Bodmin (Cornish: Bosvena[1]) is a town and civil parish in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom.

The town is part of the North Cornwall parliamentary constituency, which is represented by Ben Maguire MP.

Bodmin Town Council is made up of sixteen councillors who are elected to serve a term of four years.

[6] The Bodman spelling also appears in sources and maps from the 16th and 17th centuries,[7] most notably in the celebrated map of Cornwall produced by John Speed but actually engraved by the Dutch cartographer Jodocus Hondius the Elder (1563–1612) in Amsterdam in 1610 (published in London by Sudbury and Humble in 1626).

[9] St. Petroc founded a monastery in Bodmin in the 6th century[10] and gave the town its alternative name of Petrockstow.

The monastery was deprived of some of its lands at the Norman Conquest but at the time of Domesday still held eighteen manors, including Bodmin, Padstow and Rialton.

[11] Bodmin is one of the oldest towns in Cornwall, and the only large Cornish settlement recorded in the Domesday Book in 1086.

An inscription on a stone built into the wall of a summer house in Lancarffe furnishes proof of a settlement in Bodmin in the early Middle Ages.

The first was the Cornish Rebellion of 1497 when a Cornish army, led by Michael An Gof, a blacksmith from St. Keverne and Thomas Flamank, a lawyer from Bodmin, marched to Blackheath in London where they were eventually defeated by 10,000 men of the King's army under Baron Daubeny.

Warbeck was proclaimed King Richard IV in Bodmin but Henry had little difficulty crushing the uprising.

In 1549, Cornishmen, allied with other rebels in neighbouring Devon, rose once again in rebellion when the staunchly Protestant Edward VI tried to impose a new Prayer Book.

Proposals to translate the Prayer Book into Cornish were suppressed and in total 4,000 people were killed in the rebellion.

The creation of the Cornwall Constabulary in 1857 put pressure on smaller municipal police forces to merge with the county.

After a public enquiry, the force was disbanded in January 1866 and policing of the borough was deferred to the county from thereon.

There are a number of interesting monuments, most notably the black Delabole slate memorial to Richard Durant, his wives and twenty children, carved in low relief, and that of Prior Vivian which was formerly in the Priory Church (Thomas Vivian's effigy lying on a chest, all in black Catacleuse stone).

[24] Other buildings of interest include the former Shire Hall, now a tourist information centre, and Victoria Barracks, formerly depot of the now defunct Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry and now the site of the regimental museum.

There is a fine collection of small arms and machine guns, plus maps, uniforms and paintings on display.

The Honey Street drill hall was the mobilisation point for reservists being deployed to serve on the Western Front.

[25] Bodmin County Lunatic Asylum, later known as St Lawrence's Hospital,[26][27][28] was designed by John Foulston.

The reserve has 83 acres (33.6 ha) of public land and at its highest point it reaches 162 metres (531 ft) with the distinctive landmark at the summit.

The 44 metres (144 ft) tall granite monument to Sir Walter Raleigh Gilbert[31] was built in 1857 by the townspeople of Bodmin to honour the soldier's life and work in India.

An ornate granite drinking bowl which serves the needs of thirsty dogs at the entrance to Bodmin's Priory car park was donated by Prince Chula Chakrabongse of Thailand who lived at Tredethy.

Eight of its fourteen governors are nominated by the Diocese of Truro or the Parochial Church Council of St. Petroc's, Bodmin.

[33][34] A new-build college on a site close to the Asda supermarket, it will eventually cater for 1,280 students, with 197 staff employed.

[36][37] Aspiring National Service Sergeant Instructors of the Royal Army Education Corps underwent training at the Army School of Education, situated at the end of the Second World War at Buchanan Castle, Drymen in Scotland,[38] and later, from 1948, at the Walker Lines, Bodmin,[39] until it moved to Wilton Park, Beaconsfield.

Buses to central Bodmin, Wadebridge, Padstow, Rock, Polzeath, Port Isaac and Camelford depart from outside the station entrance.

[54][55] Some areas of the town have high levels of deprivation, and the proportion of children in poverty is higher than the average for Cornwall.

In 1865–66 William Robert Hicks was mayor of Bodmin, when he revived the custom of beating the bounds of the town.

The game is started by the Mayor of Bodmin by throwing a silver ball into a body of water known as the "Salting Pool".