St Piran's Day
5 March 2026 — Kernow bys vyken! Have a pasty while I pass by!
On 5 March Cornwall celebrates St Piran's Day. Piran is the patron saint of Cornish tin miners and one of the patron saints of Cornwall. Tradition says he was an Irish saint of the 5th–6th century who crossed the sea and settled on the Cornish coast. A popular legend tells how a black stone in his hearth melted and white tin ran out of it, which is said to have inspired the Cornish flag: a white cross on a black field, white metal against black stone. Today the day is marked with processions, music, dancing and, of course, pasties, the traditional Cornish pastry filled with meat and vegetables. The best-known procession is at Perranporth, where people walk across the dunes to a site linked with the saint. The date is fixed and does not depend on the Moon, so every year in early March our miner crosses the sky as a glowing, constellation-like figure.
Flying across the sky: An ethereal, bluish-silver figure of a Cornish miner made of bright dots and fine lines like a constellation, with a helmet and a pickaxe, walking across the night sky
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