The Collect Britain site includes one of the largest oral history collections in Europe with archives of stories from BBC local radio stations.

Over the next year researchers with the Sound Archive will be adding more dialects to the site, including examples from Cornwall.

It is hoped the recordings will chart the evolution of regional voices and prevent accents from dying out.

'Constantly changing'

It aims to address fears that different ways of speaking are being diluted.

Curator of English Accents and Dialects at the British Library Sound Archive, Jonathon Robinson said: "Languages are constantly changing, and that is true of any language, accent or dialect.

"It's an important part of people's identity and people are proud of the way they speak and I think that will continue."

One local resident, Bernard Teag from Stithians, says he would like to hear more people speaking with a Cornish accent.

"I think it's rather nice to hear people talking in regional dialects quite frankly, a lot of the old England is getting lost and it would be a pity if that was lost with it."

The website is due for completion in September 2004.

When it is finished, it will contain over 100,000 images and 350 hours of sound recordings.