Looe Island
| Looe Island | |
 Looe Island | |
|---|---|
| Location | |
| Location: | 50°20’12"N, 4°27’7"W |
| Grid reference: | SX256514 |
| Area: | 22½ acres |
| Data | |
| Population: | Uninhabited |
Looe Island, , also known as St George's Island, and historically St Michael's Island is a small island a mile off the coast of Cornwall, opposite the little town of Looe.
There was once a monastery here, and the Cornish name has been given as Enys Lann-Managh, meaning 'Island of the monk's enclosure'. Some scholars suggest the island could be as Ictis, the tidal island described by Diodorus Siculus as a centre for the tin trade in pre-Roman Britain, though Mount Batten opposite Plymouth has made the same claim.
The island is now owned and managed by the Cornwall Wildlife Trust, a conservation charity. The Trust carefully manages the island for the benefit of wildlife and landing is only permitted with a boatman authorised by the Cornwall Wildlife Trust. The waters around the island are a marine nature reserve[1] and form part of the Looe Voluntary Marine Conservation Area [2] (VMCA). First established in 1995, the Looe VCMA covers nearly three miles of coastline[3] and aims to protect the coastal and marine wildlife around Looe.
History
People have been living on Looe Island since the Iron Age. Evidence of early habitation includes pieces of Roman amphorae as well as stone boat anchors and Roman coins.[4] In the Dark Ages, the island was used a seat of early Christian settlement: the monks soon picked up on the popular imagination to claim that Jesus as a child come here with Joseph of Arimathea, which story seemed to do them no financial harm: the island became a place of pilgrimage for early Christians. A small thatched roofed chapel was built there during this time.
In the later Middle Ages, the island came under the overall control of Glastonbury Abbey, with the Prior of Lammana directly responsible for its governance. The island's chapel was under the care of two Benedictine monks until 1289 when the property was sold to a local landowner. The priory was replaced by a domestic chapel served by a secular priest[5] until the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1536 when it became property of the Crown.
From the 13th to the 16th centuries the island was known as St Michael's Island but after the Dissolution of the Monasteries, it was rededicated in 1594 as St George's Island.[6]
Through the 17th and 18th centuries the island was a popular haunt for smugglers avoiding the Government's revenue cutters out of Plymouth and Falmouth. The Old Guildhall Museum in Looe hold information and research about the smuggling families of Looe Island and information is also available the more recent publications about the island.
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 0-245-52940-3) and its sequel Tales From Our Cornish Island (1986, ISBN 0-245-54265-5). 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.
Babs Atkins bequeathed the island on her death to the Cornwall Wildlife Trust to be preserved as a nature reserve in perpetuity. The adjoining islet, formerly known as Little Island, now renamed 'Trelawny Island' and connected by a small bridge, was bequeathed by Miss Atkins back to the Trelawny family, who previously owned Looe Island from 1743 to 1921.[7] The full history of the island is explained at length in Island Life: A History of Looe Island, published in 2006, and the role of the island today is briefly described in Looe Island Then and Now published in 2014.
Geography
Situated in the English Channel and bathed in the Gulf Stream, lying about one mile from East Looe in the direction of Polperro, it is about 22½ acres in area and a mile in circumference. Its highest point is 154 feet above mean sea level.
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 extremely low spring tides it is possible for the journey to be made by foot across the slippery, seaweed covered rocky sea floor. However you have to remain on the beach and promptly head back to the mainland.
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 places of worship of the Roman period 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.[8]
Outside links
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("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Looe Island) |
References
- ↑ "Looe Island Nature Reserve". Cornwall Wildlife Trust. http://www.cornwallwildlifetrust.org.uk/nature_reserves/where_to_find_the_nature_reserves_1/looe_island_nature_reserve/looe_island_nature_reserve/. Retrieved 31 October 2015.
- ↑ "Looe Voluntary Marine Conservation Area". Looe Marine Conservation Group. http://looemarineconservation.org/conservation/looe-vmca-area/. Retrieved 31 October 2015.
- ↑ "Looe VMCA map". Cornwall Wildlife Trust. http://www.cornwallwildlifetrust.org.uk/Resources/Cornwall%20Wildlife%20Trust/PDF%20Documents/Looe_Voluntary_Marine_Conservation_Area_map.pdf. Retrieved 31 October 2015.
- ↑ 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
- ↑ Weatherhill, Craig, Place Names in Cornwall and Scilly, Wessex Books, 2005
- ↑ Looe Island Then And Now Clarke, Carolyn United pc Verlag ISBN 3710310466 p12
- ↑ Dawe, Kevin (2004). Island musics. pp. 207–208. Berg Publishers ISBN 978-1-85973-703-3.
Books
- Looe Island Then and Now: Carolyn Clarke 2014 United P. C Publisher ISBN 978-3-7103-1046-1
- The Looe Island Story: an Illustrated History of St George's Island, Mike Dunn, 2006, Polperro Heritage Press, ISBN 978-0-9549137-2-4
- Island Life: A History of Looe Island, David Clensy, 2006 ISBN 978-1-4116-8917-6
- We Bought an Island: Evelyn E Atkins 1976 ISBN 0-340-22688-9
- Tales from our Cornish Island: Evelyn E Atkins 0-340-22688-9
