Tintagel Head

Tintagel Head, a cliff 300 feet high on the western coast of Cornwall, about 22 miles W. of Launceston, and but 6 miles from Camelford—the Camelot of Arthurian legend. Partly on the mainland and partly on the so-called island, almost cut off by a deep chasm from the rest of the promontory, stand the imposing ruins of the castle where King Arthur held his court. His spirit still hovers around the scene of his splendour in the form of the red-legged chough, a beautiful Cornish bird already rare in Leland's time. The oldest part of the existing ruins is the keep, apparently of Norman construction, but there need hardly be a doubt that a Saxon, and perhaps earlier a British stronghold occupied the same site. The castle was still habitable in 1360, when we read of its being provisioned.