Merry Maidens

Standing stones known as the Merry Maidens, lie Southeast of St Buryan, and are thought to date back to the Bronze Age. The circle consists of regular spaced granite stones, most under four feet in height.

Legend suggests that they are the remains of nineteen young women who danced on the Sabbath, and were turned into stone. Two tall granite monoliths (thirteen and fifteen feet high) in the nearby fields are referred to as the pipers, and are thought to be the musicians who supplied the music. There are many such petrification legends in Britain.

The stones were dowsed by the late Tom Lethbridge, he is said to have received a mild electric shock from one of the stones.

Directions: The stones are in a field off the B3315.