Case file · Fairy lore
The knockers of the Cornish tin mines
Cornish and Devon miners told of knockers: small, big-headed, whiskered beings in miners' clothes who knocked on the rock to lead men to rich tin lodes or to warn of a coming collapse.
1800 CE · 50.15, -5.68 · status: legend
The account
Miners left the last bite of their pasty for them and avoided whistling or swearing underground. The knockers were variously said to be the ghosts of men killed in the mines or of medieval miners. The Welsh equivalent is the coblyn.
The sceptical view
Knocking sounds in mines have physical causes: creaking timbers, settling rock and water. Folklorists see the beliefs as a way of coping with danger and as safety lore.
Connections in the atlas
- Tommyknockers of American mines
- Coblynau of the Welsh mines
- Agricola's mine demons
- Kobolds and the naming of cobalt