stay guide cornwall

brought to you by
   

Chysauster, near St Just

On a rugged landscape filled with wildflowers and heather, 2.5 miles north-west of Penzance, lies a small section of the once-great Roman settlement of Chysauster. Many of the stone walls remain nearly in full height; with a bit of imagination you can picture what life would have been like in prehistoric Cornwall. The original inhabitants of the site lived here 2,000 years ago, so its streets are some of Britain's oldest. The village consisted of eight stone-walled homesteads known as courtyard houses, which are only found on the Land's End peninsula and the Isles of Scilly. Each house had an open central courtyard surrounded by a number of rooms roofed with turf or thatch. As with other Roman stone-walled settlements, Chysauster was built within view of a hillfort, to which it may have had a subservient relationship, or was used by the villagers who went there for markets, sanctuary or festivities. Little more is known but it is thought the inhabitants only stayed here for 100 years.

Address: St Just