Bodmin Heritage Day

The Riding Weekend dates back to the 15th Century and and Riding Sunday still takes place where the Mayor and Officers attend the Riding Service in St Petroc’s Church.

Heritage Day takes place on the first Saturday of July. It is a celebration which can keep you busy for the whole day. Please try to get a programme which gives you details of all the events.

At 10 AM the Ragadaziow sight the beast of Bodmin and they order the Helliers to give chase. The rest of the day will be spent with the Ragadaziow visiting the pubs in Bodmin performing mummers plays at the pubs showing the trial of the beast. The Helliers can also be seen chasing around the town with the beast visiting lots of pubs.

During the day we have events taking place around Bodmin. In Fore Street there will be stalls selling a wide variety of items together with a few games. At the bottom of Fore Street is the Mount Folly where there is entertainment across the day, please see the programme. Crossing to the car park there is a Craft Fair in the Shire House Suite together with a chance of having a cup of tea. In the car park is a Food Festival. This gives you the opportunity of buying food to take home but it also offers a wide range of foods to consume on site. Beyond the food festival there is a large children’s area with entertainment and activities which always offers a good experience to children and parents. Above the children’s area there will be two encampments, one for the 32nd Regiment of Foot and also an Iron Age settlement where there will be an author signing her books describing Iron Age living.

There will also be the reintroduction of the Bodmin Children’s Dance. The dance will start at the top of Fore Street, outside the library at 1:30 PM led by the Bodmin Town Band and followed up by Golowan Band from Penzance. There will be busking events occurring around the town. Cats Eyes Morris will be performing at various locations and at a stage in the afternoon in Priory car park where there will be some performances. At 15:49 PM there will be a procession down Fore Street with all the performers of the day taking part. They will be led by the Golowan Band and hopefully will have the beast in the procession. The procession will go to the bottom of Fore Street and then the beast will be delivered for trial at 4 PM on the Mount Folly. Please refer to the programme for the words of the trial.

At the end of the day there is Cornish wrestling in Priory Park starting at about 5 PM. This is a fully authorised Cornish wrestling event and you never know you can find yourself fitting into one of the categories.