The Preaching Pit at St Newlyn East is a terraced outdoor gathering place, formed in an old quarry and used for Methodist services. It is a historic auditorium, not a prehistoric stone circle or an established Druidic site.
The terraces could accommodate a substantial crowd. Local accounts connect the place with the community affected by the East Wheal Rose flood of 1846, while other records describe later stages of its development and use. Those dates need not all refer to the same moment of construction.
Its story is about people deliberately making space to gather. The ancient enclosure at Hay Close is a separate site nearby, with a much earlier archaeological history. Similar shapes do not make them the same kind of place.
Where it is
St Newlyn East Preaching Pit
50.366621, -5.06083 · Position source: https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1141454
Listed preaching pit, NHLE grid SW8242156338
Visiting and access
A location reference, not confirmation of public access or a visitor entrance.
Sources
Source: https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1141454 Source: https://cornishstory.com/2021/03/31/mapping-methodism-st-newlyn-east-preaching-pit/
Connected subjects
Read on
- The Ancient Circle That Isn’t — and the Ancient Circle That Is
St Newlyn East’s Preaching Pit looks ancient. Hay Close really is. Their different histories reveal how the same landscape kept finding new reasons to gather people together.