Looe Island
Looe Island, also known as St George's Island, and historically St Michael's Island is a small island a mile from the mainland town of Looe in Cornwall, United Kingdom.
According to local legend, Joseph of Arimathea landed here with the child Christ.[citation needed] Others[who?] have identified the island as Ictis, the location described by Diodorus Siculus as a centre for the tin trade in pre-Roman Britain.
The waters around the island are a marine nature reserve[1] owned by Cornwall Wildlife Trust and form part of the Looe Voluntary Marine Conservation Area (VMCA).[2] First established in 1995, the Looe VCMA covers nearly 5 km of coastline[3] and aims to protect the coastal and marine wildlife around Looe.
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[edit] History
People have been coming to the island since the Iron Age. Evidence of early habitation includes pieces of Roman amphora as well as stone boat anchors.[4] In the Dark Ages, the island was used a seat of early Christian settlement. There was a chapel and dwellings.
In the later Medieval period, the island came under the control of Glastonbury Abbey. Lammana Priory was a priory on the island consisting of two Benedictine monks until 1289. It was owned by Glastonbury Abbey and the property was sold in 1289 to a local landowner. The priory was replaced by a chapel served by a secular priest[5] until the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1536 when it became property of the Crown.
Through the 17th and 18th centuries the island was a popular haunt for smugglers avoiding the British government's revenue cutters out of Plymouth and Falmouth.
In the 20th century, Looe island was owned (and inhabited) by two sisters, Babs and Evelyn Atkins, who wrote two books: We Bought An Island (1976, ISBN 0245529403) and its sequel Tales From Our Cornish Island (1986, ISBN 0245542655). They chronicle the purchase of the island and what it was like to live there. Evelyn died in 1997 at the age of 87; Babs continued to live on the island until her death in 2004, at the age of 86. On her death, the island was made a bequest to the Cornwall Wildlife Trust; it will be preserved as a nature reserve in perpetuity.
[edit] Geography
It is about 22.5 acres (9 ha) in area and a mile (1.6 km) in circumference. Its highest point is 47 metres (154 ft) above sea level. The island, like much of south west England, has a mild climate with frost and snow being rare.
The island is owned and managed by a charity, the Cornwall Wildlife Trust. This is a non-profit making venture, the landing fees and other income being devoted to conserving the island's natural beauty and providing facilities. The island is open during the summer to day visitors arriving by the Trust's boat. After a short welcome talk visitors are directed to the small visitor centre from where they can pick up a copy of the self-guided trail. Visitors have some two hours on the Island and all trips are subject to tides and weather/sea state. While it is normally accessible only by the Cornwall Wildlife Trust's boat, at low spring tides it is possible for the journey to be made by foot across the rocky sea floor.
[edit] Media appearances
In 2008, Channel 4's archaeology series Time Team visited the island to carry out an investigation into its early Christian history. They excavated the sites of Christian chapels built on both the island and on the mainland opposite. During their dig they found the remains of a Benedictine chapel that was built in c.1139 by monks from Glastonbury Abbey, a reliquary, graves and the remains of much earlier Romano-British chapels built of wood with dating evidence suggesting use by Christians before the reign of Constantine the Great.
In 1994/95 Andrew Hugill composed Island Symphony, an electro-acoustic piece utilising sampled sounds sourced over the net plus recorded natural sounds from the island itself.[6]
[edit] Further reading
- The Looe Island Story: an Illustrated History of St George's Island, Mike Dunn, 2005, Polperro Heritage Press, ISBN 978-0954913724[7]
- Island Life: A History of Looe Island, David Clensy, 2006. ISBN 978-1-4116-8917-8
- We Bought an Island. Evelyn E. Atkins, 1976. ISBN 0-340-22688-9
[edit] References
- ^ "St George's Island marine nature reserve". Cornwall Wildlife Trust. http://www.cornwallwildlifetrust.org.uk/nature_reserves/where_to_find_the_nature_reserves_1/st_georges_island/St_Georges_Island/. Retrieved 2010-08-07.
- ^ "Discovering the Wonders of Looe's Marine Heritage". Cornwall Wildlife Trust. http://www.cornwallwildlifetrust.org.uk/conservation/livingseas/yourshore/Discovering_the_Wonders_of_Looe_Marine_Heritage_Cornwall_Wildlife_Trust.htm. Retrieved 2010-08-07.
- ^ "Looe VMCA map". Caradon District Council. http://www.cornwallwildlifetrust.org.uk/Resources/Cornwall%20Wildlife%20Trust/PDF%20Documents/Looe_Voluntary_Marine_Conservation_Area_map.pdf. Retrieved 2010-08-07.
- ^ http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/T/timeteam/2009/looe/index.html Time Team Site report
- ^ Orme, Nicholas (2007) Cornwall and the Cross. Chichester: Phillimore; pp. 30-31, 35, 38
- ^ Dawe, Kevin (2004). Island musics. pp. 207–208. Berg Publishers ISBN 9781859737033.
- ^ The Looe Island Story: An Illustrated History of St. George's Island
[edit] External links
- Cornwall Wildlife Trust
- Smuggling history
- Map sources for Looe Island
