This autumn will see an exciting four-week archaeological excavation taking place near Bodmin, which hopes to uncover a possible hidden stone circle at a unique prehistoric ritual site called Castilly Henge.
Not all henges contain stone circles, and there is only one other known to survive in Cornwall.
The project is a collaboration between the Cornwall Archaeological Society, the Cornwall Heritage Trust and Historic England.
To give people the chance to learn more about this fascinating monument and the important questions the dig will target about its character, date and potential later reuse, this month the project hosted the first in a series of free community talks with Dr Olaf Bayer, Senior Archaeological Investigator at Historic England.
Over 100 people joined us for the talk, which took place at Roche Victory Hall. Thank you to everyone who came along – we hope you enjoyed learning about Castilly Henge!
The excavation is being funded by Historic England. Outreach for the project, which includes this free talk, has been made possible by a £42,990 grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund and a £10,000 grant from Historic England.
This project is a collaboration between…
We will be hosting the second talk in this series via Zoom on Thursday 4th September 2025 from 6pm – 7pm.
The talk will be repeated at one additional venue local to the excavation site during the next few months. Full details to follow.
Cornwall Heritage Trust has recently launched a fundraising appeal to rescue and secure the future of Castilly Henge.
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We are hoping to raise £50,000 towards the acquisition of the monument and have so far raised over £10,000 thanks to the generous support of nearly 100 donors. We cannot thank them enough.
We still have some way to go to reach our target, so if you can donate, we would be hugely grateful. Every penny makes a huge difference and is vital in helping us to rescue Castilly Henge, secure its future through active management and enable the public to visit it for free all year round.
