28/09/2026
This weekend we took a stank up to Mulfra Quoit, one of those wonderfully atmospheric corners of West Cornwall where you can stand beside a great granite monument and wonder what on earth was happening here thousands of years ago.
Mulfra is a Neolithic portal dolmen, probably dating to around 3500–2500 BC - a burial and ceremonial monument built by people living in Kernow thousands of years ago.
The great capstone has fallen, but the surviving upright stones and traces of the surrounding cairn still give us a remarkable glimpse of a prehistoric landscape.
this area is one of the few places around West Cornwall where we can see two bodies of water at the same time... the English Channel and the Celtic Sea!
But, as so often happens on a Kernow Tour, the conversation took an unexpected turn.
One friend spotted a rather beautiful little purple flower growing nearby and asked what it was.
Devil’s-bit Scabious.
And what a name.
Its scientific name is Succisa pratensis, and the curious name comes from its root. Instead of continuing neatly downwards, the root appears abruptly truncated — almost as though something has taken a bite out of it.
According to an old piece of folklore, that something was the Devil.
The story goes that he was rather annoyed by the plant’s supposed medicinal powers and, in a fit of infernal jealousy, bit off part of the root. The plant survived, but ever since has carried the evidence of his teeth. The Latin succisa means roughly “cut off underneath”.
And our ancestors certainly thought this little plant was worth having around.
Historical herbalists used Devil’s-bit Scabious for an astonishing range of ailments. It was traditionally associated with treating coughs, fevers, skin complaints and inflammations, and was regarded in some traditions almost as a cure-all. Nicholas Culpeper wrote about it in the 17th century, while earlier herbal traditions attributed still more remarkable powers to the plant.
It also has a rather more pleasant modern claim to fame: those pincushion-like violet-blue flowers are an important source of nectar for bees and other insects, and the plant can flower well into autumn — a useful late-season meal when many other flowers have already disappeared.
And there we were.
We had come to admire a monument built perhaps five and a half thousand years ago, and ended up discussing a small purple flower that our ancestors believed the Devil himself had tried to destroy.
THAT'S the joy of Cornwall / KERNOW!
You never quite know where the next story is going to come from....
