pub was so named as winking at the barman would reputedly allow you to purchase smuggled spirits. Industrial revolution Whereas St Buryan was an important regional religious centre during the Middle Ages due to its monastery and Royal Peculiar status, the importance of the parish to the district faded with the onset the industrial revolution. This was in part due to the destruction of the collegiate buildings during The Protectorate period after the civil war and also the gradual weakening of the political position of the Church of England that occurred during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This loss of importance is reflected in the fact that the proportion of the district's population living in the parish fell from four and a half to less than two percent over this period. Unlike other parishes in Penwith, such as St Just, St Buryan was not a major focus of tin mining activity during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, having a mainly agrarian economy. After a spike in population in the early 19th century that is mirrored across the district and coincides both with the arrival of the railways and increased tin mining activity in Penwith, the population of the parish gradually declined over the next two hundred years (see figure right), in part due to the increased mechanisation of farming that the industrial revolution brought, requiring fewer people to work the land. China clay, Cornwall's other great mining export in addition to tin, was mined in the parish for a brief period in the nineteenth century at two pits at Tredinney Common (1880) and Bartinney Downs by the Land's End China Clay Company. Traction engines were still a novelty in 1884 and one used for the transport of 30 tons of clay for shipment from Penzance drew large crowds. Although initially successful, by 1891 the clay pits had become economically unviable. A newly formed company, Zennorin Developments Ltd applied to reopen the pits in 1970, but was rejected on the grounds that it would spoil an area of outstanding natural beauty. Twentieth century After a period of decline during the twentieth century, which saw a reduction in the village's population (see figure), culminating in the loss of a blacksmiths, the local dairy, the village butchers and a café in the early nineties, St Buryan has been enjoying a renaissance, fuelled in part by an influx of new families. The local school