Our Cornish journey starts in an ancient tropical ocean south of the equator where primitive fish swim in the warm waters and deserts stretch north across England and Europe. At this time you can walk to America. On the horizon the African Super-Continent slowly moves towards us as volcanoes erupt ash and lava.
Gradually the ocean floor is squeezed away and the Lizard emerges. Further north, Coal Measure swamps and deltas form. Continents collide over a period of 80 million years, buckling the strata. If we could stretch the rocks out flat again Cornwall would be 300 miles long.
Cornwall becomes part of Pangea and hot granites from inside the earth rise and cool to form the backbone of Cornwall. On their margins veins rich in tin and copper await the arrival of man 250 million years later.
Warm seas lap our Cornubian Caribbean island while dinosaurs roam the landmass further east. The Altantic Ocean finally opens up as Cornwall continues its journey northwards. Chalk and flint are deposited in the clear waters and a mass extinction event wipes out the dinosaurs and many other species, just 60 million years before the present time.
Sea levels fluctuate again and West Penwith becomes an island. Beaches form at St Erth and St Agnes Beacon. Ice sheets then move southwards, they miss Cornwall but there are icebergs offshore.
Sea level drops over 300 feet and it would be possible to walk to France. Man appears and is faced with tundra conditions including permafrost, cave dwellings, wolves and bears.
What has changed since? The ice sheets melted, river valleys flooded and the English Channel cuts us off from Europe. Erosion and weathering shape the Cornish landscape and form our magnificent coastline. Man discovers the mineral legacy of our rocks which give us mines, mineral wealth, building stones and china clay. Cornish inventors push back the frontiers of science and discovery and poets, writers and artists are inspired.
