Zennor

Zennor sits on the north Cornish cliff-coast between St Ives and St Just, a place of granite walls, ancient field systems, and weather that comes in hard off the Atlantic. The church of Saint Senara contains one of the most famous pieces of wood-carving in Cornwall: a medieval bench-end showing a mermaid holding a comb and a mirror, cut at least six hundred years ago.

The legend attached to it runs like this: for years a beautiful and richly dressed woman came to the church at Zennor to hear a young man named Matthew Trewhella sing. She came and went without anyone learning her name or where she lived. Then she came no more — and Matthew was gone with her. Neither was seen again on land.

A ship anchoring in Pendour Cove some time later was hailed by a mermaid, who asked the captain to raise his anchor because it was blocking the door of her home — she needed to get back to her children and to Matthew. The anchor was weighed, the ship moved, and the mermaid dove below the surface. Ships in the cove are said to sometimes hear Trewhella's voice rising from the water, still singing.