guesses of writers, far removed from us, indeed, in 

 point of antiquity, but having no more direct knowledge of the 

 true facts than ourselves. 



