A Cornish Bestiary

Did you hear about the Redruth girl who vomited snails? Or how the saint of Gunwalloe saved his sister’s eye from a goose? Can you cure warts with a slug, or whooping cough with spiders? Sea serpents and bear-dogs, giant birds and bigfoots, devil-fish and sea ghosts – these are the beasts that haunt the landscape of Cornwall. In this book of bizarre beasts you’ll find familiar faunal favourites like the red-eyed Owlman of Mawnan Smith and the Beast of Bodmin Moor as well as Camborne’s Frog King and Ladock’s feathered fiend, plagues of flies and octopuses and shoals of Holy fish. You’ll find beavers and boars, rhymes for curing adder bites and the reason we feed pasties to snails. This compendium of Cornwall’s most curious creatures brings together stories from natural history and folklore, broadside ballads and news reports, celebrating the wonderful stories we share with the animals around us.