bR
763
Cg
673
: y
Gornell University Library
Sthaca, Nem York
BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE
SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND.
THE GIFT OF
HENRY W. SAGE
1891
THE
Hoe of the Saints
PRINTED BY
SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-SIREET SQUARE
LONDON
se
2
a
a
a
<
i
2
ORATORY
AN
PAGAN SEPULCHRAL TUMULUS SURMOUNTED BY A CHRISTI
JUST.
™ THE PARISH OF BT
SSTET;
aAamar nnma
THE
Hoge of the Saints
A MONOGRAPH
OF
EARLY CHRISTIANITY IN CORNWALL
WITH THE
LEGENDS: OF THE CORNISH SAINTS
AND AN INTRODUCTION ILLUSTRATIVE OF THE
ETHNOLOGY OF THE DISTRICT
BY
WILLIAM COPELAND BORLASE, M.A.
LATE PRESIDENT OF THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF CORNWALL
AND VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES, LONDON
Truro
JOSEPH POLLARD, 5 ST NICHOLAS STREET
LONDON : GIBBINGS & (0©., 18 BURY STREET, W.C.
1898
}
TO
FRANCIS BISSETT HAWKINS
M.D., F.B.S., &e.
THE FOLLOWING PAGES ARE INSCRIBED BY
THE AUTHOR
A TOKEN OF GRATITUDE
AND
A TRIBUTE OF ESTEEM
INTRODUCTION
“DESCRIPTIVE OF THE FRONTISPIECE, WITH NOTES ON
CORNISH ETHNOLOGY, ETC.
SECTION OF THE MOUND AT CHAPEL CARN BREA (SCALE ts INCH To 1
FOOT), FROM ‘ARCHAOLOGIA,’ VOL. XLIX. P. 196
A, original tumulus, with ‘Giant’s Grave ;’ B, dolmen built on the original tumulus and
covered by cairn; C, Romano-British stratum; D, Anglo-Saxon stratum; E, founda-
tions of Christian edifice
THE frontispiece of this work, so pleasingly executed
by Mr. McFappey, after an original drawing! made
by Dr. Witu1am Bortasse, the Cornish historian and
the Author’s great-great-erandfather, in the middle of
the last century, represents a monument second to
none in the county of Cornwall for the interest it
possesses for the archeologist.
It occupies a central position on the apex of the
last hill in England, is a mark well known to mariners,
and on nearer approach is seento consist of a rough,
bare pile of stones, risingover the granite outcrop
which flanks the hill and the scanty heather which
1 For an exact facsimile of this see Archeologia, vol. xlix. There
is also a wretchedly bad copy of it in Buller’s Account of St. Just.
V1 THE AGE OF TILE SAINTS
clothes its summit to the height of some fifteen to
twenty feet.
In Dr. Borlase’s time it was crowned by a little
Christian edifice deserving, perhaps, rather the name
of a hermitage, such as that on Roche Rock,’ in the
eastern part of the county, than of a church or
baptistry. The architectural features shown in the
little door-case, to which steps led up, and which was
sheltered by a buttress-like projection, may indicate
that the walls of the building laid claim to consider-
able antiquity, while a quantity of coarse and heavy
slates and some ornamental ridge-tiles found in the
débris may point to its having been reroofed in the
Middle Ages. By whom it was founded or after what
Saint it was named there is neither legend nor docu-
ment to enlighten the curious.
Early in the present century the stones which
formed it were removed to build a barn; but as long
as the building remained the cairn on which it stood
was not dismantled, nor does it even seem to have
been surmised that it contained anything more ancient
than the Christian ages. It had been raised, in fact,
so it was thought, as a basis or pedestal for the nearer
exaltation heavenward of the holy man who had
his dwelling on the top. With this popular explana-
tion the writer never felt satisfied. Having explored
many and many a genuine pagan cairn in the vicinity,
he convinced himself that here was probably one of
the most perfect of them all, one which owed its pre-
servation to the sanctification by Christians of a pre-
viously venerated place of interment.
He therefore made two attempts to reach its centre,
the first of which was unsuccessful, the second (in
' This is figured in Blight’s Cornish Crosses.
INTRODUCTION vii
1879) attended by results here to be described.
Suffice it to say that his prognostications were realised,
and that as the workmen proceeded they laid bare
successively layer after layer in descending order,
evidences of the presence of human beings on this spot
in each and every period into which the discrimina-
tion first of the archeologist and then of the historian
has seen fit to parcel out the annals of the past, from
the earliest type of structure man is known to have
set up in the British Isles to the days when the
superstitions of the primitive cultus gave place to
the new order of things, or were perpetuated by those
who were introducing the worship of Christ. The
section of the mound was to the antiquary what a
railway cutting through aqueous strata is to the
geologist, or what a duly attested pedigree is to the
historian. Each ‘age’ was here represented—the
‘Stone Age,’ with its ‘ giant’s grave’ and slender, hard-
packed envelope of stone and clay; ‘the Bronze Age,’
with its cist or dolmen covered by its cairn of loose
stones; the ‘Iron Age,’ working up into the period
of Roman provincial civilisation ; and, surmounting
all, in due order, the vestiges, evidenced in the
Christian sanctuary, of that epoch to which the
writer gave years ago—somewhat fancifully, as he now
thinks—the name of the ‘ Age of the Saints,’ a name,
however, which his publisher will not permit him to
change, informing him that under that designation it
has become well known in Cornwall, and that under
that and none other it must take its chance once
more. :
We will proceed, then, to describe the contents of
each of these strata respectively, and then let them
tell us what they can of the successive waves of popu-
vill THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
lation which in the unrecorded past have left their
traces on the Cornish shores.
Commencing with the lowest, and therefore the
most primitive, the structure marked A in the section
is a vault the lower portions of the walls of which had
been built in a pit sunk several feet below the level of
the surrounding surface. It measured 7 ft. 6 ins. long
internally, and lay in a direction N.N.W. and 8.8.E.
At the bottom at the northern end it tapered to a
point, but the plan was more rectangular as the
walls ascended. The width in the centre was 38 ft.,
and at the entrance, which was at the southern end,
2 ft. 6 ins. The height of the interior was 4 ft. Four
eranite blocks laid transversely on the side walls
formed the roof, and increased in size as they ap-
proached the N.W. end. In reaching this chamber
the workman cut through three concentric walls, in
the inner one of which was a kind of rude door, con-
sisting of a single slab placed on edge and supported
by a stone prop. Near this a spindle-whorl of baked
clay was found. The chamber itself, which was
rudely constructed of dry masonry, was half full of
slimy earth and stones, mingled with ashes. On the
floor were a whetstone, and a few atoms of pottery
which might have dropped through from above. From
the fact that the pit in which the vault was built
would always have held water for weeks together after
wet weather, it is clear that no soluble matter would
have been retained. The composition of the mound
which had originally covered the structure was clearly
distinguishable from the cairn of large loose rotten
stones which rested upon it, consisting as it did of
clay intermixed with small stones, the contents pro-
bably of the pit before mentioned. The tumulus was
INTRODUCTION 1x
only slightly elevated above the cap-stones of the
vault, and was seemingly oval. On the western side
there were traces of a sewer-like creep, or entrance
passage, connecting the edge of the mound with the
southern end of the chamber.
On a level corresponding with the top of this
earlier tumulus, and at a distance of 6 ft. 6 ins. from
the chamber (B in the section), stood a fine cist or
dolmen, covered by a single well-chosen slab, 4 ft.
square on the top and 1 ft. Gins. thick. The space
beneath it measured 3 ft. by 2ft. 6ins., and 2 ft. in
height. There was nothing in it, and the stone
which had formed the fourth side had been removed.
It was evident that it had been built on the surface
of the previously existing mound. The cairn which
covered it formed the second stratum of the entire
tumulus in ascending order. From information col-
lected on the spot it appeared that other similar cists
had been removed from this same level at the time
when the building at the top was demolished.
Above this ‘cisted cairn’ stratum, again, at the
level marked C in the section, fragments of pottery
were turned up, such as are found among the ruins of
ancient British camps and villages in the neighbour-
hood, often accompanied by evidences of tin-smelting
and coins of the period of the Thirty Tyrants. To
this epoch may also be assigned the construction of
stone beehive huts, both under and above ground,
and closely resembling Irish examples of which we
shall speak later on. In the stratum marked D were
additional evidences of the progress of civilisation,
until at E, surmounting all the rest, upon the apex of
the cone, came the stones which had formed the
pavement of the cell, the foundations for which had
x THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
been strengthened by layers of flat stones sunk into the
loose débris of the cairn, and one of which pile-like
supports reached to within a foot or two of the
covering stone of the cist or dolmen.
We have here no isolated instance of the fact that it
was the custom of the early Christians to appropriate
to their own use the cemeteries and sepulchral sites
of their pagan predecessors, the ancestors of the
native converts, and the cultus of whose spirits the
missionaries could not venture wholly to suppress.
Evidence on this point is attainable in various parts
of Western Europe. One of the sepulchral tumuli
at Carnac, in Brittany, was surmounted by a Christian
shrine. The church of Santa Cruz de Cangas de
Onis, in the Basque Provinces of Spain, was built on
a ‘tumulus de guijarros ’(a mound of pebbles—that is
to say, a cairn), in the centre of which a chamber
was discovered approached by a gallery, to which
the Spanish antiquary who described it gives the
name of the ‘ gruta de las hadas,’ or ‘ fairies’ cave.’
We need not, indeed, go out of the British Islands for
examples. Within a few miles of Chapel Carn Brea
is the little Christian chapel of Porth Curnow, in the
parish of St. Levan, which stands upon a mound in
which a sepulchral urn was discovered.’
Similarly, when a paving-stone in the floor of the
principal little church in the cemetery of Monaster-
boice,* in the county of Louth, was taken up, a cist
was found beneath it, containing a fragment of
pottery which in the pattern of its ornament and in
' Seminario Pintoresco Espanol, 1857, p. 130.
* See infra, p. 110.
* Proc, Roy. Soc. of Antiquaries of Ireland, 5th series, vol. ii.
p. 145.
INTRODUCTION x1
its texture was evidently of the sepulchral class,
similar to that found in pre-Christian cairns in other
parts of Ireland and in West Britain.’ With it, in
the same cist, was a polished stone celt.
The question which now presents itself is, Who
were the people severally represented in the succes-
sive prehistoric strata of the tumulus at Carn Brea,
and of whom those living in the Christian era must
have been the descendants and successors? We must
not look for any great and sudden breaks in continuity.
Each succeeding ave makes large drafts on that which
has gone before, and in tracing out the influence which
one state of primitive society exerted on another lies
in great measure the interest we derive from the study
of antiquity.
The veneration, then, which was clearly inspired
by this spot dates back to the days of those who raised
the first and lowest mound. As far as their cultus is
concerned we can, to a certain extent, identify them.
They were worshippers of the dead, of the ancestors
of their race, the spirits of whom, so they believed,
inhabited the mounds in which their bodies had been
interred. In Ireland these spirits were called Sidhe.
In Fiace’s Hymn, a production of the eighth century,
it is said that before Patrick came ‘darkness lay on
Treland’s folk: the tribes worshipped Sidhe.” They
were supposed to inhabit the ‘ green hills,’ whether
natural or artificial, of the island, and to come out
into the world of the living on November Eve, which
1 This particular type of pottery is exactly similar to the sepulchral
pottery found in North Brabant. Compare fragments of urns given by
Prosp. Cuypers (Nijhoff, Bajdragen, vol. i. p. 74, pls. ii. and iii.) with
the ruder examples of pottery with the chevron ornamentation in Ireland
and Cornwall.
* See Trip. Life of Patrick, edit. Whitley Stokes, vol. ii. p. 409.
Xi THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
to the Christians was All-hallow Fen. On that night,
known to the pagans as Samhain, the festival of the
dead was celebrated, and we read that then ‘all the
Sidhe of Erin were left open, for ingress and egress to
all, for by this word Sidhe were meant not only the
denizens of the tombs, but the mounds themselves and
the chambers within them. We read, for example, of
a person entering the ‘Sidh of the cave,’? by which
there can be little doubt that the vault or chamber to
which the passage from the exterior of the tumulus
led was intended.
This cultus of the dead has its affinities throughout
the northern and north-central portions of the con-
tinent of Asia and Europe, and, on the south-west,
passes down the western coast of Europe into the
Iberian Peninsula. Evidence of this is to be found in
the presence of megalithic remains and a particular
class of legend or superstition which accompanies them.
Among the Lapps, in whose customs and language
we recognise the survival of an elder offshoot of the
Finno-Ueric stock, we find it ina more primitive form
than elsewhere, and under a name which is barely
distinguishable from that found in Ireland, for the
ghosts of the departed to whom the Lapps offered
sacrifices at the mouths of the natural caves in the
hills in which they interred their dead were called,
in the seventeenth century, if they are not so still,
Sitte.?
Between this cultus and that of the old Norsemen
the resemblance can scarcely be accidental. By the
latter the spirits of the dead were called elves, or
' See the Mchtra Nerai, or Expedition of Nera, MS., T.C.D., H.
2-16, col. 658-662 (the Yellow Book of Lecan).
* See Scheffer, Hist. of Lapland, London, 1751, p. 23.
INTRODUCTION Xl
vettir, our word wight. Vigfusson! tells us that ‘the
dead were supposed to dwell in their barrows or
burial-places, or in the great hills where they lived
in life. A man believed that he should ‘die into the
hill’ near which he had lived. Sacrifices were offered
to those spirits of ancestors. The sacrificial altar
had its proper name—the ‘horg,’ a heap or high
place, answering to the Irish ‘ cruc,’ which we believe
was used sometimes in a like sense.
The Latin writers translated the word Sidhe by
dei terrent. In the language of popular superstition
they are variously styled ‘the good people,’ ‘the
gentry, or, in Cornwall especially, the pisgies, pikstes,
or piskies, meaning ‘the little people.’ 122
XIII. Anmorican Sarnts—450-700—anpD THE SUBSEQUENT
Breton INFLUENCE ON CHRISTIANITY IN CoRNWALL. 165
XIV. Curistian ARCHEOLOGY oF CORNWALL FROM THE SIXTH
TO THE NINTH CENTURY INCLUSIVE ; . . 180
CONCLUSION . ‘ . 2 j ; “ . 186
INDEX F ‘ : : ‘ . ne 4e- S189.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
CHAPEL Carn Brea (ETCHED BY Mr. FRANK
McFappEN) . : : : . . Frontispiece
SEcTION OF THE MounD aT CHAPEL CARN BREA . nfs Vv
Puate I.—Iriso Monastic BeEenive Huts, ror Com-
PARISON WITH CORNISH BEEHIVE DWELLINGS.
(a) Tot TooRYBRENELL, OR SCHOOLHOUSE.
(6) TRAHAUN-A-CHORREAS, OR THE LENT TRa-
HAUN : . : . . To face p. 50
BosPorRTHENNIS BEEHIVE HvUT, FOR COMPARISON WITH
Rounp Hovusss at INISHMURRAY . ‘ ‘ » «= ~52
St. Levan CHURCH : ‘ ; we . 88
Puate IJ.—(a) CHarEet oF St. Exoy \ . To face p. 100
(6) Mapron WELL CHAPEL
Puate III.—Rvinep CHuRcH AT PERRAN-ZABULOE
AS IT WAS IN 1892. ‘: : yas i 106
Doorway oF Rounp TowER oF DONAGHMORE s 6 - 108
ELEVATION AND PLAN oF PortH CURNOW CHAPEL . » . 110
Puate IV.—Sprcrmens oF Earty CHRISTIAN ARCHI-
TECTURE IN IRELAND, FOR COMPARISON WITH
ORIENTAL EXAMPLES.
(2) Door oF CHURCH OF ST. FECHIN OF
FORE ‘ : 2 :
To face p. 118
(6) Doork oF CHURCH oF RaTAss, NEAR
TRALEE é : ‘ :
GROUND PLAN OF MADRON WELL CHAPEL . a . 182
Parc-an CHAPEL, ST. JUST i ; Sons d ~~ 186
THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
A MONOGRAPH OF
EARLY CHRISTIANITY IN CORNWALL
CHAPTER I
PREFATORY
THE erection of a portion of the See of Exeter into a
separate diocese, the limits of which were to be co-
extensive with those of the county of Cornwall, and
the episcopal seat of which was to be fixed in the
cathedral city of Truro, was the event which called into
existence, in the year 1878, the first edition of this
work. Anevent it was which crowned triumphantly
the long-deferred hopes of several Cornishmen—
eminent for their knowledge of the history of their
county—among whom may be specially mentioned
Mr. Pedlar,! Mr. Carne,? and Mr. Adams,? who,
looking forward to a consummation which the latter
alone lived to witness, expended no little care and
1 The Anglo-Saxon Episcopate of Cornwall, by E. H. Pedlar.
London, 1856.
2 «The Bishopric of Cornwall,’ by the Rev. John Carne, M.A.,
Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, No. vii. April 1867.
3 ‘Chronicles of Cornish Saints,’ by the Rev. John Adams, M.A,,
Journal of the R.I.C., between the years 1867 and 1875 inclusive—
eight papers in all.
B
2 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
thought on the question of our early Saints and of
the ancient Cornish See.
Since the new bishopric has become a fact of
Enelish history, a hitherto unprecedented impetus has
been given to the study of our primitive Christian
antiquities, and a desire has been manifested for
further information about them, which is by no means
confined to the land west of the Tamar.
Bearing this in mind, and happening to have beer
in that year chosen as the President of the Roya!
Institution of Cornwall, I chose for the subject oi
my address that period of our local annals which
covered the introduction of Christianity into Cornwall.
or, as it might fairly be termed, our ‘ Age of the
Saints. At the outset of the investigation, of which
these pages are the result, let me freely confess that ]
more than once was minded to turn back from the
task in blank despair of ever arriving at anything
tangible as a result. Like the Yorkshireman’s horse.
the object before me was certainly difficult to catch,
and I could not always persuade myself that it would
be good for very much when [had caught it. Still, the
pursuit itself became engrossing. Matter of great,
though collateral interest (which by the way must
serve as my apology for occasional digressions), was
clearly strewn along the path. The very obscurity
which hid the mark from sight was an incentive tc
pierce it if possible; and to be able to register in
passing any landmark which recent researches had
succeeded in setting up in this our darkest age,
seemed to be a worthy object in itself. In laying
before my readers such scanty data as I have been able
to bring together, I shall set up no claim to original-
ity, remembering that an address, such as that which
PREFATORY 3
current events then called upon me to take in hand,
should not be made a peg on which to hang out the
writer’s notions, but a plain and simple recapitulation
of facts already attained, and an indication of direc-
tions from which new light might possibly be looked
for, and that not altogether in vain. In this light
alone, as simply tentative, must be regarded, for ex-
ample, those etymological suggestions on which I shall
occasionally venture.
One further remark in preface. A happy thing
it is for the student of to-day that he has not the
excuse his forefathers had for the bias, or the intole-
rance, or the over-credulity, which were the natural
outcrop of the conditions of society—-of which they
formed a part. I will instance my meaning from the
works of two of our oldest Cornish historians. Are
we not free to-day to sift the legends of these Saints
of ours without having our vision clouded by the
superstitious element still surviving in the days of
Hals, and making that quaint old author not only
take these stories all in faith, but add to them also—
to borrow the words of his unsparing critic—fresh
‘rapsodies [sic] and digressions of his own’?* Are
we not quite as free, on the other hand, to extract
from these sources, where we can do so, the kernel of
fact—the explanation, it may be, of some weird tradi-
tion still hovering round the ancient haunts—with-
out finding ourselves trammelled by the narrow and
polemical spirit which caused our next writer, Tonkin,
to discard them bodily as the foolish and mischievous
1 Original MS&. entitled An Alphabetical Account of all the Parishes
in Cornwall, by Thomas Tonkin, ‘ Advertisement,’ p. ii, 1736. The
MS. consists of 2 vols. 4to; the first from A to I; the second from K
to O. The third portion, from O to Z, was presented by the Rev. C.
M. E, Collins to the Royal Institution of Cornwall.
B2
4 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
productions of Papists? History, in its treatment,
has indeed undergone a complete change since then.
There is a palpable and healthy dislike of bias or pre-
judice of any sort or kind, and intolerance brings
down upon it our righteous indignation. The his-
torian who, only a century ago, in the interests of
his own philosophy, could venture to blink the facts,
or rather shape them in elegant parentheses into any
mould he chose, would be sure to come off badly
were he found to be attempting it to-day. We still
have amongst us, it is true, what may almost be
termed ‘a school’ of men who treat history in a fashion
so light and poetical that they occasionally sacrifice
matter of fact, often essentially bare by reason of its
truthfulness, on the altar of a bright idea—whose
‘clear, shallow’ minds can float tranquilly along over
difficulties, the sight of which, had they realised their
importance, should have been sufficient to have
deterred them in their voyage to conclusions. In the
hand of such, however kindly their intentions may be,
history can have no claim to scientific method, but
passes into the region of fine art. One thing is now
quite certain: lack of material cannot any longer be
pleaded as an excuse for misrepresentation. In the
case of the history of our country at large, new stores,
overflowing with original details, have been thrown
open at the Record Office and elsewhere—stores
which are day after day being turned to good account,
in behalf of our own county history, by more than
one patriotic Cornishman. The nation itself has, as
we know, undertaken in the more important cases
the publication of these MSS. Each and every state-
mentin English history must now be prepared to pass
under the dissector’s knife: each and every chapter
PREFATORY 5
in it, treated as an organic whole, can only be pro-
nounced capable of having lived at all, when it has
satisfactorily undergone a test examination in respect
to the vital power inherent in each and all of its com-
ponent parts. ‘A stern and rigid method,’ some may
say—‘ one calculated to throw down without building
up, and to damp the student’s ardour for the work.’
And yet it bears no ill effects. Never has the
intellectual life (cloistered in the study from the rush-
ing world around) been so really well worth living as
it is to-day. Not even when the Benedictine fathers
laboured at their ponderous tomes, were men found
more ready and willing than they are at present to
bring their best energies to the front, and to expend
them—it may be in some rude archaic dialect, or it may
be in the patient search for scraps of evidence from
beneath the dust of ages, if only (and this all the re-
ward they now desire) they may succeed in brushing
off the crust of error, and in laying bare the truth;
in rehabilitating in all its pristine clearness the un-
derwriting on the palimpsest, and in erasing from it
its overcoating of fable and romance.
6 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CHAPTER II
AUTHORITIES
Now, in order to make as sure as we can of
laying hold of a true thread of history, when
traversing a period such as that I propose to you to-
day, where so much that has been hitherto received
as half the truth, perhaps, has been found on
careful investigation to rest only upon ‘ guess, mis-
take, or fable, it is of the first importance before
making a start, that we should be provided with
none but the most proficient guides or—to borrow
a phrase from the merchant's desk—be ‘correctly
posted up to date.’ To find ourselves repeating, as
many do, over and over again, under the semblance
of a genuine fact, some statement which, had we
consulted the right authorities, we should have found
had long ago fallen a prey to fair and accurate
criticism, is but lost labour and a waste of power.
In the first place, therefore, I will point out a few of
those sources to which we may most safely apply, in
order to gain an insight into the subject before us.
Pre-eminent in authority, as bearing on the general
question, is the work of Mr. Haddan and Professor
Stubbs—the ‘ Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents
relating to Great Britain and Ireland’!—the first
' Vol. i.; vol. ii. part i.; and vol. iii.; all published. Oxford, Cla-
rendon Press, 1869-738.
AUTHORITIES 7c
instalments of which form a perfect mine of inform-
ation on all that relates to the British and Anglo-
Saxon Churches, from the third century downward
to the incoming of the Norman kings. Commenced
in a spirit worthy an English Mabillon, this great
work has unhappily come to a standstill, short of the
all-important Irish portion, for which Mr. Haddan
had been specially qualifying himself! Painstaking,
accurate, and devoted to the cause of that Church of
which he was a member, Mr. Haddan was profoundly
learned in the annals of her early days, and his un-
timely death in 1873, after a life of gratuitous labour,
has left a blank behind which cannot be filled.
Fortunately for us, that portion of the ‘Councils’
which relates to Cornwall was completed, and
brought down, with transcripts of the original docu-
ments, and still more valuable editorial notes, to the
year 1072. But more especially those earlier parts
of the work which relate to the primitive British
Church in general, and to Wales and Brittany in
particular, contain extracts and allusions essential to
our purpose. With respect to the Irish phase—
although we have not Mr. Haddan’s own collections
—we learn from his preface? where we are to look for
the authorities on which he relied. ‘The labours,’
he says, ‘of Dr. Reeves, Dr. Todd, and Mr. King
... have recently converted Irish early history and
archeology out of an almost proverbial chaos of wild
and uncertified fable into something approaching to
coherent and critically digested knowledge.’ The
‘Vita Sancti Columb’ of Adamnan, written at the
1 A fragment of this portion, left in MS., has since been published.
? Haddan and Stubbs’s Cowncils, vol. i. p. xi.
8 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
close of the seventh century,’ and admirably edited by
Dr. Reeves,? and the ‘Life of St. Patrick,’ by Dr.
Todd,’ filled as it is with weird incidents transporting
us back to the time when Paganism and Christianity
were running in a blended stream—are both of them
works which demand the most careful scrutiny from
those who would look on the early Saints as living
men; who would see them in their monk’s habit, and
their hermit’s cell; would accompany them to their
altars, learn their religious rites, and form some
fairly definite picture of what manner of men they
were. There is yet another name which can never
be dissociated from the great company of the
founders of Irish archeology—that of Mr. George
Petrie. If we would view our subject not only in its
general aspect, but if, in addition to this, we would
bring to our aid the more specially antiquarian, or
monumental details, his works, and more particularly
that on the Irish Round Towers,* should be our text
books. Together with these, we must not omit to
notice, since it is the most exhaustively illustrated
work on the subject we have, the posthumous vo-
lumes of Lord Dunraven, so handsomely edited by
Miss Margaret Stokes.° The matter they contain
possesses a peculiar interest to students of Cornish
antiquities, not only on account of the likeness which
1 Reeves’s Adamnan, pp. v and lxxviii.
? The full title is The Life of St. Columba. Dublin (Irish Archeo-
logical and Celtic Society), 1857.
3 St. Patrick, Apostle of Ireland. Dublin, 1864. To this should
now be added The Tripartite Life, translated and edited by Dr.
Whitley Stokes.
4 The Ecclesiastical Architecture of Ireland, &c., 2nd edit. Dublin,
1845.
° Notes on Irish Architecture. Iondon, 1875-77.
AUTHORITIES 9
the remains often bear to those in our own neighbour-
hood, but from the fact that many of us look back
with pleasure to the occasion '—it was the autumn
of 1862—when, in company with the Cambrian
Association, the noble author spent some days in
Cornwall, and continually expressed the great interest
which a comparison of our remains with those of his
native land afforded him. Following out the archi-
tectural line, we shall do well to compare these
primitive structures with those represented in De
Vogiié’s ‘Syrie Centrale,’ ? and their decorations with
that given in Grimm’s ‘ Architecture en Arménie.’ ®
Our crosses, too, so admirably figured by Mr. Blight,
should be read by the light of those more elaborate
ones given in Cummings’s ‘ Isle of Man,’ * in O’Neill’s
‘Crosses of Ireland,’® and in Stuart’s ‘Sculptured
Stones of Scotland.’ ® Our special thanks are due to
the Rev. William Iago for the light which he has
thrown, both by his excellent representations of them,
and his equally valuable critical notes, on our ancient
inscribed stones in Cornwall;’ and for a masterly
digest of that subject generally, we can now turn to
the work of M. Emile Hiibner, ‘ Inscriptiones Britan-
1 See Jowrnal of the R.I.C. for 1862.
2 Syrie Centrale, ‘ Architecture Civile et Religieuse, etc., du 1° au 7°
Siécle,’ par le Comte Melchior de Vogiié. Paris, 1865.
3 Monuments d’ Architecture Byzantine en Géorgie et en Arménie.
Pétersbourg, 1859.
* The Runic Ornaments, &c., of the Isle of Man, by the Rev. J.G.
Cummings. London, 1857.
5 Illustrations of the Sculptured Crosses of Ancient Ireland, by
Henry O’Neill. London, 1857.
®° The Sculptured Stones of Scotland, by John Stuart. (Printed
for the Spalding Club.) Aberdeen, 1856.
7 Published in the Journal of the R.I.C. and in Sir John Mac-
lean’s Trigg Minor.
10 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
nix Christiane.’! I am glad to have this opportunity
of publicly expressing our sense of the services which
the Rev. C. W. Boase, Fellow of Exeter College,
Oxford, has rendered to our county history in the
concise and able articles which have appeared from
his pen, relative to Cornish Saints, in the volumes of
Dr. William Smith’s ‘Dictionary of Christian Bio-
graphy.’? In the absence of reliable details of the
lives of the individuals, these notices embody much
important information on the general subject. To
the difficulties of his task as their biographer, Mr.
Boase is fully alive. On the one hand, there are
only the ‘nuda Sanctorum nomina,”* attached to our
parishes and holy wells; on the other there are the
Legendary Lives, composed at intervals of from five
to seven centuries from the date of the person re-
corded. The largest store of these legends is that
preserved in the gigantic collection known as the
‘Acta Sanctorum, commenced by Bollandus in the
seventeenth century. All quarters of the globe sent in
their quota of tradition, and allegory, and fiction, to
swell its copious pages, and the romances which have
been hung round about the neck of many a native of
the British Isles are to be found there. Then there is
the work of Capgrave, the ‘ Legenda nova Anglie,’ and
that of Colgan? with its scarce second volume, and, last
1 Inscriptiones Britannie Christiane, edidit AAmilius Hiibner.
Berolini et Londini, 1876.
* London, John Murray, 1877.
3 P. 713, in voc. ‘St. Crewenna.’
4 William of Malmesbury, quoted by H. and §. Cowncils, vol. i.
p. 150.
° Acta Sanctorum veteris et majoris Scotie sew Hibernia, fol.
1645, vol. i. Vol. ii. Triadis Thawmaturge, sive Divorum Patricit
Columbe, et Brigid@a .. . acta, 1647.
AUTHORITIES 11
but not least, the massive results of the life-work of
Ussher '—all so rich in the marvellous that it is hard
to believe sometimes that even a shadow of truth can
be left. For Wales, Mr. Rice Rees? has endeavoured,
not I think without some little success, to produce
some sort of order out of the chaos of Welsh lite-
rature, by bringing into harmony the legends of the
Saints and the existing Bardic genealogies. Notices
of Cornwall, its chieftains and Saints, are scattered
through his pages, but the date of the compositions
is too far removed from the period of which they
profess to treat to allow more than very general con-
clusions to be drawn from the evidence. in his
‘Lives of the Cambro-British Saints,’ another Mr.
Rees * has contented himself with editing and translat-
ing some of the Latin Legends of the twelfth century
in the form in which they have been handed down to
us. The Armorican Saints have been treated by
more than one writer. Amongst them I may
specially mention the work of Le Grand,’ a priest of
the Order of St. Dominic, who lived at Morlaix at
the close of the sixteenth century.
No other country whose population spoke the
Celtic language is so devoid of materials from which
to reconstruct her Hagiology as is Cornwall. The
hand of ruin has been unsparingly laid upon her
1 Britamnicarum Ecclesiarum Antiquitates, et Primordia, col-
lectore Jacobo Ussherio. 1st edit. Dublin, 1639.
2 An Essay on the Welsh Saints, by the Rev. Rice Rees, M.A.
London, 1836.
3 Lives of the Cambro-British Saints, by the Rev. W. J. Rees
(Welsh MSS. Society). Llandovery, 1853.
4 Les Vies des Saints de la Bretagne Armorique, par F. G. Albert
le Grand de Morlaix, avec des Notes, etc., par M. D. L. Miorcec de Ker-
danet, revues par M. Graveran. Brest, 1837. See also Fremenville,
Antiquités de la Bretagne. Brest, 1832.
12 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
ancient literature. The Danes destroyed everything
down to the tenth century, and Henry VIII. and
his two Protestant children completed the work down
to their own time, by burning all that came after—
almost the only exceptions being the Bodmin manu-
missions,! the Leofric Missal, the Exeter Domesday,’
and the Episcopal documents and Registers preserved
at Exeter.2 From the Itineraries of William of
Worcester and Leland, we learn something of the con-
tents of the monastic libraries, and of the Legend books
extant in their day; but these writers lived respec-
tively in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and the
information contained in William of Worcester * is
often mere hearsay. The value of Leland ° lies in the
fact that, having received from Henry VIII. the ap-
pointment of King’s antiquary,’ and a commission to
inquire into the existence of ancient MSS. through-
out England, he made it his business, during a tour
lasting from 1536 to 1542, to visit all the religious
houses and parish churches which lay on his route,
and to jot down the names of the MSS. in their
1 ap. 941 to (at latest) 1048. See H. and 8. Cownctls, vol. i.
p. 676.
? Dr. Lyttelton, then Dean of Exeter, obtained a MS. copy of this
for Dr. Borlase, in 1758. He considered it the original return from
which the Western part in the Royal Domesday was formed.
5 These Registers begin on December 26, 1257, and continue, with
only one break—viz. from 1292 to 18306—down to the dissolution of the
monasteries. Oliver, Monasticon, p. vi. Bound up with Bishop
Bronescombe’s is the T’axatio of Pope Nicholas IV., 1288-99, which,
like the others, is important, as giving the nomenclature of the parishes
at that date. See zbid. p. 456. In his additional supplement to the
Monasticon (p. 6) Oliver mentions a Legenda Sanctorum of Bishop
Grandisson, and quotes a quaint story from it.
4 Itinerarium, edited by J. Nasmith. Cambridge, 1778.
5 Itinerary, Oxford, 1770. Collectanea, 2nd edit., London, 1770.
® See Chalmers’s Biographical Dictionary, in voc. ‘ Leland.’
AUTHORITIES 13
possession, often adding extracts from them, and
explanatory notes of his own. It was fortunate that
he started when he did, for the crisis of 1549-50
(which he lived to lament) was impending, when the
barbarous order was issued first to deface, and after-
wards to burn, the whole of the Service books, from
one end of England to the other, to the number,
Mr. Maskell calculates,! of no less than 250,000.
With them went the Breviaries—many of which no
doubt, like that of Aberdeen, contained short notices
of favourite Saints; and with them too went the
‘Legende ’* books, containing the stories of the
local Saints appointed to be read either as homilies
in the monasteries, for the sake of edification during
meals, or (where found separately) on the feast day
in each parish respectively. The fabulous tales
found in early county histories, and in that of Hals
in especial, are doubtless in many instances the oral
survival of the contents of these Legends. That
some among them embodied a certain amount of
tradition, more pagan perhaps than Christian, cannot
be questioned; but it must be remembered, at the
same time, that in the Middle Ages, the composition
of these ‘Legend’ had become not merely a scholarly
exercise, but actually a trade. Warton, in his ‘ Lives
of the Poets,’ tells a good story about one Gilbert de
Stone, a legend-monger of the fourteenth century,
who, being applied to by the monks of Holywell, in
Flintshire, to write the Life of their Patron Saint,
1 Monumenta Ritualia, vol. i. p. elxviii.
2 Mr. Dickinson (List of Printed Service Books, London, Masters,
1850, p. 12) mentions three copies of Sarum Legende. It is possible,
however, that many of the Cornish parishes contained a separate life
of their Saint in manuscript, and that it was this which Leland found
at St. Ives and elsewhere, and which he calls the Legende.
14 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
was notin the least put out by being informed that no
materials for it existed, but, on the contrary, under-
took to compose for them ‘a most excellent legend
after the manner of that of Thomas 4 Becket.’ To
this subject, however, we shall recur again presently.
The MS. collections of Dr. Borlase are very full
on the subject of our Hagiology. It was his intention
to have published a Parochial History of Cornwall,
and with this end in view he forwarded a series of
questions to the incumbent of each parish. Of the
answers he received several are preserved, and local
traditions of the Saints, which he specially asked for,
are to be found in them.’ He also carried on a long
correspondence with Drs. Lyttelton and Milles, suc-
cessive Deans of Exeter, and from them received
copious extracts from the Cathedral archives. Lastly,
he had access to the lost MSS. of Hals and Tonkin,
from which he took notes, finally embodying the
whole of the information in a digested form in a folio
volume, entitled ‘Parochial Memoranda, ? The
multifarious researches of Mr. Whitaker are made
known to us in his ‘ Ancient Cathedral of Cornwall,’ *
a subject which has since been well handled by
Mr. Pedlar, in his ‘ Anglo-Saxon Episcopate,’ and by
Mr. Carne in his ‘ Bishopric of Cornwall,’ from both
which sources many valuable hints on the subject
before us may be derived. ‘Dr. Oliver’s ‘ Monasticon
Dicecesis Exoniensis,’* containing as it does the more
important documentary evidence preserved at Exeter,
together with the supplement on Church dedications,
1 Dr. Borlase, MSS. Orginal Letters vol. vy.
2 MS. commenced in 1738.
3 2 vols. London, Stockdale, 1804.
4 Exeter, 1846.
AUTHORITIES 15
is most essential to the right understanding of the
nomenclature of our parishes. It is, however, to
the memory of that most patriotic West-Country-
man, the late Mr. Adams,! that we owe the
heaviest debt of gratitude, for the most persevering
attempt yet made to reduce into form the scattered
fragments of Cornish Hagiology. At the time when
a terrible disaster in a foreign land snatched him
from us, he had already contributed no less than
eight lives of those Saints specially connected with
Cornwall to the volumes of the ‘Journal of the
Royal Institution of Cornwall,’ choosing that for the
vehicle of publication for this interesting series,
which, in a more extended form, I believe it was his
intention to have brought out in a separate volume.
His essays are all the more valuable on account of
the local knowledge Mr. Adams was able to bring to
bear in illustration of the traditions and fables he
was seeking to unravel.
1 The papers contributed to the Jowrnal of the R.I.C. by Mr. Adams
were: 1, ‘St. Cuby’ (October 1867); 2, ‘St. Petrock’ (April 1868) ;
3, ‘St. Constantine,’ and 4, ‘St. Samson’ (April 1869); 5, ‘St. David’
(April 1870); 6, ‘St. Burian’ (April 1878); 7, ‘St. Crantock’ (April
1874); 8, ‘St. Gunwallo’ (April 1875). [The dates are those of publi-
cation. |
16 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CHAPTER III
THE LEGENDARY LIVES AND THEIR VALUE
Tur legendary lives, of which I have spoken, were
composed during a period extending over the eleventh
and twelfth centuries, the latter being the most
prolific of them.! To the ecclesiastical element in
medieval society, they were what the Arthurian
legends were to the lay. They were compiled, says
Mr. Rees,’ ‘when the descendants of the Norman
invaders were desirous to render more intimate the
connection between the British and Roman Churches,
and to conciliate the Welsh by writing favourable
particulars of their national saints, whom they
venerated. A monk of the nearest monastery, who
had pretensions to authorship, would be employed
very likely to write a religious romance to be read in
the church of such and such a place upon the feast
day, and for this purpose would be supplied with a
1 This statement, of course, does not refer to an earlier class of
lives, which forms, indeed, a most important element in the materials
for early ecclesiastical history, and among which may be mentioned
Sulpicius Severus’s Life of St. Martin, Constantius’s Life of St. Ger-
manus, Bede’s St. Cuthbert, and Adamnan’s Columba; nor even to
the Tripartite Life of St. Patrick, although that was written at a
greater interval than the others from the date of its subject. See note
to Reeves’s preface to Adamnan’s Columba.
2 Dr. W. Smith’s Dictionary of Christian Biography, the Rev.
C. W. Boase in voc. ‘ Crewenna.’
3 Introduction to Cambro-British Saints.
VY
THE LEGENDARY LIVES AND THEIR VALUE 17
few local names and such traditions as were still
lingering on amongst the gossips of the vicinity.’ At
times the author might have been a native of the
place for which he wrote, and in that case the local
stories would be made the most of. In the absence,
however, of any material such as this, incidents in
the life of Christ or the Apostles, occurrences in the
Old Testament, or miraculous performances previously
attributed to other Saints, were (when the inventive
genius failed) transferred to new names and places
with a boldness that was worthy of a better cause.
‘In looking at these compositions, we seem at first
sight to have a history ready cut out for us,’ but
in the words of Dr. Arnold, speaking of the early
legends of Rome, ‘if we press on any part of this
show of knowledge, it yields before us and comes to
nothing. ‘We have no criterion,’ adds Mr. Rees,
‘except oar own subjective impressions whereby to
distinguish fiction from truth; and we are in con-
tinual danger of mistake if we try to transform the
one into the other. The claim of the legends to be
read as authentic history would not have been
advanced even by the authors themselves, as
Mr. Boase points out in the case of St. Bernard,”
who, having himself written a life of St. Malachi
brimming over with the marvellous, warns others
against believing in similar fictions. A parallel case
would be presented in modern times by ascertaining
the late Cardinal Newman’s own view of the claim of
1 For this view of the origin of some of the legends, as well as for
several other useful hints in the sequel, the writer is indebted to a
friend, whose valuable assistance he takes this opportunity of acknow-
ledging.
2 Dictionary of Christian Biography, loc. cit.
18 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
his fable Callista to be studied as history, or Cardinal
Wiseman’s with regard to his equally fictitious
Fabiola. The principle of this legend-mongering
may be all very well when applied to novelettes or
homilies; but, knowing as we do how terribly per-
plexing it is to the student of history in after days,
we cannot allow Mr. Anthony Froude’s justification
of it in his ‘Life of St. Neot’’ to pass quite un-
challenged. He must speak for himself alone. ‘We
all,’ he says, ‘write legends. Little as we may be
conscious of it, we all of us continually act on the
very same principle which made the lives of the
saints such as we find them, only perhaps less
poetically. Who has not observed in himself, in his
ordinary dealings with the facts of everyday life, with
the sayings and doings of his acquaintance, in short,
with everything that comes before him as a fact, a
disposition to forget the real order in which they
appear, and rearrange them according to his theory
of how they ought to be ?’
From the method in which they were compiled,
we are not surprised to find that in an immense
number of instances the legends contain incidents so
strikingly similar, that they may almost be regarded
as the common property of the whole class. In the
first place the subject is, in nine cases out of ten, a
person of high birth,’ a nobleman’s child, or himself
a prince, in which latter case he is sure sooner or
later in life to exchange his earthly kingdom for the
monk’s cowl or hermit’s cell.2 Here we have un-
! Lives of the English Saints (Toovey, 1844), introduction to the
‘Life of St. Neot.’
* E.g. take for Cornish examples Ia, Buriana, Germo, Milor, Con-
stantine, the whole family of Brychan, and Cystennan Gerniw, &c. &.
’ Keby, Constantine, &e. ke.
THE LEGENDARY LIVES AND THEIR VALUE 19
doubtedly a fact of history. The saints were often
persons of high rank. The Welsh genealogies all
point to it, and to go further back still, it was to the
tribal chieftains that Patrick and the primitive Irish
missionaries successfully directed their first efforts.
Secondly, the saint is very frequently born when his
parents are old, and develops a marvellous aptitude
for learning from unusually early years. Thirdly,
he is an excursionist, roaming from place to place
with all the restlessness of his nature,? paying visits
to his friends and kindred in Brittany, Cornwall,
Wales, or Ireland—a statement which is undoubtedly
correct, and which goes far to show the close relation-
ship which existed between the several populations
of those countries at the time, three of them, the
Welsh, Cornish, and Bretons, certainly speaking the
same language, while the difference between that and
what was then spoken in Ireland cannot have been so
great as 1t appears now. On the subject of their
travelling proclivities, Mr. Adams has quoted a
quaint passage from Fuller :*—‘ Most of these men
seem born under a travelling planet ; seldom having
their education in the place of their nativity, ofttimes
composed of Irish infancy, British breeding, and
French preferment ; taking a cowl in one country, a
crozier in another, and a grave in a third; neither
bred where born, nor beneficed where bred, nor
buried where beneficed; but wandering in several
kingdoms.’ ‘To voyage over seas,’ says Gildas,‘
' Keby, &c. &e.
? David, Teilo, Padarn, Samson, Petroc, Keby, &e. &c.
’ ‘Chronicle of Cornish Saints: St. Constantine,’ Jowrnal of the
&.I.C. April 1869, p. 87.
4 Gildas, M.H.B. 31.
c 2
20 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
‘and to pace over broad tracts of land’ was to them
‘not so much a weariness as a delight.’ Frequently
these excursions extend themselves to mission enter-
prises, or to distant pilgrimages, and the Saint makes
for Rome, Jerusalem, or even India!—a fact, with
regard to Rome, which is attested by many writers,
and with regard to Jerusalem? by Palladius, who
speaks of Britons, in the year 410, as sharing the
hospitality of the lady Melania. Fourthly, the Saint
of the Legends works miracles, seldom, as I have
said, altogether new to us, but copies of older stories,
which were in turn, many of them, reflections of those
in the Scriptures. For example, St. Cadoc® strikes
the ground with his staff and causes a spring to burst
forth, after relating which, the writer thoughtfully
reminds us that Moses had done the like. He might
have added the intermediate instance of St. Anthony
and several more. Fifthly, since the Legends were
designed for homilies, quaint moral platitudes are
often introduced by way of exclamation on occasions
where they are little expected. Thus, in the Life of
St. Melorus, transcribed by Oliver from Bishop
Grandisson’s ‘Legenda Book,’ * the author,® after
narrating how the boy’s right hand and left foot were
cut off and replaced by a silver hand and a bronze
foot, which subsequently miraculously grew with the
rest of the body, exclaims, ‘O! quam insolitum et
1 Petroe.
? Palladius, Hist. Laws. exviii, written (according to H. and 8.
Councils, p. 14) in the year a.p. 420.
3 * Life of St. Cadoe,’ in Cambro-British Saints.
* Leland (Itin. vol. iii. p. 62) quotes from the Life of St. Sativola
the passage, ‘Johannes de Grandisono abbreviavit Legendas Sanctorum
in usum Exon. Eccles. a.p. 1336.’
5 Oliver, Monast. Hx. Add. Suppl. p. 6.
THE LEGENDARY LIVES AND THEIR VALUE 2]
dampnosum commercium! pro manus vel pedis carne
commutare es sive argentum!’—a tale which, by
the way, recalls to us that of Nuada the Tuatha-De-
Danann king in Irish romance, who, having lost his
arm at the battle of Moytura, when fighting against.
the Fomorians, had it replaced by a silver one, con-
structed by a divine artificer. Sixthly,—In addition
to the names of heroes of the Arthurian Romances,
which occasionally occur in the lives,! there is a
small but curious intermixture of topographical de-
tails apparently pointing to an acquaintance on the
part of the writer, either direct or indirect, with the
localities of which he is treating. To this last sub-
ject, as well as to the appearance here and there in
the legends of an element which is certainly of pagan,
not of Christian origin, I shall presently take occasion
to refer. Lastly, the Saint’s death, unless a martyr-
dom, is a peaceful and joyous departure to heaven,
whither he is conveyed by angels and patriarchs ?
in a white cloud.
From this short summary of the contents of the
Legendary Lives we may gather that, with the ex-
ception of a few incidental truths of a general
character scattered through them here and there,
they are very far removed indeed from the pale of
authentic history. There is one small class of details,
however, which they contain, which we cannot without
question afford to ignore—namely, those which bear
on our local annals. Shall we retain any portion
of these, or are they so irrevocably intermingled with
the residue of the fabulous and the false, that nothing
1 Adams’s ‘St. Crantock,’ Journal of the B.I.C, April 1874, p.
2738.
2 St. Keby, St. Cadoe, ke. &e.
23 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
remains but to discard the whole? The student of
history who knows nothing of the locality, vexed and
put out of heart by the drudgery he has had vainly
to undergo in plodding through these tangled mazes,
prefers to take the sceptical view. The Cornishman,
knowing the local traditions, and being as it were
a party to them himself, is willing to take as much
on faith as he reasonably can. Cap. viii.; and in cap. ili. ecclesiasticos are contrasted with
barbaricos ritus.’
NATIVE POPULATION OF BRITAIN AND GAUL 31
comparison of the manner in which it was treated
by the kindred Gaulish colony of Galatia. The
same enthusiastic temperament gave an ‘orgiastic’
character, to use the words of Professor Lightfoot,’ to
the Christian worship of Asia Minor. The Galatian
capital was the stronghold of the Montanist revival,
and at the same time, side by side with this, we read
of a ‘persistence in heathen rites under a Christian
guise’ as lasting on there down to the fifth century at
least.
The route by which Christianity immediately
arrived in Britain is clear enough. The Easter con-
troversy, when rightly understood, according to the
facts brought together by Mr. Haddan, proves in
the first place that the British Church was, directly
speaking, of Western, and not of Eastern origin.”
It was an offshoot from and subsequently a reflection
of the Church of Gaul, the original seat of which was
fixed at Lyons, perhaps early in the second century.’
The close connection which was kept up with that
country during the next two centuries is apparent
from many sources. It is seen, for example, in the
assistance rendered by the British Bishops in con-
demning the Donatists at the Council of Arles, in
314;4 in the fact that it was St. Martin of Tours
who sent Ninian,° in 401, to carry the Gospel as far
as the Forth; and in the circumstance that Gallic
Bishops, between the years 429 and 447 (and pro-
minently St. Germanus amongst them) ® were sent into
Britain to suppress the heresy of Pelagius, or Morgan
1 Preface to the Epistle to the Galatians.
2 H. and S. Cownetls, vol. i. p. 153.
3 Tbid. vol. i. Preface, pp. xviii, xix.
4 Ibid. vol. i. p. 7. 5 Bede. Hist. Ecc. iii. 4.
®’ H. and §. Councetls, p. 16.
a2 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
—that ‘brat bred here amongst us at Bangor,’ as our
own Scawen! so quaintly calls him—whose doctrines
had taken deep root in the British Isles. Churches
were subsequently dedicated to the orthodox Galli-
cans at Canterbury and at Candida Casa in Galloway
—from all which facts it would appear incident-
ally that the numerical strength of the Christians in
Britain in the middle of the fifth century was by no
means inconsiderable. Their fountain head was, how-
ever, still in Gaul, and it will be of importance to our
inquiry to remember that the mission of St. Patrick
to Ireland was an offshoot from Gaul also.”
1 Antiquities Cornu-britannick, or Observations, &e., by —
Scawen, Esq., from a MS. in the library of Thomas Astle, 1717, p. 2.
* Todd’s St. Patrick, p. 816, where he receives his commission
from St. Germanus.
CHAPTER V
ST. PATRICK
Havine here adverted to St. Patrick, it will not be
out of place—dismissing alike the unsupported state-
ments of medizval writers and the negative hypotheses
of nineteenth century criticism, such as that of Led-
wich—to inquire what we really possess in the way
of written material on which to rest our knowledge of
this personage. It will be seen, as we proceed, that
the process of our inquiry will bring to light certain
facts regarding Christianity in Gaul in the fourth
and fifth centuries which bear upon the general
question of sacerdotalism in the West, and upon the
position of the ‘Saints’ individually and collectively
in that system.
At Trinity College, Dublin, there exists a vener-
able and precious volume, the ‘ Book of Armagh ’—so
venerable as to its date and its contents that in the
year 807, when it was transcribed in its present form,
it was often obscure to the transcriber—so precious
that it contains ‘the oldest and most authentic
notices’ of the national Saint ‘now in existence ’—his
title-deeds to credit, in fact, and the sources from
which all other biographies, such as the ‘ Tripartite
Life,’ recently translated by Dr. Whitley Stokes, have
been formed. In his critical preface to the latter
D
34 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
work, the last-named Irish scholar sums up what he
regards as facts concerning Patrick.
He was born in the latter half of the fourth century, and
was reared a Christian. He had relatives in ‘the Britains’
(i.e. Great Britain), which he calls his patria. His father,
Calpornius, son of Potitus, was both a deacon and a decurio,
and therefore belonged to a Roman colony. . . . His father
lived at Bannauem Tabernie, a place probably on the west
coast of North Britain, and there, in his sixteenth year,
Patrick was taken captive. His captors took him to Ireland
. . . where he was employed in herding sheep. . . . After
six years he ran away from his master . . . . and after a three
days’ voyage. . . . journeyed home through a desert. A few
years afterwards he dreamed that he was summoned to Ire-
land, and, giving up his home, his parents, and his status as
a free-born man, he went to preach the gospel to the Irish
tribes. . . . Subsequently he travelled through ‘the Gauls’
and Italy, and spent some time in the islands of the Tyrrhene
Sea. . . . He was ordained a deacon, and, at some time in his
career, was a bishop. Almost worn out, we find him again
in Iveland, travelling through the remotest parts of the
country. ‘The Lord’s flock,’ he says, ‘was increasing rapidly,’
and he could not count the sons of the Scots and the kinglets’
daughters who were becoming monks and virgins of Christ.
He ordained clergy, and taught at least one priest from his
infancy ; but his success excited the jealousy of the rhetori-
cians of ‘the Gauls,’ in which country (France) he had
brethren (fratres).
All these facts are obtained, it must be remembered,
from documentary evidence, mainly autobiographical,
independent entirely of the later religious romances,
the earliest of which latter was written nearly two
centuries after his death. Having spoken of his
creed, his learning, and his character, Dr. Whitley
Stokes concludes—
ST. PATRICK BO
This is allthat can be stated with certainty about Patrick.
When and where he was born ; his mother’s name ; his baptis-
mal name; where he was captured; when and by whom he
was educated; when and by whom he was ordained; when
he returned to Ireland ; whether afterwards he left that
country; whither he travelled as a missionary; the date of
his death; the place of his burial: on each of these points
we have only the statements-—sometimes discrepant, and often
obviously false—contained in the religious romances above
mentioned, and certain other documents dating from the
eighth to the eleventh centuries.
Of the reality of the existence of this Patrick, son
of Calporn, we feel not the shadow of a doubt. But
he was not the only Patrick, and as time went on
traditions of one other Patrick at least came to be
commingled with his own. We have before us the
names of ten other contemporary Patricks, all eccle-
slastics, and spread over Wales, Ireland, France,
Spain, and Italy. The name appears to be that of a
grade or order in the Church rather than a proper
name in the usual sense. Thus Palladius is called
also Patrick in the‘ Book of Armagh,’ and the Patrick
(whichever he may have been) is represented as
styling Declan ‘the Patrick of the Desii,’ and Ailbhe
‘the Patrick of Munster.’ When Patrick sojourned
in a cave in an island in the Tyrrhene Sea he found
three other Patricks there.
What, then, is the meaning of this? We are about
to attempt an explanation, which, if it commends it-
self, may grow into areceived fact, and add a circum-
stance hitherto unknown to the Life of the Saint ; or,
on the other hand, if it can be refuted, will draw from
us the willing admission that we have been led into
error by a series of coincidences which are at all
events remarkable.
pd2
36 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
According, then, to the amalgamated legend,
Patrick had four names, which were Sucat, Cothraighe,
Magonius, and Patricius. Sucat, we are told, was
the name which was given him at his birth. It is
explained to signify Deus Belli, the God of War, and
‘was the name,’ says Dr. Whitley Stokes, ‘ of a Cymric
war god; in modern Welsh hygad (warlike),’ to which
that eminent Irish philologist significantly adds that
‘some of the exploits’ of this ancient deity ‘may have
helped to form the legend of our saint. It occurs to
us at once that, had the parents of this Patrick been
Christians, it would certainly have been, as Lanigan
has observed, ‘a very odd name’ to give their child.
With far greater reason may it be referred to a
Patrick other than the son of Calporn, whose parents
were pagans at all events at the date of his birth.
In the second name, Cothraighe, Dr. Whitley
Stokes suggests that we should recognise a reflex of
the Old Gaulish name Caturigos. If this be so, and
if rigos answers to the Irish raighe, we must see in
it not a genitive of a possible Old Gaulish riz, a king,
but simply the equivalent of raighe or raidhe, a word
which O'Donovan ' explains as a patronymic termina-
tion like the Greek udys, and Joyce,” who writes it
raidhe, as‘ a word suffixed to men’s names to designate
the tribes descended from them.’ Milchu, therefore,
who purchased him as a slave, and gave him this name,
regarded him as a member of the tribe Cathraighe,
or, inits continental and Latin form, Caturiges—a fact,
by the way, of the greatest importance, as illustra-
ting the ubiquity of the tribes to which the Saints
belonged, which, like their individual members, the
1 Book of Rights, p. 44. * Names, ser. ii. p. 115,
ST. PATRICK 37
Saints themselves, appear now in Ireland, now in
Gaul, now even in Italy itself.
To the third name, Magonius, we would call
special attention. Patrick, we are informed, was so
called by St. Germanus because of his conquest over
- the Magi. Apart from the extreme improbability of
this explanation, the form of the word Magonius for-
bids us to entertain the supposition. Magonius is an
adjectival form derived from Magonus, and meaning
‘one who has to do with Magonus.’ It becomes neces-
sary, then, to inquire who or what was Magonus.
In Gaulish inscriptions we get the name in three forms,
Magonus,’ Magunus,? and Mogounos.*? These were
men’s names ; but in countries where Celtic is spoken,
as Gliick has pointed out, nothing was more common
than for men to bear the names of gods. Who, then,
was the god? The answer is that the name is one of
those applied to the Gaulish and British Apollo. We
will instance its occurrence as follows. We have it,
first of all, in an Alsatian inscription, ‘ Apollini Granno
Mogouno.” Tt occurs again in the name of the river
Main; in Latin Menis or Menus; and in Old High
German Moin, Mohin, and Mogin, from which MJagon-
tiacum, Mogontiacum, or Mogontia (the present
Mayence) is derived.t Coming to Britain, we have an
inscription at Risingham, in Northumberland, which
reads, ‘ Deo Mogonti Cad.;’* another at Penrith, in
Cumberland, ‘ Deo Mogti’ (for Mogonti); a third at
Netherby, ‘ Deo Mogonti Vitire [Sancto];’ a fourth at
Plumpton Wall, ‘ Mounti [for Mogunti] Deo ;’ and a
fifth,‘ Deo Mouno Cad.,’ at the Roman Wall, intowhich
' Griit. 1142. * ? Thid. 1012. + Orell. 200.
4 Orell. 2026. ° See note in Bécker’s edit. of Notitia Dignitatum.
® See Hiibner, Corp. vii, 820 et seq.
38 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
latter the Alsatian inscription permits us to read a g
(as compare Mael for Magel, &c.), and make it
Mogouno, showing that there were two ways of de-
clining the name, the one with a nominative Mogon,
or Mogons, the other with a nominative Mogounos or
Magonus. 'To the same god belongs an inscription at
Musselborough, ‘ Apollint Granno, in which latter
epithet we seemingly recognise the name for the sun,
which in Goidelic is grian, genitive greine. In the
monosyllable Cad, attached to inscriptions in North
Britain, we may have the abbreviation for Cadurigi,
in which case the inscription would mean ‘to the
Caturigian Apollo,’ an interpretation suggested by
Sr. Joaquin Costa.!
Zeuss enables us to trace this word in Goidelic
thus: ‘Ir. mug (gen. moga) gl. “ puer, servus”
(modern mogh), whence mogan (juvenis hero).’ In
Brythonic, where map=mab means a son, we have
mabon, meaning a young hero, so that we can add
to our inscriptions the Deo Mapono’ at Armthwaite,
the Apollint Mapono at Hexham, and the Deo Sancto
Apollint Mapon at Ribchester. With the Irish form
we may further associate the Gothic magus (puer),
whence magia (puerulus); also the High German
magu (in maguzoho, pxdagogus ; maguzoha, nutrix ;
the Old Swedish magu, and the Old Nose mogr).
It is evident that here we are on the right track,
when we consider how essentially appropriate is the
meaning ‘youthful hero’ to Apollo, whether in the
Roman or the provincial conception of him.
A very curious possibility results from the study
of this word. It is that from this name in its simple
* Romanceros, Madrid, 1881, p. 821.
* Hiibner, Corp. vii. 882, 1845, 218.
a
ST. PATRICK 39
form and meaning—namely, mug, or mogh, or magus—
comes the term magus, as applied by Pliny, and sub-
sequently by Christian writers, to the Druid priests.
Its identity with the Persian name for the priests of
that country would have commended it to non-
Christian writers, while the pleasure of associating
it with that of the sorcerer Simon would have made
its adoption particularly acceptable to the Christian
adversaries of the superstitions against which they
waged war. ‘This view is rendered the more likely
by the fact that there can be no doubt that the word
‘servant, or ‘slave, of such and such a deity, was
the term applied by Celtic-, and we believe also by
Germanic-speaking! peoples first to their pagan
divinities, and afterwards to the Christian God and
his saints. The word Mogh, or Mug, itself was
actually used, as in the case of Mogh Ruith, the
‘servant of Ruth, Rudh,’ or the ‘ Wheel,’ a deity to
be identified with the sun, and therefore, in a sense,
with Apollo. So also Mogh Corb is ‘the slave of
Corb, and ‘Mug-Eime,’ the name of an apparently
divine dog, ‘the slave of the half.’ As examples of
other names of the same class we may point to Mael
Uma, ‘slave of Uma;’ Mael Brigte, ‘slave of Briget ;’
Gille Christ, ‘servant of Christ.’ In the case of Mogh
Ruith the man who bore that name was himself a
mighty wizard or Druid. It is not, then, an extra-
vagant supposition that in the word magus we have
the genuine term by which the Druids designated
themselves.
1 If so the word would be Karl, which seems to be the equivalent
of Mael. Prof. Rhys has pointed out that Mael Maccon would be the
equivalent of Karl Hundeson. It would not be used in that case, how-
ever, in any such sense as that to which we are here adverting.
40 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Patrick’s name, then, Magonius, might imply
that he was in some way connected with the pro-
vincial Apollo. We proceed a step further. Ausonius !
has handed down to us the names of certain persons
at Bordeaux marked out by him for eulogy, which
are formed in a precisely similar manner, such, for
example, as Ammonius, which is exactly a case in
point. As we shall see from what is to follow, it is
plain that the adjectival termination originally signi-
fied either that their relation to the god whose name
formed the first portion of the word was that of a
priest, or shrine servant, or that, as time went on
and religions changed, it was borne in virtue of
descent from a hierarchical family attached to his
service.
It is from the pedigree of Attius Tiro Delphidius
that we learn how such names arose and were
perpetuated. Attius was a poet, who when a boy
wrote verses in praise of Jove. His father was called
Attius Patéra, and was a famous teacher of rhetoric
at Rome in 339. The father of this latter Attius,
again, was Pheebitius of Beliocasses—that is, of
Bayeux. When we read of him he was a very old
man who had been appointed to a professorial chair
of grammar at Bordeaux. Previously to that, how-
ever, he had been a priest serving at the shrine of
Belenus, another name for the Gaulish and British
Apollo. From that fact it was that he received his
name Pheebitius, and his official title ‘ Beleni edituus,’
or ‘ Patéra,’ both of which terms signified ‘ priest of
Apollo,’ and the latter of which served, as we have
' See Auson. Professores, Carm. iv. v. x. xiv., and the notes to
Valpy’s edition. See also Hieronym. EHuseb. interp. in Chron. ad
annum Christi 339.
ST. PATRICK 4]
seen, to designate his son Attius, although, from the
praise bestowed on him by St. Jerome, we may take
it that he was a Christian.
More than this, however : Pheebitius was sprung,
we are told, from the stock of the Druids, ‘stirpe
Druidum,’ which is a statement of very considerable
importance, since it seems to show in the first place
that among the Druids, about whom we know so little,
there were sacerdotal families; and secondly that,
upon the fall of Druidism before the mandates of the
Roman Emperors, the members of those same sacer-
dotal families did not scruple to transfer their
allegiance to the new régime, or to perform sacred
offices in connection with it, or, which follows as a con-
sequence, to transfer to its uses allthat store of learning
of which we know that as Druids in Gaul they were
possessed. The term of existence, however, of the
Romano-provincial deities was not a long one.
Christianity rapidly supervened, and finally took its
place as the State-authorised and Imperial religion.
Can we doubt that the mantle which had fallen from
the shoulders of the Druids upon those of the servants
of Belenus would in like manner descend from the
shoulders of the latter upon those of the servants of
Christ? Several circumstances of history tend to
confirm the view that this was so. We might point
indeed to the composition of the Christian sacerdotal
system in the West in its entirety as a proof of this.
Prominent is the fact that just as there had been
sacerdotal families under the elder and pagan systems,
so there were, as we shall presently see, families of
saints in Gaul, and Britain, and Ireland. The re-
lationships between saints are perpetually cropping
up throughout their legends. Then, again, a very
42 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
numerous list might be drawn up of saints who, like
Palladius, Martinus, &c., bore—just as we hold that
Patrick did—the names of heathen deities. Lastly,
it may be that the sudden and firm hold which
Christianity gained on these Celtic-speaking peoples
can be most readily explained by the theory that it
was accepted readily by that class who monopolised
the learning of the age—namely, the sacerdotal class,
or caste, we might almost call it, which came, as we
have seen, from the stock of the Druids, handed on,
in Gaul, though not necessarily in Britain, through
the priests of the Roman gods. That Patrick belonged
to such a stock we venture to think is implied in the
fact that he bore the name Magonius, and the
question arises as to whether he himself had been a
heathen priest before he was converted, or whether
the name had merely descended to him. This we
cannot answer for certain, but it brings us to the
consideration of his fourth and last name, Patricius.
We have seen that the ‘ edituus’ of the shrine of
Apollo bore as a synonym for his official title the
name Patéra.' ‘Sic noncupant,’ says Ausonius,
‘ministros Apollinaris mystici.. Now in the collec-
tion of Irish canons in the Codex Valicellanus ” at
Rome, transcribed doubtless from one of those made
in Ireland early in the eighth century (although in-
dividual canons may have been earlier), the name of
the national saint, into whose mouth the sentences
are put, is not Patrick at all, but Parerius. When,
' The derivation of this word is uncertain, although the suggestion
of M. Roget de Belloguet that it isa form of the Armorican word paotr
(‘ serviteur,’ ‘employé ’) is worthy of attention.
* See Die irische Kanonensammlung, by H. Wasserschleben,
1874; the codex is a tenth-century one, A18 in the library of the
Oratory of Sta. Maria, Valicella, at Rome.
ST. PATRICK 43
therefore, we recall the fact that Patrick had fratres
among the rhetoricians of France, with whom, how-
ever, he was, for some reason or other, at variance ;
and when we add to that that his legend connects
him with Armorica and with Bordeaux, where, only
a generation or two before, the meaning of the word
Patéra was so clearly understood; and, to go one
step further still, when we remember how many
Patricks there were besides himself, we are led to the
conclusion that between this particular saint himself
and the worship of the provincial Apollo of Gaul and
Britain there had been, either in his own person or
in that of his immediate ancestors, some very close
connection indeed.
If in endeavouring to bring out these points we
have been able to throw some light upon the relation
of the pagan to the Christian sacerdotal systems in
Gaul, from which country our insular Christianity
was directly derived, the space occupied in this
seeming digression will not have been wasted.
We are even tempted to go a little further, and
recognising in the legends and superstitions which in
Ireland find their centre in the name of Patrick,
subject-matter of the self-same class with which, in a
less degree, we have to deal in the case of the
Cornish saints, to turn for a few moments to the
superstitions attaching until recently to the cultus
of that saint, and to the ritual associated with it,
an acquaintance with which is essential to a right
understanding of the amazing hold on the mind of
Irishmen which the magic of his name possessed and
vet possesses.
In his name, then, or in that of some other of
those saints who formed the rest of the constellation
44 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
of which he was the centre, a system of worship has
been carried on from time immemorial which, though
accepted by Christians, was not of Christian origin, but
part and parcel, as can be readily proved, of a vast
substratum of paganism once covering the face of
Western Europe, and traceable also in islands of the
Mediterranean, in North Africa, and portions of Asia.
The worship of wells with their sacred fishes, of lakes
with their sunken cities, or their fabulous monsters
dwelling in their depths, to which offerings of butter
were made; the association of water with death and
burial; the practice, called the dessa or turas, of
passing in circles, counted in odd numbers, around a
dolmen, or a cairn, or a circular enclosure, the sup-
posed bed or grave of a sacred ancestor ; the crawling
through cavities beneath magical rocks; the placing
the hands or fingers in holes in pillar-stones and walls;
the custom of offering shreds of cloth, or hair, or
crooked pins, or nails at some ‘ blessed’ spot; the
turning a stone round the body for purposes of cursing
or otherwise; the sacred seasons of the year; the
Midsummer fires; the preparations on November Eve
for the visits of the dead—all these, and countless
other observances practised in the names of Patrick,
or Bridget, or Declan, or some other saint, on their
pattern or festival days, or at the shrines set apart
for their cultus, were simply the relics of a pagan
ritual, fulminated against with some effect by the
edicts of kings and the Councils of the Church in
Germany, France, and Spain, but with little or none
in the ‘Sacred Island’! in the Far North-West, where
' The author has long been engaged on a work the object of which
is to compare the ancient monuments and superstitions of Ireland
with those of other countries.
ST. PATRICK 45
Druidism, in its most barbarous guise, held its
ground secure from the onslaughts of Roman legions,
and where Christian missionaries, recognising, as it
would seem, that assimilation of observances need
not prejudice the doctrines of their faith, exercised
toleration, and, in common with all other immigrants
to the island shores, suffered themselves to become
‘Hibernis Hiberniores.’
True, Patrick is always represented as at war
with the demons of the old mythology—so realistically
so, sometimes, that we are tempted to think of him
as an invader with an army at his back. The
mountain Croagh Patrick owes its special sanctity to
the victory he obtained there over Crom Dubh, who
may be looked upon, perhaps, as the god of either
the pagan ancestors of the O’Malleys or of their pre-
decessors. A cleft in the north side is pointed out
by oral tradition as the hollow into the ground be-
neath which the saint drove the demons who annoyed
him on the summit, while a lake below, called Loch-
na-Corra, bears the name of a female fiend, the
fiercest of them all, whom he drove into the earth
with such violence that its waters, previously hidden,
welled forth and covered the spot. For all this,
however, the ritual of the older cultus was too
strong and too popular to be obliterated, and, the
idols having been dethroned, the Christians permitted
the observances to be continued in the names and
under the patronage of the pioneers of their faith,
with here and there, we suspect, a genuine old pagan
name received unconsciously into the ‘odour of
sanctity’ as time went on.
The observances at Croagh Patrick on August
15th, at the Wells of Struel, near Downpatrick, on
46 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
St. John’s Eve; at Holy Island, on the Shannon, at
Whitsuntide; and at Lough Derg in the late summer
and autumn, are among those specially connected
with Patrick. Of these the most ancient and famous
pilgrimage was that to Croagh Patrick, the ‘Mecca
of Ireland,’ as O'Donovan called it. Hither, on the
appointed day—Black Crom’s Friday—flocked de-
votees by thousands from all parts of the island.
Previous to climbing the path leading to the apex,
the pilerims passed seven times round a pile of stones
forming a rude altar, bearing the name of St. Benan.
This done, they crawled to the centre, a distance of
fifteen yards, on bare and bended knees, over heaps
of sharp stones, blood flowing copiously the while ;
but here, as in all other trials, so intensely wrapt
were they in the enthusiasm which their task inspired
that all sense of pain or fatigue was deadened, even
in the oldest and weakest. No cry or murmur ever
escaped an Irish pilgrim’s lips. On the altar was a
cross, having reached which, they hung strips of
cloth to the transverse beam. On the stones, forming
the altar, concentric circles are sculptured, which, to
judge from a passage in the Glossary of Cormac, were,
we think, emblematic of the sun, in connection with
the worship of which it would seem that the rotatory
courses, or rounds, always made ‘ sun-ways,’ were
instituted. They next walked barefoot up the Casan
Padrwig, ‘ over stones as sharp as oyster-shells with
their sharp edges upwards,’ says an eye-witness.
Arrived at the summit, they found themselves on the
spot where, according to the written legend, Patrick,
surrounded by birds of sable hue, strove with the
powers of darkness, until Victor, ‘the angel of the
Scotic race,’ came with his white birds to relieve and
ST. PATRICK 47
console him. In a truly Odinic passage—we feel sure
that there is a close affinity between these fables and
Teutonic mythology—we read that ‘it was in a bird’s
shape that Victor was wont to come to Patrick,’ and
that on the occasion of one visit to him near Mount
Slemish, in Antrim, ‘he left the impression of his
feet —bird’s claws, we suppose—‘ in the rock.’
On the verge of the apex the pilgrims first did
honour to a stone, in which was a hollow supposed
to have been made by Patrick’s knee, for, ike Fin
MacCumhail, whenever his knee or his hand or his
crozier (with Fin it was his sword) touched a rock,
the imprint of it remained in the surface. The prac-
tice was for the pilgrim to place in it his own knee,
bleeding from the effect of the sharp stones over
which he had crawled. Thence, once more on their
knees, the devotees crawled for twenty yards to the
rude stones which formed the altar of a little church
called Teampull Patruig, and having paid their devo-
tions there walked fifteen times around it on a path
which skirts the apex of the peak. Next they visited
a small enclosed space resembling a dried-up well,
called Patrick’s Bed, and, if they had come there for
a certain cure, turned round seven times in it, and
there remained all night. This done the ceremony
was completed by their descending the mountain by
another precipitous path to a place called the Relic
Mhuire, where there are three circles, each thirty
yards in circumference, and going seven times in
circuits round each of them, repeating at the same
time, in obedience to a Christian injunction, seven
aves, seven paters, and one creed, the like number of
which they had repeated at each of the foregoing
‘stations, with the exception of that at the altar on
48 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
the summit, where the number prescribed was fifteen
paters, fifteen aves, and one creed.
We will do no more than glance at other pilgrim-
ages to spots connected with Patrick. At Lough
Derg, which in the Middle Ages became the most
famous resort, and attracted pilgrims from Britain and
the Continent, the devotees were required to pass
three times round each of seven penitential beds,
Patrick’s bed being the largest, and finally to pass
twenty-four sleepless hours in a cave, for which a
darkened chapel has since been substituted. At
Struel, after first taking sod from Patrick’s grave at
Downpatrick, on which ‘no weed would ever grow,
but only grass and shamrock,’ the principal object of
adoration was a well, which, precisely at twelve
o'clock in the night of Midsummer Eve, poured forth
a double volume of water, and was reputed to effect
most miraculous cures. To climb a hill bare-kneed,
and to be ‘ turned’ in a rude seat formed of natural
rocks, called ‘ Patrick’s Chair,’ formed also a part of
the observances at this latter place.
Enough has been said to show what the name of
his national saint means to an Irishman, and to indi-
cate how much of the tradition about him relates to
a veritable historical personage, how much may be
distributed among others who bore the name, and
how much may be relegated to the superstitions inci-
dent to a previously existing order of things. To the
ecclesiastical element he may be regarded as what
Fin MacCumhail is to the lay. Not only was he the
bringer of the Gospel, but he was also, in a sense,
that intensely spiritual side of the Irish nature which
was there already to receive it. To the heart and
mind of the simplest peasant of to-day he is the link
ST. PATRICK 49
between earth and heaven. Take the patron saints of
other countries—St. James, St. Denys, St. Andrew, St.
David, St. George—they date but from the romance of
chivalry. Patrick ismuch more. He is one with the
soil itself. Asa giant of old he cleaves the moun-
tains ; he causes new lakes to arise; he leaves his im-
pression on the rocks. As a man, living in the fourth
and fifth centuries, he teaches the Irish the faith of
Christ ; as a saint of to-day he gathers to himself—no
longer merely from the four provinces of Erin, but
from the four quarters of the earth—his scattered
people ; and bids them, according to their old adage,
‘leave their weapons outside the dining-hall’ and
celebrate his feast with harmony and mirth.
We shall not be far wrong if, in judging of other
saints besides Patrick, we apply to their legends,
and the superstitions which may survive regarding
their lives, the same mixed method of interpretation
which we have here applied to him.
ta
500 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CHAPTER VI
POSSIBLE TRACES OF CHRISTIANITY IN CORNWALL DURING
THE ROMAN PERIOD, A.D. 250-450
Wuitst Christianity was spreading itself north-
wards and westwards through Britain, it is scarcely
probable that the Dumnonian peninsula should have
been entirely exempt from its influence. Even had
we no external evidence, from the pages of history, of
the presence here of Roman merchants who carried
on the tin trade, we have internal proof, in the
western district especially, of a large resident popula-
tion, who, from the traces they have left behind them,
had certainly come in contact with the civilisation of
the Roman province. Beehive huts, built in the
manner loosely known as ‘ Cyclopean,’ oval chambers
nestling in the thickness of a surrounding rampart,
detached circular enclosures environed by fortified
banks, have each in turn given to the explorer’s sho-
vel independent testimony, in the shape of coins, iron
implements, and the red glazed pottery inaccurately
called Samian ware, of their having been occupied
during the Romano-British period, in some instances
at a time when nominally Christian Emperors wore
the purple.’ I have noticed at length elsewhere the
identity which exists between one class of these
structures, the ‘hut clusters,’ and some found in
1 Nenia Cornubia, p. 258 et seq.
[PLaTE I.
THE TOORYBRENELL, OR SCHOOL-HOUSE, INISHMURRAY.
TRAHAUN-A-CHORREAS, OR THE LENT TRAHAUN, INISHMURRAY.
From etchings bu the Author, after Wakeman.
IRISH MONASTIC BEEHIVE HUTS, FOR COMPARISON WITH CORNISH BEEHIVE DWELLINGS.
THE ROMAN PERIOD 51
North Wales.'. I may here add that a similarity
equally striking is noticeable between another class—
namely, the ‘beehive huts’ and the fortified en-
closures, and certain primitive dwellings in Ireland
attributed to, and often called by the names of, the
earliest native Saints, whether solitaries or cenobites.
The architecture, if it is worthy of such a name,
of St. Brendon’s oratory, of which Lord Dunraven
gives a picture,” as well as the cell of the same Saint,’
is reproduced at Bosporthennis, in the parish of
Zennor. The same may be said of three habitations
figured by Mr. Petrie in his essay on the ‘ Round
Towers.’* Again, the position and ground plans of
the buildings on St. Senach’s Island Magherees,® as
well as that of Inishmurray Cashel,® remind us of
several similar enclosures buried in the furze of our
crofts, or perched on the very edges of our cliffs.”
The cells at Inishmurray, sketched by Mr. Wakeman,?
recall to us Cornish beehive huts, and since there
seems to be little doubt that the Irish ones were built
and inhabited by Christians, it will be as well for
1 Arvona Antiqua, by Elias Owen. Two papers published in the
Arch. Cambrensis. Seealsoa paper entitled Vestiges of Harly Habi-
tations in Cornwall, read by the writer at the Exeter meeting of the
Archeological Institute in 1873.
? Notes on Irish Architecture, plate xxiii.
3 Thid. plate xxiv. 4 Pp. 180, 181.
> Notes on Irish Architecture, Lord Dunraven, vol. i., plate facing
p. 88. Mr. Petrie attributed the erection of these structures in Ireland
to the Firbolg and Tuatha De Danann tribes, who differed from the
rest in building with stone and not wood, but these are legends.
° Thid. plate facing p. 44.
7 E.g. Gurnard’s Head Chapel, with hut circles also enclosed in the
ramparts which enclose the headland.
8 See plate i, where copies of Mr. Wakeman’s drawings have been
made from the Journ. of the Roy. Archeol. Assoc. of Ireland, 1885-6,
pp. 204, 207.
E2
52 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
future excavators to bear this fact in mind when
making researches amongst those in Cornwall, lest, in
imagining them to possess an entirely pre-Christian
antiquity, they may be led to discard traces which
are really genuine and valuable. It is perhaps worth
mentioning that, in common with some unquestion-
ably Christian enclosures in the Isle of Man,’ one of
yn: 2B pak \
9
Ne SY Ge ee
hy ye Me fe SEY 8 = Pras: as "2
é “% an wy a D
al He ety i
ih raat a
i Hi ni
for
BOSPORTHENNIS BEEHIVE HUT FOR COMPARISON WITH ROUND HOUSES
AT INISHMURRAY (see plate i.)?
our groups of hut clusters—that of Chysoister, in the
parish of Gulval—is locally known as ‘ the Chapels.’
During my excavations there a few years since, I
discovered that the north-east end of one of the
chambers (26 feet long by 18 feet broad) had been
partitioned off from the rest of the area by a line of
stones running transversely across the floor, and
' I was informed of this fact by a gentleman residing in the Isle
of Man, who has given considerable attention to the antiquities there,
and who showed me plans of several of these ‘Chapels,’ consisting of
banks of earth surrounding a central structure.
* From J. T. Blight’s Churches of West Cornwall.
THE ROMAN PERIOD 53
forming, as it seemed to me, the coping or step of a
raised pavement or dais. Near the doorway of this
same chamber lay a rough granite block which had
fallen from the wall, having a cavity or basin hol-
lowed out in its surface, 10 inches long and 4 inches
deep. Similar ones are found in Ireland, often near
churches, and are called balldns. So little did
I think at the time that Christian remains could
possibly occur in this place, that the idea of connect-
ing the hut in question with a place of worship never
crossed my mind until recently. Indeed, I do not
think the proof sufficient to allow of our doing so
now, but I may have said enough to show that,
should the excavation of similar groups be under-
taken, special attention should be devoted to the hut
occupying in each cluster the position of the one I
have described.! To pass on to something more
tangible, I may refer to Dr. Barham’s valuable paper
in the ‘Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall,’
on that most interesting monument of Christian times
in Britain—although it is not necessarily in any
other sense a Christian monument—the ‘ Constan-
tine’ stone at St. Hilary.2 If Professor Hiibner
is right in considering it as a mile stone, then I think
we may infer that, very early in the fourth century,
there was a Roman road through Cornwall, and by
consequence a very considerable communication with
the rest of Britain. More to the point, still, was a
discovery made at Padstow, to which Mr. Haslam
directed our attention in 1847, of certain pieces of
Roman pottery on which were stamped the portions
1 See the plan in my paper read at Exeter in 1873, quoted above,
where it is marked F.
2 Journal R.I.C. No. xix. 1877, p. 366.
54 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
of a cross, together with the sacred monogram.! We
are not, then, utterly devoid of some fair presumptive
evidence of the presence of Christians in Cornwall
during the Roman period. The first, and indeed the
only record of their presence, however, relates not to
native converts, but to exiles. The Isles of Scilly
(‘insula Sylina, que ultra Britannias est’) served as a
place of banishment for heretics. Sulpicius Severus,”
who wrote only twenty years after the event, relates
that two Bishops, Instantius and Tiberianus, con-
victed of the Priscilline heresy, were carried thither
into exile in the year 380. Fortunately only a very
few of the Legend-writers have been bold enough to
claim for the subjects of their pseudo-biography a
date earlier than the middle of the fifth century.
The life of the martyr St. Melior or Melor,’ said to
have suffered in A.D. 411, is, says Mr. Haddan, ‘an
Ambresbury legend of the eleventh century, “ in-
certum ” even to William of Malmesbury.’
1 Archeological Journal, vol. iv. 1847, p. 307.
* Hist. Sac. ii. 51. H. and 8. Cowncils, vol. ii. Addenda, p. xxi.
3 Capgrave, L. N. A. 229; Acta SS. Jan. 8, 1, 186; H. and S.
Councils, vol. i. p. 86.
CHAPTER VII
CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND : VALUE OF EVIDENCE
DERIVABLE FROM IRISH SOURCES
THE later decades of the fifth century saw the im-
passable gulf of Saxon heathendom fixed between the
Christian Churches of the Continent, whose main-
spring by this time was at Rome under the immediate
successors of Leo the Great, and the isolated British
Christians now confined with the rest of their race to
Cumbria, Wales, and West Wales or Dumnonia. Cut
off from the influence of Councils and regulative
decrees, and thus unaffected by the changes which
were in progress during this great epoch of Church
organisation abroad, Christianity in Britain was left
to grow up as a wild vine drawing nutriment from,
and therefore assimilating itself to, its own native and
uncultivated soil. One branch had already trailed
over into Ireland, the land of the Scoti as it then was,
and there it soon bore fruit in a manner that was
truly marvellous. Scattered Christian families were
already there when St. Patrick arrived, if we may
put any credence in the story in which it is stated
that he was taken to see ‘a certain stone cave of
wonderful workmanship,’ containing ‘an altar under-
ground, having on its four corners four chalices of
56 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
olass.! Jt was, however, to the Gallican mission con-
oD 2 >
ducted by Patrick himself, an event nearly coinci-
dent with the arrival of the Saxons in Britain, that
the great awakening was due which caused Ireland
to be known far and wide as the land of the Saints,
and the missionary himself to be placed first on the
roll of his native Hagiology, as the founder and
‘chieftain’ of the first of the three orders into which
the Saints there were afterwards divided—namely, of
the ‘ordo sanctissimus.’” The island now became
the centre of all the religious and literary life of the
North. Thither every peaceful scholar, every ‘ philo-
sophus,’*® as the monk of those early days is charac-
teristically called by Sozomen, fled for refuge before
the pagan hordes which, on the withdrawal of the
Roman legions, swooped down into their place. Leland, Itin. vol. ii. p. 15.
6 Very doubtful if it has anything to do with the name. Mon. Dio.
Eix., p. 487.
7 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 188, from the Exeter Registers.
S This name occurs in the Aberdeen Breviary, March 1.
” Leland, Iti. vol. iii. p. 15, spelt there Maruanus.
eo Ne om
IRISH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 67
the possibility that he, and not the Welsh Saint
Meunan, gave name to the parish of St. Mawnan,
ascribed to St. Maunanus in the list of Oliver.
Germochus was a king, a statement in which Leland?
and a local tradition, embodied in the verse which
couples him with Breaca, agree. William of
Worcester’s informant, on the other hand, calls him
a bishop,® and tells us that his day was kept on the
feast of the birth of John. He gives his name to the
parish of Germo, where the church contains remains
of great antiquity, and in the churchyard of which is
a curious canopied seat (possibly an altar tomb) known
as St. Germo’s chair.* Crewenna is another ‘nudum
nomen’ retained in the parish of Crowan, where the
feast is kept on the Ist of February.
The two next Saints on the list, Helena and Etha
(or Tecla),’? present some difficulty. They have ap-
parently slipped into the list by some wrong-reading
or mistake in the names—a kind of error very likely
to happen in the case of a scribe of the tweltfh century,
who knew nothing of the native Saints, but only
of those in his own Calendars. The word Etha,
however, may possibly be that of the Irish virgin
1 «Maunanus and Stephen,’ Mon. Dio. Ea. p. 441.
* Leland, loe. cit.
3 Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 235, where the spelling is
‘Gyermochus.’
4 This structure is early, but the arches are pointed; the capitals
are plain, and the pillars thick. For a good representation of it, and
of other antiquities in Germo church, see Blight’s Churches of West
Cornwall, Parker, 1865, pp. 76, 77.
5 Mr. Boase (in his article on Breaca) gives the alias of Thecla.
In Leland the word is written small, and out of theline. Tecla, indeed,
is a regular Saint in the Roman Calendars. She appears also in the
Armorican Litany edited by H. and 8. Cowncils, vol. ii. p. 81. Her
day was Sept. 23.
F 2
68 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Yth,! mentioned by Ussher, and whose Life must have
been well known, since it was written by Bede himself.
Of St. Gwithian, with his late name-form Gothian,” we
have no vestiges save in the name of the parish in
which Connerton is situated, bordering on the ‘ Est-lo,’
or eastern branch of the Hayle estuary, and perhaps
in the crumbling walls of an ancient church amongst
the sand dunes.
Last on the list is St. Wynnerus, known also as
St. Guigner and Fingar,’ and whose name is preserved
in Cornwall in the parish of Gwinear. We have seen
that one legend makes him the precursor of St. Hya,
and tells us that he had a sister called Piala. A
history of himself, his sister, and their fellow martyrs,
attributed to St. Anselm but pronounced ‘ spurious’
by Mr. Haddan, narrates that he was a disciple
of St. Patrick. Having returned from Armorica,
whither he had gone on a mission enterprise, to his
native country (Ireland), he found that island con-
verted to the faith, and his father Clito dead. He
set out accordingly for Cornwall in company with
Piala, and a band of 777 men, of whom 7 were
bishops baptised by Patrick. In the year 450‘ this
whole multitude was slaughtered by our old friend
of the other Legends, the same insatiable tyrant
1 Mr. Collins, of St. Erth, mentions that her Life was written by
Bede, and refers to Ussher, p. 696. See Par. Mem., MS., Dr. Borlase,
p. 109. Her name may occur in Landithy, which was, we suspect, the
original name of Madron parish.
2 Oliver, Mon. Dio. Ha. p. 489.
* Lives are found in Acta SS. Mart. 23, iii. 456; Migne, Patrol.
clix. 826 (both quoted by H. and §. Cowncils, vol. i. p. 36): there is
a notice of him in Ussher, Index Chron. fol. edit. 1687, p. 521, which
places him in the year 460. Le Grand contains a Life, edit. Kerdanet,
Brest, 1837, p. 812.
4 This is the Bollandist date.
IRISH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 69
Theodoric. Turning to the pages of Le Grand, we
find another Life of Guiner, as he is there called,
collected (the author tells us) from MS. Legends in
the Cathedral of Vennes and the College of Fol-coét.
In the ‘Proprium Sanctorum’ of the former place
his day is marked as the 14th of December, and there
is a chapel founded in his honour in the same
cathedral. He was the patron of the ancient parish
of Languengar, in Brittany.
It is curious to note that the Breton Legend-
writers brought St. Guiner direct from Ireland to
their own province of Cornubia or Cornouaille, and
made the tyrant Theodoric a prince of that country.
Otherwise the main facts, such as the name of his
father, and his martyrdom in company with a band
of followers, are the same. It is not unlikely that
sometimes in respect to localities the Breton Legend
may embody the truth, and that the stories followed
the Arthurian Legends of Geoftry of Monmouth from
Brittany to England in the twelfth century. Still, it
must be noted, in favour of the priority of Cornish
tradition, that the older country gives its heritage of
legend to the new, and not (except in very special
cases) vice versa.” The universality of traditions of a
certain type, and the consequent appropriation by
one district of events belonging to another, is one of
the most difficult problems we have to solve in the
course of our enquiry into the dates and localities of
these early Saints. Indeed, as the student of Oriental
religions has special occasion to know, difficulties,
topographical and chronological alike, must always
1 Le Grand, Vies des Saints, p. 814.
2 Mr. Haddan speaks of Cornish Saints as migrating to Brittany
(Councils, vol. i. p. 157, note).
70 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
be expected to arise in cases where the religion of a
country, handed on through long ages, has never
actually been replaced by another faith, but where it
has suffered continual modifications from internal
sources, or has had superadded to it from without
new objects of devotion derived from connection
with kindred or neighbouring peoples.
Dr. Borlase throws out a hint! that in the case of
the parish of Phillack, now bearing a dedication to
St. Felicitas,? we have the name of Gwinear’s sister
Piala. If this be so, out of the thirteen names of
Saints, composing this Irish company, we have no less
than nine which have given their names to parishes
in the vicinity of their landing place at Hayle. One
other parish there is—a central one in the group—
which probably bears the name of a contemporary
Irish Saint. We refer to St. Erth. William of Wor-
cester® had heard a story that Uni and Ia hada
brother called Herygh, a name which might readily
become Ereh or Erth. This Saint has been identified
by Oliver,’ and more recently by Mr. Kerslake,’ with
a person of the same name who was patron Saint of
Chittlehampton, in Devon. There is, however, a St.
Hierytha, to whom the latter church may with a
greater show of reason be ascribed ;° and it seems
probable that Mr. Collins, rector of St. Erth in the
1 Tn his own memoranda, MS. Par. Mem. fol. 15, No. 6.
? Oliver (Mon. Dio. Ex. p. 438) assigns this Saint to Phillack. It
is so named in Bishop Bronescombe’s Register. There was a ‘ Con-
nerton Chapel’ in the parish, and the vicar is entitled to the tithe sheaf
of Runnier (query Revier ?)
’ Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 285.
4 Oliver, Mon. Dio. Ha. p. 446.
° Paper read at Bodmin at the Congress of Brit. Arch. Assoc., 1876,
and reprinted from their Journal, vol. xxxiil. p. 16.
° Camden ascribes it to this Saint.
IRISH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 71
last century, was correct when he stated his opinion
that the founder of his church was one Ercus,! ‘a
king’s son in Ireland, consecrated bishop by St.
Patrick.’ He adds that in the books at Exeter the
name was written Ercy, or Ericus, and in the Kings’
Books Ergh.
In the Land’s End district are three Irish Saints,
long grouped together in a separate Deanery—Burian,
St. Levan, and Sennen. ‘The first of these, St.
Buriena,” would belong to a later date than those we
have been considering, if we could credit the tradi-
tions which place her in the sixth century.? As usual
she was a king’s daughter. Her name has been
identified by Mr. Adams‘ and others with that of
‘ Bruinsech the slender,’ mentioned in the Martyrology
of Donegal.’ A note appended to the entry of this
name there, and suggesting the connection between
it and the name of a town in England, would have
little weight, were it not that Leland® supplies what
Whitaker considers an intermediate link in the ety-
mological chain by mentioning a certain Bruinet, a
prince’s daughter, in connection with the life of St.
Piran. Again, in one of Piran’s Lives a story is given
of the abduction of a beautiful maiden, called
Bruinecha, from her cell by a neighbouring chieftain,
1 Borlase, quoting Mr. Collins’s Hxcerpta, who again quotes Ussher.
MS. Par. Mem. fol. 14 (A), No. 2.
2 «The Life of St. Buriena, Virgin,’ in the Acta SS. (May 29, vol.
vil. p. 88), is mentioned by H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 700, as ‘
purely modern compilation.’
3 Mr. Boase’s article, ‘St. Buriena,’ in Smith’s Dict. Christ. Biog,
4 Journal B.I.C., No. xiv., April 1878, p. 140.
> May 29.
° Ttin, vol. ili. p. 195. Her name is simply thrown in as ‘ Bruinet
filia cujusdam reguli.’
72 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
and this name Colgan!’ identifies naturally enough
with Bruinsecha, possibly the Bruinet of Leland, and
the Buriana of our Legends. It really seems to be
almost confirmatory of this view that the feast day
attributed in an English Martyrology? (May 29) to
St. Burian is the same as that of St. Bruinsech in the
Donegal Calendar. The present feast is held on the
nearest Sunday to May 12.’
Of St. Levan more can be gathered from local tra-
dition than from the attempt to identify him with any
individual found in existing Legends. The homely
tales which have wound themselves round his name
perhaps indicate to us, even after a lapse of twelve
centuries, something of the inner life of an obscure
Trish hermit. Dr. Borlase graphically records his
visit to the church of St. Levan in or about the year
1740.4. ‘Whilst we were at dinner at the inn,’ he
says, ‘it was very pleasant to hear the good old
woman, our Landlady, talk of St. Levin, his cursing
the name Johannah, his taking the same two fishes
twice following, his entertaining his sister Manaccan,
and as a confirmation of everything we were desir’d
at our departure to observe his walk, the stone he
fish’'d upon, with some other particulars of like
importance. Mr. Hunt has so amply edited these
Legends in his ‘ Romances and Drolls’ that for a fuller
account of them we cannot do better than betake
' Colgan, Acta SS. Hib. vol. i. p. 459.
? Adams, Journal R.I.C. loc. cit. The date of the English Mar-
tyrology is as late as 1608.
5 Burian is the Eglosberrie of ‘Domesday.’ A considerable cultus
arose around the place in later times: the son of one of the three
Cornish princes, called Geruntius, was cured by her merits of a malady.
Another tradition connects it with Athelstan, under whom it was said
to have become a collegiate church.
4 MS. Par. Mem. p. 4, No. 8.
IRISH SAINTS IN CORNWALL Lo
ourselves to his work.!_ Perhaps Porthleven bears his
name, and was a favourite haven for this patron of
fishermen, particularly when on a visit to the parish
of his sister, St. Breaca. Carew calls St. Levan ‘St.
Siluan,’ an example possibly of the tendency to
reduplicate the Saint. This form is still retained in
the euphonious name of an estate—Selena, which, it
is needless to say, has nothing to do with the goddess
of night.” Siluanus (or Silvanus) is the name of
a chapel mentioned under Burian in the ‘ Inquis.
Nonarum;’* of such endless variation are these
names capable. Locally the parish is known as
Slevan.
The name of Sennen occurs in Irish and Welsh
Calendars as a Saint and bishop, and a friend of St.
David. His death is said to have taken place in
544. Dr. Borlase, however, preferring to keep up
the connection with the Hayle group, identifies him
with the St. Sinninus found in Leland’s list.2 St.
Warne’s Bay in Scilly recalls the name of another
Trish Saint, Warna, about whom a tradition, says
Troutbeck,’ is handed down amongst the St. Agnes
Islanders, that he came over from Ireland in a little
1 Popular Romances of the West of England, 2nd series, p. 9 et
seq., where, we find, he substitutes St. Breaca for St. Manaccan, as the
sister of St. Levan.
2 On consideration we do not think that St. Siluan can be explained
by a reduplication of the word ‘ Saint.’
3 Oliver, Mon. Dio. Ex. p. 487.
4 Rice Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 240. His festival March 1. There
is a Senan mentioned in a hymn attributed to St. Columba, in Reeves’s
Adamnan, p. 227. The feast day at Sennen is kept on June 30.
Tonkin MS. G., p. 1 (a lost MS. quoted by Dr. Borlase, Par. Mem.
p. 8, No. 22.)
5 Borlase, Ant. of Corn. p. 887 and note. In Cressy’s Saints is a
Senan, who died in 660; his day was April 29.
& Troutbeck, Isles of Scilly, p. 149.
74 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
wicker boat, covered on the outside with raw hides,
and that the bay in question was the spot where he
landed. With Irish Saints, too, rather than with
Armorican, St. Rumon (Ronan,’ Renan, Ruan) must
be classed. Leland, quoting from his Legend, which
he had an opportunity of examining at Tavistock,
tells us that he was‘ genere Scotus Hiberniensis ;’ and
that there was in Cornwall a wood called the Nemezean,
once on a time filled with wild beasts, in which St.
Rumon made himself an oratory (at) Falemutha.’
Ordulf, Duke of Cornwall, carried away his bones to
Tavistock.? The author of the history of Cury* adds
that there is a MS. in the Bodleian Library containing
a history of St. Ruan, and that it mentions the district
known as Menég (Meneage) as the Silva Nemea.
Besides three churches in Cornwall (Ruan Lanyhorne,’
and the two Ruans in Meneage) he has a chapel in
the parish of Redruth,* and, as might be expected from
the deportation of his remains to Tavistock, a church
in Devon, Rumonsleigh,’ bears his name. Of the
Breton version of his Life in Le Grand the same may
be said as in the case of that of St. Gwinear. In
many points we have details in common, but the
names (and in this instance that of the Nemzean wood,
here called the ‘ forest of Nevet’) are transferred to
1 A Life of Ronan in Le Grand, edit. Kerdanet, p. 286. Com-
memorated in the Aberdeen Brev., May 22.
* In the text this word stands by itself, apart from the context.
3 Leland, Collectanea, 2nd edit. vol. iii. pp. 152, 153; also vol. ii.
p. 256.
* Cury and Gunwalloe, by Cummings, Truro, 1875, p. 2, note.
5 Dedicated, however, Oct. 17, 1821. Called in Stapeldon’s Reg.
‘Ece. de Lanreython.’ Oliver, Mon. Dio. Ez. p. 442.
“ ©A chapel to St. Rumon in Redruth Town. Ha. Reg. Borlase,
MS. Par. Mem. p. 52.
7 Oliver, Mon. Dio. Ea. p. 452.
IRISH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 1D
Armorica. In that country he possessed a hermitage,
and several places retain his name.!
With the name Nemea and Nevet we may com-
pare a word used by the Irish writers to express a
sacred territory. According to O’Donovan the word
nemed was ‘ explained by the glossographists as nemh-
zath—that is, terra celestis sive sacra.’ ‘The aged and
venerable trees that were planted in these nemeds by
the patrons or distinguished patres of the churches
belonging to them were called jidh Nemhedh (arbores
termini), and their destruction by fire is sometimes
recorded as a lamentable occurrence. That jfidh
nemhedh was understood by the Irish writers to
signify ‘ the trees of a sanctuary’ O'Donovan under-
takes to demonstrate in opposition to Dr. O’Conor
and Thomas Moore. ‘The meaning of the word
fidh nemhedh, he says, ‘ appears from a tract in the
“Book of Ballymote” concerning the Argonautic Ex-
pedition and the destruction of Troy. In this tract
the sacred shrine at which Polites and Priam were
killed by Pyrrhus is called by the very name fidh
nemhedh, which is sufficient to show that the Irish
scholar who translated that tract from Justin could
find no better word to express the sacred altar of
Priam, over which an aged laurel hung and embraced
the household gods in its shade, according to the
description :
‘ Addibus in mediis, nudoque sub etheris axe
Ingens ara fuit, juxtaque veterrima laurus
Incumbens are, atque umbra complexa Penates.
1 For places in Brittany called by St. Rumon’s name, and references
to notices of him, see Le Grand, edit. Kerdanet, pp. 289, 290, and notes.
The Bollandists give his day as June 8, according to Kerdanet’s note.
Also H. and 8. Councils, vol. ii. p. 87, note.
76 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
‘It was even in the fidh nemhedh of Jove, says the
Trish monk who translated the story, that “ the cruel
wretch dared to slay the son in the presence of the
father.” ’?
So far O'Donovan. We can scarcely doubt that
Meneage once possessed the Fidh Nemhedh, or Silva
Nemea, which gave it its name—‘ filled with wild
beasts’ in the sense, perhaps, that pagans perpetuated
their sacred rites and sylvan orgies there, and that
the Armorican ‘Nevet’ represented the transmigration
of the name to that country.”
In the name of our Cornish parish Feock we have
that of one of the most famous of the Irish Saints,
Fiacc, bishop of Sletty, the disciple of Patrick, and
withal a bard who could sing (in a hymn still extant)
the praises of his master.? Fictitious as the reputed
dedication as given by Oliver to a St. Feoca clearly
1 O'Donovan, M8. Letters, Ord. Surv. Co. Donegal, 14, c. 19, p.
119, in Royal Irish Academy, Dublin.
? In the romantic period of the Irish Annals we find the name
Nemedh as that one of the early colonists. His people are opposed to
the Fomorians, or Giant Tribes coming from the North. In current
popular tradition his name is handed down in a form which takes the
pronunciation Nevvy. Stories of his battles are still told in the wildest
portions of the mountains of Donegal, where a narrow and rugged gorge
near Dun-Lewy (the Goidelic reflex of Lugdunum) bears his name. It
is difficult to dissociate this proper name from that of the German tribe
partly settled west of the Rhine, called Nemetes. If we might seek for
a rational basis for the legend of Nemedh’s opposition to the Fomorians,
we should venture to hint that it might have reference to primitive
struggles between Germanic tribes located south of the Cimbric Cher-
sonese and bands of invaders who were passing southward from that
peninsula and Scandinavia. This, however, belongs to questions relat-
ing to the early inhabitants of the British Islands and the localities
whence they were derived, into which we cannot here enter. (See
Introduction).
The word nemet enters into many place-names, and occurs respec-
tively in Britain, Gaul, Spain, Germany, and Galatia (in Asia Minor).
3 See Todd’s St. Patrick, pp. 14, 130, 306, 424 and note.
TRISH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 77
is) we fear it would be going beyond our tether to
import, without further evidence, the great St. Fiacc
to our shores. The name was a common one in
Treland,’ and we must rest content with allowing
that a more obscure personage of the same name may
have founded Feock. The same name probably occurs
in Sheviock *—that is to say, if Mr. Carne rightly sup-
poses that parish to be the Saviock of ‘ Domesday,’ #
which might clearly be an abbreviation of San-
Viock.
In Breton archives there is a Life of St. Ké,° a
reputed Irishman, and with whom we should have
been inclined to couple our St. Kea® (Landigay, as
its old name was) had it not been that Norden men-
tions, we know not on what authority, that that
parish is called in Records ‘ St. Keby.’”
Last, but not least, we come back to St. Piran,
whose claim to be found in Cornwall we have already
discussed. Besides the churches of Perran Uthnoe,
Perran Zabuloe, and Perran-Arworthal,’ and a chapel
in Tintagell,® it appears that ‘Colgan, John of Tin-
' Oliver, Mon. Dio. Ex. p. 438.
2 In the index to O’Donovan’s Annals of Ireland it occurs twelve
times.
3 Oliver (Mon. Dio. Ea. p. 442) gives the alias of Seviock. The
dedication is to SS. Peter and Paul, and is as late as October 13,
1259.
4 «On the Domesday Manors,’ Journal R.I.C. No. iv., October 1865,
. 26.
: 5 H. and §S. Cownctls, vol. ii. p. 87. Le Grand, edit. Kerdanet,
p. 675.
6 Landege in Carew, Survey, 1602, p. 91.
7 Norden, Spec. Brit. Pars. Desc. Corn. p. 57.
8 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 442.
9 ‘Tn Tintagell parish, chapels of St. Pieran and St. Denys, also a
chapel within the castle.’ (Dean Lyttleton’s Extracts from the Ex.
Registers, Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 85.)
78 _ THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
muth,' and Leland’? concur in considering — that
the church of St. Keverne? also bears the name of
this most popular Saint. As St. Kyran his name, or
that of one other of the Ciarans, appears in Ireland
near Parsonstown,* as St. Kerrian at Quimperlé in
Brittany,” and also in a church m the city of
Exeter, and as Keveran or Kieran in Oliver’s dedica-
tion in the case of the church in Meneage.® Dr.
Borlase expresses himself strongly of the opinion that
St. Keverne and St. Piran of Perran Zabuloe are not
to be identified as one and the same person, and notes
that the Saint’s days are different, the parish feast at
St. Keverne being held on the Sunday next before
Advent Sunday.’ Davies Gilbert,® too, speaks of
mutual visits paid between St. Piran and St. Keverne,
which reminds us that similar visits were paid in
Treland by St. Ciaran of Clonmacnoise and St.
Ciaran of Saighir. Can St. Keverne bear the name
of the former? The name of St. Keverne in ‘ Domes-
day’ is certainly rather wide of the mark. In
Lannachebran and the ‘ Canonici Sancti Achebranni’
the most subtle etymologist would scarcely recognise
the name of Piran, to which we may add that a distinct
personage called Achebrann is found in the Welsh lists.
1 Quoted ibid. p. 194, No. 18.
2 Ttin. vol. iii. p. 24, ‘St. Piranus, alias Kenerine,’ but clearly mean-
ing ‘ Keverine,’ as it is spelt at p. 25.
3 In Carew, Survey, p. 91, ‘St. Keyran.’
4 Mr. Kerslake’s paper on Celtic Hagiology, p. 7.
5 Thid.
8 Oliver, Mon. Dio. Ex. p. 440.
7 MS. Par. Mem. p. 194, Nos. 17 and 18. The feast at Perran was
March 5.
8 This whole question is gone into, in the disagreeable style which
pervades his work and makes some portions of it difficult to read with
patience, by Whitaker, Ancient Cath. Corn. vol. ii. pp. 10-12.
IRISH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 79
Dr. Todd expresses an opinion, in his ‘ Life of St.
Patrick,’! that the date attributed to St. Kiaran in his
Legend Lives was too early. He is there classed
with Ailbhe, Declan, and Ibar, Saints who preceded
Patrick and represented a distinct order of things, if
not a different race. He was, however, a Saint not of
the first but of the second order, and ‘one of the
twelve apostles of Ireland sent forth from that school.’
His father was descended from the chieftains of
Ossory,” and he himself was born in Cape Clear island,
where, according to one of his Legends, he was the
founder of the ‘first Christian church erected in
Treland.” ‘His principal church was, however,
Saighir, now Seirkieran.’ It is told of him that ‘he
began by occupying a cell in the midst of a dense
wood, ® whither he drew the wild beasts of the forest
around him, and tamed them by kindness for his
pleasure. According to his Life, translated by Mr.
Standish O’Grady,* his principal attendant was a boar,
and his monks a fox, a brock, a wolf, and adoe. He
possessed marvellous powers over fire and water.
A perpetual fire was kindled by him at Easter, at
which others were lighted. Leland, Iti. vol. iii. p. 30.
6 Blight’s Cornish Churches, p. 77, containing a seat, possibly
once an altar tomb.
7 Rees’s Camb.-Brit. Saints, p. 398.
88 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Maddick had his rock in St. Issey.’ St. Levan’s stone
still remains in his churchyard, the veneration of the
country-side.” ‘Within the churchyard,’ writes Dr.
Borlase,’ ‘ lies a round stone evidently cloven into two
parts. Our good landlady informed us that in her
mother’s time there was scarce room enough to thrust
ST. LEVAN CHURCH (SHOWING THE STONE TO THE EAST OF THE PORCH)
the hand betwixt the parts of this stone, but they are
now (1740) a foot distance from one to the other, and
when they are grown wide enough for a horse loaded
with panniers to pass betwixt them I know not what
great wonders are to happen, according to the pre-
dictions of St. Levin.’ Between Sennen and the cliff,
1 «Tn the cliff on the north-east side of the parish [St. Issey], and
less than half a mile from St. Maddick’s Well, was a rock having a
basin cut into the surface of it, called St. Maddick’s Rock. Less than
twenty years ago a farmer cleft this rock asunder to make gate posts’
(MS. letter from Mr. Hedges to Dr. Borlase, dated August 17, 1753).
* Hunt’s Popular Romances, 2nd series, p. 10.
5 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 4, No. 3.
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 89
on the Land’s End side, is another instance of a cleft
stone, known as the Sanctifying Stone, through the
gap in which whoever passed received benefits the
nature of which was no longer remembered by the
farmer who showed it to the writer a year or two
ago.! Another similar instance is given by Davies
Gilbert,? in connection with St. Piran’s Well, the
taking the waters of which by children, ‘ accompanied
by passing them through the cleft of a rock on the
sea shore, was believed to cure various diseases, and
particularly the rickets.’ Here is a distinct instance
of the prevalence of pagan customs amongst the
Christian Saints. Children were in like manner
passed through the ‘Mén-an-tol,’ in Madron, for
crick in the back,? and there is evidence of similar
customs in countries where there is no traditional
connection with Saints whatever.‘
Rock worship, and the ceremonial practice of
creeping through crevices in or beneath rocks or
trees, belong to the primitive cultus of the extreme
north, and are seemingly referable to what we may
best term Finno-Ugric influence. On the summit of
the mountain of Neiden, in Lapland,’ is a passe-varek,
sacred rock, called Niackkem-Karg, or the ‘ Mountain
of Creeping,’ in allusion to such a custom. One of
the Hiinebedden, or ‘ Giants’ Graves,’ in the province
of Drenthe, in Holland, bore the name Duyvel’s Kutte,
1 Personal observation.
2 Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iii. p. 329.
3 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 5, No. 8, and elsewhere.
4 E.g. see Cyprus, by General Cesnola, London, 1877, p. 189. ‘Old
women’ are described as ‘lighting tapers’ at a holed stone, ‘in hope of
_ being cured of bodily ailments.
> See Leems’s Account of the Laplanders, Copenhagen, 1767, in
Pinkerton’s Travels, vol. i. p. 876 et seq.
90 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
about which a tradition is related by Ubbo Emmius,'
that it derived its name from the custom of passing
human victims, about to be slaughtered in sacrifice,
through a ‘foramen’ or creep beneath the super-
incumbent stones. These Hiinebedden, we may add,
are precisely similar in structure, dimensions, and de-
tails of design to the so-called Leaba-na-Feinné, or Beds
of the Feinné, in Ireland. Similar legends, connecting
them with ‘ Hags’ and ‘White Women,’ exist in both
countries. Itis by no means improbable that the Corn-
ish term for a dolmen—namely, ‘ Giant’s Quoit ’—is
derived from the same word which the Dutch express
by Kutte—namely,a cut, crevice, or fissure. Creeps or
passages into the inner chamber of megalithic struc-
tures are very frequently observable.
A very remarkable instance of the practice of
passing a child through a crevice or ‘ foramen,’ not
between rocks, but between two trunks of trees, will
be found in M. Lecoy de la Marche’s ‘ Anecdotes,’
&e., from Etienne de Bourbon, a Dominican in the
thirteenth century.2 In the diocese of Lyons he
records a custom among mothers of carrying their
sick children to the grave of a saint called Guine-
fort, who on enquiry turned out to be no human
being at all, but a holy dog, with a history which is
a reflex of the Bethgellert story. The dog had been
buried in a well over which a great cairn had been
raised, and trees planted around. A vetula, or hag,
assisted at the ceremony, which consisted in handing
the naked child nine times backwards and forwards
' Rerum Frisicarum Historia, Lug. Bat., 1616, p. 21. See also
Ant. Schonhovius,‘ De Origine Francorum,’ in Ant. Matthzeus, Analecta,
2nd edit., the Hague, 1738, vol.i. p. 41. There is no reason for adopt-
ing the popular and unpleasant interpretation there given.
* Paris, 1877, p. 825.
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 91
between the trunks, the clothes (panniculi) being
hung up on the briars around, and offerings made
of salt and other things. Other rites followed, into
which we need not enter, it being sufficient to add
that the whole account is well worthy of the attention
of those who are interested in comparing the super-
stitions of pagan Europe. With a very slight change
indeed the very name Guinefort would signify in
Goidelic ‘the dog’s grave.’
One more example of the custom of passing
through crevices—this time beneath a rock—adopted
by the early Christians, and we pass on. Soremark-
able, however, is this instance, and so instructive to
us if we desire to realise the kind of semi-pagan
superstition which was without doubt practised in
Cornwall, as well as Ireland, in the days pre-
ceding the Reformation, that we feel that no apology
is needed for introducing two accounts of it by eye-
witnesses, and that in full. The festival of St.
Declan was held at Ardmore, in the county of Water-
ford, on December 23. It was attended by several
thousand persons of all ages and both sexes. ‘The
greater part of the extensive strand which forms the
western part of Ardmore Bay was literally covered
by a dense mass of people. Tents were spread, each
with its green ensign, for the sale of whisky. The
devotional exercises were commenced at an early
hour in the day, by passing under the holy rock of
St. Declan in a state of half-nudity. Stretched at
full length on the ground on the face and stomach,
each devotee moved forward, as if in the act of swim-
ing, and thus squeezed or dragged their bodies
through. Both sexes were obliged to submit to this
1 From ct, gen. ctin, a hound, and feart or fert, a grave.
92 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
humiliating mode of proceeding. Upwards of 1,100
persons were observed to go through this ceremony
in the course of the day.
The rock which is the object of so great venera-
tion is said to be endowed with miraculous powers.
It is said to have been wafted from Rome upon the
surface of the ocean, at the time when St. Declan
founded his church at Ardmore, and to have borne
on its top a large bell for the church tower, and also
vestments for the Saint himself. A human skull of
large dimensions was placed at the head of the Saint’s
tomb, before which the people bowed, believing it to
be the identical skull of the Saint himself, who on
that day was believed to be present to look upon
their devotions, and who would intercede, on his re-
turn from earth, at the Throne of Grace for all those
who did him honour. The devotional exercises of
the day being over, the night was passed in revelry.
Within the precincts of the ‘ cashel’ surrounding
the holy precincts at Ardmore is one of the far-famed
‘Round Towers’ said to have been built by St. Declan
in a single night. Around this on their knees, when
the author of the second account, from which we are
now quoting, visited the spot, some thirty or forty
persons were moving, repeating aves and paters, and
removing their beads to keep a correct account of
their circuits, the men the while having their heads
uncovered.
In the same graveyard, at the other extremity,
is a stone house, about the size of an ordinary cabin,
in which the Saint is said to have been buried. In
this house were a number of people engaged in adora-
tion of the Saint. In a hole, about the centre of the
house, was an old woman, of whom little more was to
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 93
be seen than her head and shoulders, who was dis-
tributing the Saint’s clay to such persons as wished to
purchase it. When one of them purchased any the
old woman whispered something to them in Irish.
The circuit called desvul, or turas, was made by many
persons around this house, as it had been around the
‘Round Tower,’ who at intervals knelt down, remov-
ing beads as they went on.
Leaving the tower and house of clay, the writer of
this account proceeded through the village to St.
Declan’s Stone. He describes the fair on the seashore
—the tents, with food and liquor, and the cards, dice,
wheels of fortune, and the like. Thestone, which is
on the margin of the sea, is, he says, of the same kind
as the neighbouring rocks, and weighs some two or
three tons. It is said to have been floated on the sea
from Italy, crowned with nine bells, which came
opportunely, as the priest was in want of a bell, and
was about to celebrate Mass. Since then the stone
has been venerated for its miraculous cures.
It is only at low water that people can go under
the stone and perform their devotions there; they
must always take advantage of the tide. On the
Saint’s day it was always necessary to remove some of
the sand which had accumulated under the stone, to
make a sufficient passage for a large man or woman.
Ag the little rocks on which the stone rests form
irregular pillars—like the supporting stones in a
dolmen, in fact—it is necessary to have the surface
under the stone lower than the front or rear. As a
commencement the men took off hats, coats, shoes,
and stockings, and, if very large, their waistcoats, and
turned up their breeches above the knee; then, lying
flat on the ground, put in hands, arms, and head—one
94 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
shoulder more forward than the other, in order to
work their way through the more easily—and coming
out from under the stone at the other end (from front
to rear being a distance of, perhaps, four feet) rose on
their knees and struck their backs three times
against the stone, removing beads and repeating aves
all the while. They then proceeded on bare knees
over a number of little rocks to the place where they
had to enter again under the stone, and thus pro-
ceeded three times, which done they washed their
knees, bodies, and dress, and made for the well. The
women went through the ceremony in the same
manner as the men, taking off bonnets, shoes, and
stockings, and turning up their petticoats above the
knee, so that they might go through the exercise on
bare knees.
At the Saint’s well, when this writer reached it, to
which the pilgrims went from the Rock, two women
were handing up the water as fast as they could, and
receiving a halfpenny from each person for about
half a pint. Speaking of a female figure standing
over the well, he remarks its likeness to the pictures
of Callee, the black goddess of Hindostan—‘ not
quite so horrific, but a great likeness between them.’
Many persons were on their knees before the well, and
many more within the walls of the old chapel, with
their faces opposite the extreme gable, on the stone of
which were several crosses. Some went on their
knees up to the crosses, then rose and kissed the
stone most affectionately. Others knelt on one spot,
and rose; then advancing on their feet, repeating
prayers as usual, and removing beads, they kissed
the crosses and went out at another entrance, all
walking round the premises three times, at intervals
bowing to the walls, and continuing their other exer-
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 95
cises. Here they terminated the rounds, or ‘ stations’
of the day. The writer concludes by stating that the
pilgrims at Ardmore were ‘as fine people as exist,’
and that the peasantry of Cork and Waterford, from
whom they are chiefly recruited, surpassed any people
he had seen in any other part of the British Isles.
He adds, in illustration of the strength of the popular
devotion for St. Declan’s Stone, that priests had actu-
ally whipped the people from it, but they continued
their superstitions in spite of them, and in conse-
quence some priests were content to let things alone
and wink at the practice." This was more than half
a century ago.
On the St. Austell Downs the ‘ Long Stone’ and a
flat one now removed marked the spot where the
Devil perpetrated a silly trick upon a Saint who was
belated.2 Mr. Moore, writing in 1753 to Dr. Borlase
an account of the parish of St. Creed, says: ‘ An idle
story prevails among the vulgar that this Saint Creda
had a sister (also a holy virgin), who disputed with
her where the church should be built. They agreed
at last to be determined by the cast of a stone from
the hand of one of the giants that were supposed to
live in those days: accordingly the stone was thrown,
and with such surprising force that it had likely to have
rolled out of the parish ; and this * * was the occasion
of ye church being built in a corner of the parish.’ ?
The oft-told tale of the theft perpetrated by St.
Just upon St. Keverne is in one respect a reproduction
of an incident in the life of St. Patrick,’ where he is
1 For these accounts, which I have paraphrased in places, see The
Holy Wells of Ireland, by Philip Dixon Hardy, 1836.
2 Hunt, Popular Romances, 2nd series, p. 7.
3 Borlase, MSS. Orig. Letters, vol. v.
4 Todd’sSt. Patrick, pp. 481, 482.
96 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
naively stated to have contrived by ‘a pious fraud’
to run away with some of the most precious relics
belonging to the Bishop of Rome, the legend-writer
exclaiming in rapture, ‘ Oh, wonderful deed! Oh, rare
theft of a vast treasure of holy things, committed
without sacrilege, the plunder of the most holy place
in the world!’ St. Just had, as we all know, gone on
a visit to his friend St. Keverne, and was about to
return to his own part of the country, when he fell a-
coveting a piece of plate (probably the chalice)
belonging to his host. Bidding the Saint go fetch him
water from his well, he took a pious advantage of his
absence by making off with the article in question.
But St. Keverne finding his loss, pursued him, and
picking up as he went three stones of the peculiar
sort found on the Crowza (Cross) Downs, at last over-
took him at a spot where Germo Lane joins the Helston
Road. Here he threw them at him, and made him
give up his treasure. The place was ever after called
Tre-men-heverne, ‘Three Stones of Keverne. Mr.
Blight, sen., of Penzance, writing under the name of
‘Tre’ one of his pleasant letters on the Meneage dis-
trict, to the ‘West Briton,’ in 1858, mentions that
‘they were sunk triangularly into the ground, in a
nook on the right-hand side of the road, as we go from
Breage to Marazion.’ He has since informed me that
he had seen them there himself in 1825, and that to all
appearance they were ironstones, such as those found
on the Crowza Downs. They have since been broken
up to mend the roads.’ Mr. Hunt,? whose version of
the story differs a little from this one, agrees with my
' We have taken great care to state this legend precisely as it was
told by the old country people in Meneage.
* Popular Romances, 2nd series, p. 5.
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 97
authorities in the remarkable sequel that these rocks,
‘though carried away easily enough by day, return
to the spot * * at night.’ ?
Examples of Well-worship are as common as
those of Stone-worship. We have seen in the case
of St. Cadoc that the power of causing wells to rise
in dry places was one specially belonging to our
Saints. After performing his miracle in Cornwall,
Cadoc, we are told, went to Rome and Jerusalem and
the river Jordan, from the waters of which he filled
a bottle, and brought it home. He then mixed it
with the water of his Cornish spring, and though
that had only hitherto restored some few to health,
it now cured a hundredfold. Therefore the Cornish
people built an ‘ ecclesiola’ on the spot ‘in honorem
Sancti Cadoci juxta fontem.’? From the well of
St. Mary, in St. Wenn,® destroyed by Puritan soldiers,
the water was always fetched for the church font, as
was the case also in other places. At the well of
St. Cuby, in Duloe, some countrymen trying to
remove the stone basin into which the water fell,
were scared to find that one of the oxen brought to
do the work had fallen down dead.* The famous
well of St. Keyne ‘ is a Spring,’ says Norden, ‘ rising
under a Tree of a most straunge condition, for,
beyinge but one bodie, it beareth the braunches of
four kindes, Oke, Ashe, Elm, and Withye.’> « At
! See similar superstition in regard to a dolmen near Tours (Die
Feen in Europa, by Dr. H. Schreiber). The same story is told of a
stone cross, 20 feet long, at Myrath, near Falcarragh, in Donegal.
2 From the ‘ Life of St. Cadoc,’ in Rees’s Cambro-British Saints.
3 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 166, quoted from a lost portion of
Hals.
+ East and West Looe, by Thomas Bond, London, 1823, p, 120.
5 Norden, Sgec. Brit. Desc. Corn. p. 86. What follows the above is
not complimentary to the Saint.
H
98 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
our Lady Nant’s Well, at Little Colan,’ says Carew,’
‘upon Palm Sunday idle-headed seekers resorted,
with a crosse in one hand, and an offering in the
other. The offering fell to the priest’s share: the
crosse they threw into the well, which, if it swamme,
the party should outlive that yeare; if it sunk, a
short ensuing death was boded.’ ‘To Gulval Well,’
says Hals, ‘great numbers of people time out of mind
have resorted, * * not only to drink the waters
thereof, but to enquire after the life or death of their
absent friends.’ * * ‘If the party be living and in
health, the still quiet water of the well-pit, as soon as
the question is demanded, will instantly bubble or
boil up as a pot, clear crystalline water ; if sick, foul
and puddle waters; if the party be dead, it will
neither bubble, boil up, nor alter its colour or still
motion. ‘Finally, it is a strong and courageous
fountain of water, kept clean by an old woman of the
vicinity, to accommodate strangers for her own
advantage by blazing the virtues and divine qualities
of those waters.” Unfortunately, the historian has
omitted to record the name of this old woman, whose
avocation proved her ‘ the last of the Saints.’ Gulval
Well has other virtues too. Dr. Borlase mentions?
that in 1749 a ‘ woman was but lately dead who was
suppos’d to understand the nature of this well so
much that she was weekly and almost daily apply’d
to for to go to the well with those who had miss’d,
loss’d, or been robb’d of cattle or other things, and
were thoroughly persuaded that by consulting this
well under the direction of a person who knew how
1 Carew, Survey, Ist edit. p. 144.
? Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. ii. p. 121.
3 MS. Par. Mem. p. 9, No. 10.
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 99
to explain the different appearances which this
oracular water exhibited, they should receive such
information as they wanted and desired. The father
of my present manservant, adds the Doctor, ‘one
Pentyr, of this parish of Gullvall, was reckon’d very
intelligent in this Hydromanteia, and his son says he
has been often at the well with his father, when he
came there at the desire of some of those inquisitive
persons. Amongst those wells to which children
were carried to cure them of diseases in infancy
were Cubert,! Perran,? and Chapel Uny.? At the
last-named place the children ‘were dipped three
times, against the sun, and dragged three times round
the margin on the grass in the same direction.’ The
rough process of ‘bowzing’ or ‘bowsening’ for
frenzy was practised at St. Nun’s Well, in the parish
of Altarnun.* ‘The water running from this well,’
says Carew, ‘ fell into a square and close-walled plot,
which might be filled at what depth they listed.
Upon this wall was the franticke person set to stand,
his back towards the pool; and from thence, with a
sudden blow in the brest, tumbled headlong into the
pond ; where a strong fellowe, provided for the nonce,
tooke him and tossed him up and downe alongst and
athwart the water, untill the patient, by forgoing his
strength, had somewhat forgot his fury. Then was
he conveyed to the Church, and certain Masses sung
over him; upon which handling, if his right wits
returned, St. Nunne had the thanks; but if there
appeared small amendment, he was bowssened againe
1 Borlase, Nat. Hist. of Cornwall, p. 82.
2 D—D. Gilbert, Par. Hist. Corn. vol. ili. p. 329.
3 Borlase, Nat. Hist. p. 31.
4 Carew, Survey, 1st edit. p. 123.
H?2
100 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
and againe while there remayned in him any hope of
life, for recovery.’ Dr. Borlase! adds to this account
his opinion that a similar ‘bowssening’ pit had
existed at a well in St. Agnes’s parish. It is said?
that within the walls of the old church of St. Kea
was a stone to which, within the memory of man, an
inhabitant of the parish, on becoming insane, was
chained. The following is a description (also from
the MSS. of Dr. Borlase) of St. Levan’s Well: ? ‘ Over
the Spring lies a large flat stone, wide enough to
serve as a foundation for a little square Chapell
erected upon it; the Chappel is no more than 6 feet
square, 7 feet high, the little roof of itof Stone. The
water is reckoned very good for eyes, tooth-ache,
and the like, and when people have washed they are
allways advis’d to go into this Chapell and sleep
upon the stone, which is the floor of it, for it must
be remember’d that whilst you are sleeping upon
those consecrated stones the Saint is sure to dispense
his healing influence.’ On the very edge of the cliff
below this well are the remains of a structure called
St. Levan’s Chapel, connected with the well, in
Dr. Borlase’s time, by a pathway of steps ‘ shaped
with stone.’* A more wild and romantic spot for a
human habitation it would be hard to picture. For
exploring the ruins of this ancient building during
the past year we have to record our thanks to a
visitor to the district, Mr. Masterman. ‘It consisted,’
he writes,’ ‘ of two rooms, presumably the chapel and
1 MS. Collectanea, p. 252.
* A letter by Mr. Blight, sen., published in the West Briton,
August 17, 1858.
* Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 4, No. 3.
+ Thid. '
° Autograph description by Mr. Masterman.
[PLATE II.
CHAPEL OF ST. ELOY.
MADRON WELL CHAPEL,
Lrom etchings by Mr. Frank McFadden, after Blight (‘ Crosses of Cornwall’).
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 101
the cell, the one 62 ft. by 92 ft., the other 6 ft. by
123 ft. The length of the building lay east and west,
and the N.W. portion of the eastern room was formed
of one large block of granite fallen from its place.
The doorway was on the south side, the flooring
roughly flagged with granite, and fragments of very
rough and thick slating were found amongst the
débris.’
The last well we shall mention, that of St. Madderne,
(see Plate II.), enjoyed the greatest celebrity of all.
Writers at different periods have recorded the mar-
vellous cures effected there. The method resorted to
in Scawen’s time was calculated rather to kill than to
cure.! On Corpus Christi evening, having deposited a
small offering on the altar, the patient was to ‘drink
of the water there,’ lie on the bare ground all night,
‘and in the morning take one good draught more.’
The practice of raising bubbles by dropping in
crooked pins has long been resorted to by girls, as a
means of divining the period of the wedding day.’
But the most singular custom of all with regard to
Madron Well is that mentioned by Mr. Couch,’ ‘of
hanging rags on the thorns which grew in the en-
closure.’ Not only is this practice an exact counter-
part of a custom at Balmano * in Scotland, and in the
1 Ant. Cornu. Brit. 17177, p. 19.
2 Notices of Madron Well occur in Borlase’s MSS. Par. Mem. p.
31, No. 2; in his Nat. Hist. Corn. p. 81; Hals, edit. D. G. Par. Hist.
Corn. vol. iii. pp. 79, 91; Brand’s Popular Antiquities, edit. Ellis, vol.
ii. p. 369, &e. &e.; and Hunt’s Popular Romances, p. 47 et seq.
3 Quoted by Mr. Hunt, Popular Romances, second series, p. 49,
where several examples of this custom are brought together. Mr.
Couch’s notice is in the Journal of the R.L.C.
4 Statist. Account of Scotland, xviii, p. 630, quoted in Brand,
edit. Ellis, vol. ii. p. 382.
102 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Orkneys, but it obtains amongst the Yezeedees? of
the Persian border, the Mohammedans in Turkey, and
throughout Northern Asia generally. In Japan it is
still a constant usage amongst the devotees of the
most ancient form of religion in that country, the
Shintoists. In the interior of the island of Niphon
we haveourselves witnessed pilgrims tying bits of cloth
or paper to the trees, as a memorial of their visit to
some sacred shrine, or spring, or waterfall; and the
fact that in our own country the ceremony was per-
formed before the sun was up” shows that in Britain
it was originally what in the furthest Orient it is still—
a part and parcel of the most primitive and widely
extended worship of the Sun.
The connection of the usage with the series of
monuments known as megalithic, both in Western
Europe and in the heart of Asia, is sufficient to show
that it was of other than Christian origin. Near Camp,
in Kerry, is a cromleac called Maul-na-holtora—that
is, ‘ the mound of the altar.’ Beneath it, so tradition
said, there was once a well out of which a woman
took water, and with it a fish. She endeavoured to
boil the flesh, but it would not boil. The well has been
dry ever since. ‘Stations’ are held at this ancient
monument every Saturday, and the brambles around
are tied with rags, while there is a deposit of pins as
offerings.?
Many thousand miles from Kerry, on the confines
of Southern Siberia, in a wild and narrow defile in the
Bolor range through which the Kora flows, is an
' Badger’s Nestorians and their Rituals, London, 1852, vol. i. p. 99.
* Campbell, Popular Tales of the West Highlands, vol. ii. p. 184;
quoted by Mr. Hunt, Popular Romances, 2nd series, p. 50.
* Windle, MSS. in the Royal Irish Academy, Dublin. (Supp. MSS.
vol. ii. p. 42.)
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 103
assemblage of megalithic monuments, consisting of
pillar stones ' of vast height, possibly a dolmen, and
a large cairn composed of quartz stones and sur-
rounded by a circle of the same. It is said to be the
burial-place of a chief slain by the genii of the glen,
and as an act of veneration towards it the natives at
the present day leave strips of cloth from their
garments there. The origin of rag offerings seems
connected with sacrifices both of men and beasts.
In the case of the latter they were probably their
skins, in the case of the former the garments.
Among the Langobardi a custom prevailed of affixing
skins of slain beasts to poles. We have already
noticed that the ‘ panniculi’ of the children passed
through the trunks of trees in the cultus of St.
Guinefort were hung on the brambles around. We
have also mentioned the Japanese practice which
belongs to a peculiar cultus called the Kami or
Sinto, a worship of the spirits of the dead, similar to
that of the Sitte among the Lapps and of the Sidhe
in Ireland. In Kamtschatka kami means a bear. He is
regarded as the ancestor of ancestors, and strips of
cloth hung out on frames are offered to him asa god.
To come west again, Hanway mentions a rag tree on
the Caspian coast. Mohammedanism has, in fact,
perpetuated and disseminated a custom which in its
origin may be traced to Finno-Ugric and Mongolian
sources in the East, just as Christianity has in the
West. Rag trees may be seen in the desert near
Suez, placed near wells and ancient graves. Between
Armagh and the Navan Fort (the ancient Emain of
the romances), beside an ancient paved track, is a
famous rag-well sacred to St. Patrick. When we
' La Sibérie, by F. Lanoye.
104 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
visited it a few years since the thorns which spread
over it were literally covered with strips of cloth of
all colours and of all ages, from a rotten tatter to one
affixed that very day. In Ireland the idea present
to the mind in offering rags seems to be that the
particular disease should be left behind with the
shred. Mr. Windle’ has preserved the following
ritual words: ‘Air impide an Tiarna mo cuid teinis
do fhagaint air an ait so,’ meaning ‘By the inter-
cession of the Lord I leave my portion of illness on
this place.’ The original idea of votive offerings be-
came inseparable from the sequel that with the pre-
sentation of the sacrifice the object for which it was
made was gained.
In the Irish Nennius the practice of doing honour
to ‘shreds and omens, as well as proficiency in
necromancy and the possession of ‘ demon-like ”
druids,’ is ascribed to the Cruithne, or Picts. It is
among the magicians and wizards of Finno-Ugric
stock that we must look for the original importation
of such superstitions into Western Europe.
Endeavours to suppress these two old forms of
superstition, Well-worship and Stone-worship, were
made by a canon in King Edgar’s reign, forbidding
‘well-worshippings, and necromancies, and divina-
tions, and stone-worshippings.? The council of
Tours (567 a.p.) also prohibited ‘Stone-worship’
by name.? The Saints had endeavoured to turn
* MSS., R.I. Acad. 15. Cork Hast and West, p.852. Again, he says,
‘Rags are not offerings or votive. They are riddances. Thus, you
have a headache: you take a shred and place it on the tree, and with
it you place the headache there.’ Ibid. 16. Topography of Desmond,
p. 802.
hy Quoted by Stuart, pref. to Sculp. Stones of Scotland, vol. i.
p. ili.
3 Thid.
HABITS, ETC., OF THE SAINTS 105
them to their purposes by dispensing their supposed
benefits in the name of the religion they taught.
Yet the pagan element has survived through it all.
‘Pisgy Stones’ are still haunted by their fairies ;
pins are still dropped into wells; and in West Pen-
with strips of crape are still hung upon the
plants in the window when a death has occurred in
the house, for fear the evil influence might resent
the neglect and strike other living things dead
also.?
1 Information obtained in the parish of Burian.
106 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CHAPTER X
ARCH AOLOGY OF THE PERIOD OF THE IRISH SAINTS IN
CORNWALL
WHETHER we have any monumental remains in Corn-
wall of distinctly Christian character dating from the
middle of the fifth century to the early portion of the
sixth is an extremely difficult question to answer. To
this period,’ judging from a most careful examina-
tion of the forms of the letters, three of our
inscribed stones might perhaps be assigned. These
are respectively (1) that at St. Columb Minor, which
reads Bonemimori fills Tribuni; (2) that at Wade-
bridge, Uleagni fila Severi ;? both of which are written
in the British style; and (3) that at Hayle, of doubt-
ful reading, but seemingly to the memory of a lady
aged 33, who was buried ‘in a tumulus.’ This
latter, although written in the Roman fashion, need
not for this reason be necessarily considered one of
the most ancient amongst those of the older type.’
It is remarkable that, while in Devonshire only a
single instance* occurs of an ogham accompanying an
' See Hiibner, Inscrip. Brit. Christ., pref. pp. xx, xxi.
* Given by Mr. Iago in his ‘ Notes on Inscribed Stones,’ in Journ.
FR.I.C., April 1872, p. 70. Mr. Kent (p. 71) is quoted for saying that in
this case ‘ cremation had been used.’
* See Inscrip. Brit. Christ. p. xx.
* At Fardel Manor, near Ivybridge.
(PLateE III.
RUINED CHURCH AT PERRAN-ZABULOE, AS IT WAS IN 1892,
From a Photograph.
ARCHEOLOGY OF CORNWALL 107
inscription, only one also has been found in Cornwall.’
All the inscriptions (except the Saxon one at Castle-
goff and a doubtful one at Lanherne) are in Latin,
though in some of the examples there are traces
of Saxon influence. There is not one in the native
language of the country, nor in Irish, though a few of
the letters in some inscriptions, such as that at
Phillack,’ certainly present (if only in a single letter
or two perhaps) affinities with the peculiarly Irish
form of the Roman alphabet® as used in inscriptions
in Ireland as early, Petrie concludes, as the fifth cen-
tury. Very ancient as some of our granite crosses
are, we do not think it would be safe to say that we
have one example of so early a date as that of which
we are now speaking, unless it be one, of very simple
type, at Wendron.’ Thetwo little churches of Perran
Zabuloe® and Gwithian,’ both owing their preservation
to the sand drifts on our northern coasts, are probably
the earliest Christian monuments we possess. When
1 We have not seen this Southill inscription. Mr. Iago reads it
INGENUI, and regards the ogham as the same word.
2 See Journal R.I.C., April 1872, pp. 60, 63, where Mr. Iago, to
whom we are indebted for first reading this inscription, notes the like-
ness to the Erse or Irish character. This stone may be as late as the
seventh or eighth century.
3 Todd’s St. Patrick, p. 511, on the subject of the Irish alphabet.
4 Compare this stone with that of ‘ Lugnaedon son of Limenach,,’
Petrie, Round Towers, p. 165.
5 Blight’s Cornish Churches, p. 69. It might, however, be of any
date, but it is worthy of comparison with a stone figured by Petrie,
Round Towers, p. 184. Two very primitive crosses exist at Merthyr
Uni, in Wendron, and one at Trewardreva, in Constantine. See Blight’s
MS. drawing book. Some of the crosses near Boskenna, and at Tre-
verven in Burian are of an early type. In most of these examples the
cross and its surrounding circle are simply incised.
6 See paper by Mr. Haslam in vol. ii. Archeol. Journal, and his
work on the subject. See Plate III.
7 Blight’s Cornish Churches, pp. 89, 90.
108 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
first discovered that at Perran bore most distinct evi-
dence of Irish influence in its architectural details.
A comparison of the door case, as given by Mr. Has-
lam,’ with that of the Round Tower of Donaghmore,?
figured by Petrie, shows a ee which is
= =a “a A ee
Mh
Rae
{ hie
mI )
\
il 3 = ~ Ee Ma ae y
al ae pl ((eeteeee
|
vty Ue ie
Ute Me ar
DOORWAY OF ROUND TOWER AT DONAGHMORE (AFTER PETRIE)
a £
— hee eel
= i APRA HAE ste Sree = iy
quite unmistakable. The sloping jambs, the mould-
ings, the heads one on either side, are absolutely the
same. This tower, however, which Petrie dates as
late as the ninth or even tenth century,? only presents
a survival and elaboration of details found in Irish
structures dated several centuries before. Quite as
' Archeol. Journal, vol. ii. p. 229. I have allowed this passage to
stand in this edition. Unfortunately, however, doubt has been thrown
on the genuine antiquity of the mouldings, &c., at Perran. The whole
question should be thoroughly investigated by antiquaries on the spot.
* Round Towers, p. 410, 5 Thid. p. 409.
ARCHAZOLOGY OF CORNWALL 109
close aresemblance to the Piran door case is found in
a window of the Cyclopean church of Ratass,! near
Tralee,” the date of which is conjectured by Petrie to
be as early as the sixth or seventh century.? Again,
the window at Perran is identical in structure with
that of the oratory of St. Nessan in Limerick, said to
have been founded in Patrick’s time, so that there is
nothing to hinder us from admitting, on the highest
authority, that there is some reason to suppose that
our Cornish example is as old as the latter end of the
sixth century, the date, that is, when Piran was still
alive. The little church of Gwithian cannot fall far
short of Perran in point of date, though, with the ex-
ception that the chancel is narrower than the church,
it is absolutely devoid of architectural landmarks. In
this one feature, however, it corresponds with Irish
edifices of the type of Tempul-na-Trinoite at Glenda-
lough,‘ and possibly, as in that case and others,’ a
rough triumphal arch once spanned the entrance to
the chancel. The walls both at Perran and Gwithian,
in common with those of all the other ‘ ecclesiole’ in
Ireland and in Cornwall, are perpendicular, and thus
they differ entirely from the style of the earlier
masonry, such as we have seen in the beehive huts.
Mr. Petrie, speaking of the ‘severe simplicity’ and
‘the uniformity of plan and size of these little places
of worship, makes the apposite remark that these
features ‘were less the result of the poverty and
ignorance of their founders, who were skilled in all
departments of ecclesiastical art, than of choice,
1 For the doorway of this church see Plate IV., infra.
2 Round Towers, p. 185. 3 Thid. p. 183.
4 Lord Dunraven’s Irish Architecture, plate 1.
5 E.g. Tempul-na-Naam, ibid. plate c., and Inis Celtra, plate xcviil.
110 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
originating in the spirit of their faith, or a veneration
for some model given them by their earliest teachers ;
for that the earliest Christian churches on the Conti-
nent * * * were, like these, small and unadorned,
there is no reason to doubt; and the oldest churches
still remaining in Greece are exactly similar to those
in Ireland.’ !
YZ
Wi
a.
7 TIE
Yi
Y ememmcaecses sesessarcnemeets
ummm «| pee
10 20 FEET
DRAWING AND PLAN OF PORTH CURNOW CHAPEL (BY J. T. BLIGHT),
SHOWING THE MOUND IN WHICH AN URN WAS FOUND
The manner in which the church of St. Perran
has been renovated? is amatter of regret. It is much
to be wished that the Society founded some years ago
for the prevention of so-called ‘ restorations ’ had been
in existence at the time, and could have interfered to
prevent it.
Another building, which, for aught we know,
} Round Towers, p. 192.
? See Mr. Collins’s work on The Lost Church Found, and Oliver's
note on the subject, Mon. Dio. Hx., Addit. Supp. p. 11.
ARCHAOLOGY OF CORNWALL 111
might be as old as those at Perran or Gwithian, is the
miniature chapel at Porth Curnow.! ‘The courses
of stone are built,’ says Mr. Blight, ‘with some
regularity,’ and ‘ there are in the west wall two small
openings which appear to have served as windows.’
It had ‘been built on an artificially raised mound,’
and ‘ two or three yards from the western wall a large
sepulchral urn was discovered. ‘Was the site,
therefore, naturally adds Mr. Blight, ‘ accidentally
selected, or was it a spot greatly venerated, as the
grave of some noted personage, during the age pre-
ceding Christianity?’ The chapel of Carn Brea,’ in
St. Just, of which we have spoken so fully in our In-
troduction, was also placed on a mound of considerable
height, in which, when we opened it a few years since,
discoveries already detailed were made.®
1 Blight’s Cornish Churches, p. 91.
? Buller’s St. Just, engraving opposite p. 49; for original drawing
see Borlase, MS. Inscriptions, p. 81, and the frontispiece to the present
work.
3 See Introduction.
112 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CHAPTER XI
THE APPARENTLY ORJENTAL ELEMENT IN EARLY IRISH
CHRISTIANITY, AND CONSEQUENTLY IN THAT OF
CORNWALL
THE question of the origin of those peculiar archi-
tectural features traceable in primitive Irish edifices
and in our own St. Piran’s Church leads to the con-
sideration of a subject which has been so much
shirked by students of history that it requires some
boldness to approach it at all. Irefer to the appa-
rently Oriental type which has been impressed not
only on the architecture but on the whole character
and habit of early Irish Christianity. So extravagant
have been the theories invented from time to time
to account for it by native Irish antiquaries, that
some of the highest modern authorities seem to have
given the subject up in despair, have pronounced such
a supposition utterly groundless, and have accounted
for the features in question by assuming the develop-
ment of an unaided native genius. At the outset we
must clear the ground for our enquiry by bearing in
mind that we are not discussing the question as to
whether, as some have maintained, British Christianity
on its first arrival came directly from the East by
way of Gibraltar or any non-continental route. We
have clearly seen, on the contrary, that it was derived
in the first place from Gaul. What we have to con-
THE APPARENTLY ORIENTAL ELEMENT 113
sider is whether a subsequent connection through the
medium of pilg:images may not have been opened
between Ireland and Asia Minor during a period
commencing in the early decades of the fifth century,
and whether, supposing we can show that such a con-
nection did exist, it may not very possibly account
for resemblances which are certainly most remarkable.
Meanwhile, however, we must never forget that
Christianity itself is an Oriental religion, cast in an
Oriental mould; that its birth was marked by no
cataclasm severing Kast from West; that no barrier
was then fixed in the tide of culture continuously
flowing from Asia into Europe; and that it was not
until it had existed long years in the world that its
influence on Society and the reaction of Society upon
it stamped it with outward characteristics of its own,
and caused it to assume the form it wears to-day. It
should be no matter of surprise to us, then, if we
should recognise in its earlier phases incidents which
we know belong to a still existing Orient stubbornly
conservative of its ancient forms, an Orient more re-
mote than Asia Minor or Palestine ; if we should find,
as we do find, the story of Sakya Muni clothed in a
Christian garb ;’ if we should dig up on the banks of
the Indus? representations in stone of events in the
life of that great teacher portrayed in a style of art
identical with that found in the catacombs at Rome.
As to the earliest Christian teachers themselves, they
1 In the Legend of Barlaam and Josaphat. See Beal’s Catena of
Buddhist Scriptures, pp. 5, 6.
* Fergusson’s History of Indianand Eastern Architecture, London,
1876, chapter on Gandhara Sculptures, p. 181. ‘There are many of
the Gandhara bas-reliefs which, if transported to the Lateran Museum
and labelled “ Early Christian,’ would pass muster with ninety-nine
people of one hundred who visit that collection.’
I
114 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
were doing for their religion precisely what Patrick
did for it in Ireland, and what the Jesuits in China
are doing for it to-day. They were taking the existing
state of things as they found it, assimilating all that
was consistent with the preservation of the doctrine
they had to infuse, and discarding what was not. It
was just the difficulty of drawing the line at which to
stop short of too much pagan assimilation which gave
rise to the separation of the orthodox from the
Magians or Manicheans, and from those other
strange sects of Asia Minor, one of which, though
professing to be Christian, even went so far as to
dance round a wine flagon in honour of Bacchus.!
Christianity, however, as it gained in definiteness and
strength and in its hold on the human mind, joined
the great stream of civilisation as it passed westward,
gave an impetus to its waters, and finally a colour.
To and fro along the lines of commerce literature and
art were passing, and, what is still more important to
our purpose, pilgrims were passing along them too.
The importance of pilgrimages in bringing about
connections between the several countries of the
world, both before and during the first few. centuries
after the commencement of our era, can never be
overrated. To this cause is mainly due that marvel-
lous unity which the traveller of to-day observes in
Oriental lands. It has knit together Hindustan and
Burmah with Tibet, China, and Japan. It has carried
Brahmanism and Buddhism northwards, and planted
those religions in a strangely foreign soil. Through
the medium of then unconquered Persia it has
1 The Ascodrugite. In Transcaucasia there are still tribes men-
tioned by Professor Bryce, who, though nominally Christian, perform
rites which are pagan (Transcaucasia and Ararat, p. 115).
THE APPARENTLY ORIENTAL ELEMENT 115
brought these old faiths face to face with Christianity,
and joined East and West in one. Never was this
pilgrim spirit stronger than it was in the fourth and
fifth centuries, when it had extended itself to the
extreme borders as well. ‘The Britons,’ says Jerome,
‘though divided from the rest of the world, quit their
western sun, and go in quest of a clime which they
know nothing of unless by report and the history of
the Bible.’’ Other instances have already been quoted,
but most important of all is a passage in Theodoret.’
At Telanissus, near Antioch, he tells us, round the
pillar of Simeon Stylites—a figure Christian in name
but Taouist in all else—were gathered not only Arabs
(Ismaelite), Persians, and Armenians, but Spaniards,
Gauls, and Britons also. Here, then, is distinct evi-
dence of a juncture between British Christianity and
that of Asia Minor and the East, in or about the year
423.3 It now remains for us, therefore, to go back to
our Irish records, and learn, if possible, who these
pilgrims were. They were not the missionaries from
Gaul, for they would have been busy in their mission
field. They were some of the earliest native Christian
converts—those, inshort, whom we find in the following
century described as the ‘Ordo Secundus’ of the
Saints.* They it was who furnished the great band of
pilgrims and missionaries who went forth, as we have
said, to visit the holy places and to evangelise the world.
In the next place, then, we will enquire what were the
peculiar customs of this Second Order, and whether
they were suchas would lead us to believe that what
1 Jerome, Lpist. xiii.
2 Theod. Philoth. (on St. Simeon Stylites), cap. xxvi.
3-H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 14.
4 «The Development of the Native Ministry,’ Reeves’s Adamnan,
p. 334.
12
116 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
they had seen in foreign lands had influenced the
forms of their religion. It is noticeable, in the first
place, that they differed from Patrick in several parti-
culars, and in these a more distinct Orientalism is
observable on their part than on his. It is not said
that they looked up to him as their Chieftain, as the
First Order did; they celebrated different masses,
they excluded women from their monasteries,’ and
they built their churches of stone in contradistinction
to Patrick and the British Church, derived from
Gaul, who built them of wood.” It is to them, too,
that the foundation of the monasteries and the build-
ing of the early stone churches are attributed.
In speaking of early churches and their architec-
ture it is necessary to remember that until the time
of Constantine the Great there was nothing that
deserved the name of Christian Art at all, and even
when he sanctioned the erection of churches no new
style of architecture was invented in which to enshrine
the new religion. ‘Tombs, as Lord Lindsay points
out, seem to have been ‘the first altars, and mauso-
leums the first churches of Christendom.’* Later on
the public baths served as models for baptisteries, the
basilicas (or courts of justice) for churches, and cata-
combs for sepulchral chambers for prayers for the
dead.? Such were the earliest places of Christian
worship in Greece, Asia Minor, and Syria, and these
(to quote the words of Petrie once again) are ‘ exactly
1 Ussher, Brit. Ecc. Ant. p. 478.
2 Todd’s St. Patrick, p. 304, note; Petrie’s Rownd Towers, p. 125
&e. &e. Traditions in Georgia and Armenia point to some churches o
the fourth century as being built of wood. See Grimm’s Arch. Byzani
en Arménie et en George, p. 4.
3 Christian Art, vol. i. p. 6. + Thid. p. 10.
THE APPARENTLY ORIENTAL ELEMENT 117
similar to those of Ireland.” A reference to De
Vogiie’s work on the Architecture of Central Syria
will show at a glance how striking is the resemblance
between the drawings there given and the photographs
in Lord Dunraven’s book. Examples from Kelat
Sema’n,! a church of the fifth century ascribed to St.
Simeon Stylites ; from Chagea;? from Kherbet Hass,*
and others have their counterparts in Ucht Mama,
Cashel, St. Cronans, St. Kevin’s, Tempul-na-Trinoite,*
and fifty other Irish structures, the Syrian examples
being adaptations, be it remembered, to Christian
purposes, of a peculiar style of masonry previously
existing in that country, and very different, it would
appear, to any western model then existing. The
sloping jambs of the doorways? are of the character
known as Cyclopean in Greece ; the oratory of Gal-
lerus ° might be in Lycia, or in India; Tempul Benen
has an extremely Syrian look,’ and lastly the late
Mr. Fergusson was kind enough to show us a photo-
graph of a tower on the plains of Moab, standing side
by side with the ruins of an ecclesiastical edifice,
which in his work on Architecture he has very truly
described Hibernicé as ‘ a square Irish round tower.’ ®
Over the doorway, which is (as usual in Ireland) ten
feet from the ground, is a stone bearing on its face a
cross resembling exactly that occupying a similar
position at St. Fechin’s Church at Fore.’ The lintel
1 Syrie Centrale (Paris, 1865), pl. cxl., &c. &e.
2 Tbid. pl. xviii. 3 Tbid. pl. xv.
4 Trish Arch. plates 1., lxiil., lxxii., lxxiii., Ixxxix., p. 106, plates
xeviil., c., &e. &e.
5 See door of the church at Ratass, Plate IV.
® Petrie, Round Towers, p. 133.
7 Trish Arch. plate xxxvi.
8 Fergusson’s Hist. of Arch. vol. ii. p. 238, note.
2 See PLIV. See also doorway at Kokanaya, Syrie Centrale, pl. xcix.
118 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
too in the Moabite tower consists of a single block
deeply hollowed out so as to form an arch, a feature
common to Syrian and Irish masonry; and at the
summit of the tower are perforations as at Clondalkin.!
Near the oratory of Gallerus is a stone with ‘an
inscription in the Graeco-Roman or Byzantine charac-
ter of the fourth and fifth century.’? There is a
great resemblance also between the ornamentation, of
Armenian churches and those of Ireland. In each
case the peculiar interlaced or knotted pattern, pro-
bably derived originally from India, is freely intro-
duced, and has developed the same forms. Excellent
representations of it at Ani and elsewhere are to be
found in Grimm’s ‘ Architecture en Arménie,’ but,
although in that country it may be a survival of an
ancient style of ornamentation,® the examples of it
which are at present extant are probably of later
date, so that the consideration of them in this place
would lead us too far away from our subject. But it
is not only in the architecture but in the habits and
religious usages of the Irish Christians that points of
comparison with the East present themselves. Let us
take a few: (1) The rigid and fanatical asceticism of
the Anchorets reminds us of those of Edessa or the
Egyptian desert. (2) The exclusion of females from
the monasteries recalls the rule of the monks of Mount
Athos, and brings forcibly to the writer’s mind that
of Buddhist monasteries in China, in which he was
in 1875 a guest of the monks.* (3) The prominence
1 Wakeman’s Handbook of Irish Antiquities, p. 108.
* Round Towers, p.134. This may throw light on the origin of the
peculiar form of letters in the earliest Irish inscriptions.
° See note on Nestorian MSS. at the end of this chapter.
* See Sunways: a Record of Rambles in Many Lands, by the
Author, p. 348,
[PLATE IV.
5 ey rel,
EU ll
Wi an Me,
TN {hh
Bi, Mandl il! |tM |
“hilt a
] Rat
| LY “ITN ‘ni oe {
; ati tearm
ay
BY
>t
H vi ih
UP
an
DIOR OF CHURCH OF ST. FECHIN OF FORE.
DOOR OF CHURCH AT RATASS, NEAR TRALEE.
From etchings by the Author, after Petrie,
SPECIMENS OF EARLY CHRISTIAN ARCHITECTURE IN IRELAND, FOR COMPARISON WITH
ORIENTAL EXAMPLES.
THE APPARENTLY ORIENTAL ELEMENT 119
given to the number seven, as seen in the seven
churches of Glendalough (and elsewhere) brings back
to us the seven churches of Asia, and the sacred and
mystical meaning attached to that number. (4) The
fact that bishops were consecrated irrespective of
dioceses recalls the case of the émioxomo. oyodalovtes,!
for whom rules were provided by the Council of
Antioch,’ and of others, amongst the monks of Edessa
‘consecrated,’ says Dr. Todd, ‘in exact accordance
with the Irish custom.’? (5) The smallness of the
buildings, which can never have been intended for
congregational purposes. Now with regard to all
this, it may of course be true that the greater portion
of these customs are to be accounted for by the fact
that they were those in vogue everywhere in the
earliest infancy of the Christian community, and the
circumstance that they are found in the cradle-land
of the Faith, where customs were less shifting than
they were in the West, would, from this point of view,
be an argument giving additional interest to the fact
of their survival amongst us. Nevertheless, we have
reason to know that, through the medium of pil-
grimages, a connection did exist between Ireland and
the East at a period just prior to that in which Chris-
tianity in the British Isles was severed from the rest of
the world and left to develope, as best it could, such
forms and doctrines as it had already received before
it was cut adrift. We have seen, too, that it is stated in
Theodoret that the British (or Irish) pilgrim had met
in the neighbourhood of Antioch the Persian Magus,*
1 Todd’s St. Patrick, p. 45.
2 Cone. Antioch, Can. 16, 19 (a.p. 841). See Du Cange, Gloss, Med.
et Inf. Lat., in voc. ‘ Episcopi Vagantes.’
3 9t. Patrick, p. 46.
4 This word gave origin to that of Magianism, a synonym for the
Manichean heresy.
120 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
whose name was subsequently adopted by native Irish
historians as the equivalent in Latin form of their
own word Druid, although, as we have seen in a
former chapter, a very similar word was in existence
in their own language to designate a pagan priest,
which doubtless rendered the transference of the
Eastern term to them moreapposite. In Galatia—that
‘boulder’ people, as Canon Lightfoot’ calls them—
broken off from the parent stock, he might even have
heard words in a distant land that were familiar to
him at home. By what route he arrived there, or
returned, seems a matter of little moment, though it
has given rise to much discussion. If he intended to
visit Rome on his way, as in later days he certainly
did, he would take an overland route through Gaul and
Italy, in which case (when coming from Ireland, after
the Saxon invasion) he would pass through Brittany,
and perhaps, as some of the Legends aver, cross the
promontory of Cornwall on his way thither.
It is scarcely likely that he should have made for
the new city of Constantinople direct in the track of
his predecessors the Gauls, through the wild and
dangerous paths of the Hercyneian forest, at that time
only nominally under the Roman rule. He might
have passed, it is true, through the Straits of Gib-
raltar by the commercial route which was open
between Cornwall and Alexandria? in the seventh,
and probably in the sixth century too. There would
be nothing improbable in supposing that the seven
' Preface to his Epistle to the Galatians.
* See Mr. Smirke’s paper on this traffic in the Journal B.I.C., No.
viii., Oct. 1867, quoting from the ‘ Life of John the Almoner,’ Acta SS.
Jan. 23; also a MS. Vite Sanctorum (thirteenth century) containing
this ‘Life’ in the writer’s library which differs slightly from the
former.
THE APPARENTLY ORIENTAL ELEMENT 121
Egyptian monks, mentioned in the Litany of Aengus '
as buried at Disert Ulidh, might have come that way.
The fact that they came here at all is exceedingly
curious, and points, in the opinion of Mr. Petrie, to
return pilgrimages to Ireland in the fifth and sixth
centuries.
Would that the chain of evidence I have been
endeavouring to follow out were more complete than
it is, for then it would afford us an explanation of
what seems otherwise inexplicable in the case of Irish
churches, and, in consequence, of our own St. Piran’s.
The digression will at all events not be out of place
if it has tended to convince us what a special charm
the little ruined building at Perran possesses, being,
as it undoubtedly is (in common with the Irish ex-
amples), the most primitive form of a Christian stone-
built church in the world, its model brought hither
by the perseverance of noble souls, directly or in-
directly, from the birthplace of the Faith itself.
Note on Nestorian MSS.—In the Journal of the Archeological
Association of Ireland for 1890 there is a very interesting notice, aceom-
panied by illustrations, of the decoration employed in a Nestorian MS.
The author, Mr. John L. Robinson, says (p. 32), ‘It is manifest that
the art of designing interlaced ornament came originally from the East,
where it is still practised. Key patterns are still used in Abyssinia,
China, and Japan, and Mr. Allen says, “The Nestorian Church has
preserved from very early times the custom of ornamenting their MSS.
of the Gospels with interlaced work, and some of the cross pages at the
commencement of the Gospels might be almost mistaken for the illu-
minations out of an Irish MS. of the eighth century.” ’ An illustration
in this paper amply bears out this latter statement; it might be a page
in the ‘ Book of Kells.’
1 Petrie, Round Towers, p. 188. The rules of the monks of Egypt
are quoted for the guidance of an Armorican monastery as late as the
year 817. H. and S. Councils, vol. ii. p. 79, note.
132 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CHAPTER XII
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL
(circa 520-682 A.D.)
Ir has been remarked by Mr. Boase that the sever
divisions of Cornwall, in which the names of Sain
occur, roughly speaking correspond with, or are r
spectively opposite to, those coasts from which the
are said to have come.! Thus, the Land’s End di
trict, with the strip of north coast extending as far |
Perran, is specially full of Irish Saints, who came, :
we have seen, from the province of Munster. Tl
Lizard district, Mounts’ Bay, and the southern coa
supply us with names associated with Brittany, whi
the remaining and far larger portion of the coun
eastward is filled with those of Welsh extractio
The Saints which Cornwall claims as her own sons a
few, and almost confined to a single family dwellir
on the south coast. As we placed the period of tl
Irish immigration in the fifth and sixth centuries, |
now we shall place that of the Welsh in the sixth a1
seventh—approximately speaking, however, since
must be remembered that Cornwall, occupying as
does an intermediate position between Wales on 1]
one hand and Brittany on the other, was used (aft
the Saxon conquest of England) as the highroad
' Smith, Dict. Christ. Biog. article ‘ Breaca.’
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL is
and from the Continent, so that Welsh and Breton,
and even Irish Saints as well, may be looked for here
at periods later than those assigned as the mean
times of their greatest influx. Were we to give way
to speculation, we might consider the occurrence of a
few names on the north coast and the south alike,
such as Mawgan, Piran, and others, as even roughly
indicative of the route by which they travelled
Across.
A link between Irish and Welsh and Cornish hagio-
logy is to be found in St. Cairnech, or Karentocus,
whose church of Crantock lies on the north coast of
Cornwall. He is placed by his Legends’ as early as
the fifth century, and it is said of him that he ‘came
from Cornwall to join St. Patrick, and to assist
him in the compilation of the Brehon laws.’? It is
of interest to note that in the ‘ Feilire’ of Aengus,?
written in the eighth century, he is called a Cornish-
man. Wales, however, and Ireland too, claim his
birthplace. One Legend? represents him as settling
on the banks of the Severn, whence he voyaged
down the coast as far as Arthur’s Castle. Here he
performed a miracle by taming a serpent,°® by which
is allegorically meant, perhaps, that he converted an
obdurate and dangerous pagan people, or destroyed
their serpent idol, as Patrick destroyed the Crom
Cruach (the word Crom itself possibly meaning a
serpent), and drove the snakes out of Ireland. His
1 Caperave, Leg. Nov. Ang. p. 56; Acta SS. May 16; andin Rees’s
Cambro-British Saints (H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 36).
2 Smith, Dict. Christ. Biog., ‘ Cairnech.’
3 Translated by Colgan, and since then edited by Dr. Whitley
Stokes.
+ Cotton MSS. Vesp., A xiv. ; extracts from, in Cressy, p. 181.
5 From the Life in Capgrave. See also Borlase, MS. Par. Mem.
p. 110.
124 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
altar had landed before him, and on the spot where
it came ashore he built a church near the port of
Guellit, called Carran, or Carrow,} or, as Leland says,
‘constructed an oratory in a place called Guerith
Karanctanc.’? From the Exeter ‘ Domesday’ it is clear
that a collegiate church existed at Crantock before
the Conquest, the canons being said to hold ‘ a manor
called Langorroc, which the Saint Karentocus held
on the day King Edward died.’* Dr. Borlase gives
him the alias of Gernac,’* which is very similar to
Cairnech, the Irish form of his name. His day in
the ‘ Acta Sanctorum’ (May 16) is the same as that of
the parish feast. On the Cardiganshire coast is the
church of Llangrannoc, which bears his name.°
Dr. Todd mentions ® that, in the sixth century, on
account of the troubles at home, Irish Saints of the
Second Order habitually proceeded to Wales in order
to gain the benefits of the ecclesiastical education
which was springing up in the colleges of that
country.
Down to the year 682, when the Saxons advanced
as far as the Severn, Cornish and Welsh Saints were
to all intents and purposes the same people. It was
not until that date that these two countries were
severed from each other. Cornwall was merely West
Wales, and its people ‘ the West Weeallas.’ Itis true
that, as Dumnonia, it was subject to an independent
prince, but Wales itself was similarly divided up to
that time into parcels, each under its own territorial
chieftain. The two countries spoke the same lan-
' Quoted by Adams, Journ. R.I.C., No. xv., April 1874, p. 276.
* Leland, Jtin. vol. iii. p. 195.
% Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Fx. p. 54. 4 MS. Par. Mem. loc. cit.
° Rees’s Welsh Saints, p. 209, note. ° St. Patrick, p. 114.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 125
guage, and the circumstance that they lived under
separate lords in no way prevented individuals from
keeping up close ties of friendship, resulting in a
mutual interchange of visits, and cemented often by
intermarriages. If there is one general fact of his-
tory which, more than another, stands prominently
forth in the ancient records of Wales and the
genealogies of Welsh Saints, it is the proof which they
afford of the close connection of the various tribes
one with the other, and especially (prior to their
severance) of the southern and south-western Welsh
of Brecknockshire and Cardiganshire with their
kindred in Cornwall. At the time of which we speak
the common danger of invasion must have united
them more intimately even than before, and, as the
foe pressed forward and cut them asunder, those who
dwelt south of the Severn’s bank would naturally
have sought for retirement in the solitudes of our
‘wild West Wales.’
Mr. Rice Rees! divides the ancient Welsh litera-
ture, such as it is, into the Bardie and the Legendary,
and states that in the former may be found the
groundwork of the latter. ‘The fondness of the
Welsh for pedigrees’ gave employment to a special
order of Bards, who were constantly engaged in
searching old genealogies, and, we may presume, not
seldom in manufacturing new ones. In these the
aristocratic connections of the Saints stand out in
bold relief. As founders of churches their pedigrees
were kept with special care, collections of them were
prepared, and of these two have been published,
entitled ‘The Gentilities, or Pedigrees of the Saints
of the Isle of Britain.* On an examination of
1 Welsh Saints, Preface, pp. ix-xi. * Ibid. pp. 73-75.
126 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
them it will be found that so close are the relation-
ships which these men of reputed sanctity bear to
each other, that a very few genealogical trees, pro-
vided they be of a Saint-producing species, will
suffice to furnish us with all the Saints of any note
whose names have still survived. Gaul also, as we
have seen, seems to have had its sacerdotal families
even in pre-Christian times. In the case where a
parish bears the name of a native Saint, Welsh tradi-
tion, as does our Cornish tradition also, ascribes its
foundation to that person himself, and to no other.!
The names attached to churches and chapel-
ries in Wales Mr. Rees divides into two classes—
(1) those which are native; (2) those which belong to
the Roman Calendar.’ Those which bear the native
names have a prima facie claim to be considered the
oldest, and may be dated, Mr. Rees thinks, at a mean
period of from 500 to 550% a.p. Next in age come
the dedications to St. Michael; the earliest mention
of a church dedicated to this Archangel in Wales
occurring in the year 718,* though the practice con-
tinued down to the tenth century.’ Lastly come
the dedications to St. Mary, dating from the tenth
century onwards.° In these latter cases, unless the
foundation was a new one, the Roman Saint may
be supposed to have supplanted some uncanonised
predecessor of native origin. In some instances such
a change was only partially effected, and the parish
possesses two patrons, a native and a Calendar Saint,
popular favour having preserved the older title
1 Welsh Saints, p. xii. ? Thid. p. 26. 5 Ibid. p. 68.
4H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 203. > Welsh Saints, p. 65.
6 Ibid. p. 69, where the mean period is given as the twelfth
century.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL Tt
side by side with the new. Thus there is ‘ St. Elider
and St. James;’ ‘St. Beuno and St. Michael;’ ‘St.
Dogmael and St. Thomas ;’* and others.
In applying Mr. Rees’s method to the Dumnonian
Saints, we find that in Devonshire much the same pro-
cess has been going on as in Wales. The proportion
of Mary dedications is large, as it is in that country.
In Cornwall, however—-unconquered, stubborn Corn-
wall—the case with regard to the churches is different.
Out of a list of 210? Cornish churches (twenty-two of
which bear uncertain or modern names) we find nine
dedications to St. Mary, five to St. Michael, twenty-
nine to well-known Calendar Saints, twenty-eight to
obscure Saints (some in the Roman Calendar, but
most of them of foreign origin contained in early
native lists), while no less than 117 retain their native
British name. Out of a list, however, of 200 chapel-
ries, holy wells, cells, and oratories, collected from
the MSS. of Dr. Borlase, but of which thirty-five have
lost their identity, we find that twenty are dedicated
to St. Mary, eight to St. Michael, eighty-four to well-
known Calendar Saints, eight to obscure saints, while
forty-five bear a native and Celtic name.
Two conclusions may, we think, be drawn from
these figures—(1) That in the portion of the Dum-
nonian promontory west of the Tamar the element
of native Christianity was sufficiently strong to be
able to resist the levelling progress of the Anglo-
Roman religious domination, and amongst other
things to retain the names of its own uncanonised
Saints down to a period so late that their inappro-
1 Welsh Saints, pp. 70, 71.
2 In making these calculations we have taken the list of churches
from Oliver.
128 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
priateness was either forgotten or not considered
serious enough to require a change which might give
rise to opposition. The dedications to obscure
Saints, not bearing native names, but of Continental
origin, may be traced, as we shall see, in all pro-
bability to Gallo-Roman, not Anglo-Roman influence,
introduced by way of Brittany, and was the work,
therefore, of the natives themselves. (2) That the
chapelries were for the most part of very recent ori-
gin.’ Instances there are, however, in Cornwall as
in Wales, of changes of name having been occasion-
ally brought about at an early period in the case of
the parochial churches. Thus St. Just was anciently
Lanfrowdha,? Gulval was Lanisley,? Madron was
probably Landithy,* and Veryan (said to be Sympho-
rian) was Hlerky.? At a later date St. Nonna’s name
at Altarnun was changed to St. Mary,® St. Neot’s at
1 This is borne out by documentary evidence. An immense number
of chapelries date from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. For
some instances see Oliver’s Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 487 et seq. (column of
remarks). In the parish of St. Dominick a chapel to St. Iltutus, a
Welsh Saint, was licensed under that name in the fourteenth century
(see ibid.) A chapel in St. Vepe ‘ to SS. Ciricius and Juliette was new-
built in 1836’ (Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p.163). A chapel to St. Martin
in St. Winnow was licensed by Bishop Brantyngham in 1389, ‘ quam
Johannes Moyle sumptibus suis construxit’ (ibid.)
2 Buller’s St. Just, p. 19, or ‘ Lafroudha,’ or ‘ Lafroodha.’
3 Tax. of Pope Nicholas, 1291, ‘Ecclesia de Lanesly.’ In Carew
(1602) it is called Wolvele, p. 91.
4 Madron, alias Madderne, is spoken of in the Hx. Reg. (quoted by
Dr. Borlase, Par. Mem. MS. p. 73) as Madern, alias St. Patern. In the
Taxation of Pope Nicholas it is ‘Ecclesia Sti. Maderni.’ Landithy is
the manor farm adjoining the churchyard, and seems to be compounded
with a Saint’s name, possibly Yth or Etha; the change to St. Padarn
may possibly be due, as we shall see, to late Armorican influence.
5 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 443.
6 Oliver does not mention this in his dedications, but it is clear from
a document in the Mon. p. 55, where ‘ Ecclesia Beate Virginis de
Alternone’ is mentioned.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 129
Menheniot to St. Anthony,! St. Fimbar’s at Fowey?
to St. Nicholas, Sheviock to St. Hugh,’ Quethiock to
SS. Peter and Paul,? and St. Merrin’s? to Thomas &
Becket. It may be noticed, however, that while the
four first of the above examples are changes possibly
introduced by native Christians, independent of
Anglo-Roman influence, the last six are decidedly
very late. As in Wales, too, we have occasionally a
double dedication to a native Saint joined to one in
the Roman Calendar, or even to a Saxon;—for ex-
ample, St. Mawnanus and St. Stephen at Mawnan,° St.
Manacus and St. Dunstan at Lanlivery ° and Lanreath ;
and, to take again St. Merrin, Hals cites a deed
handing over certainmoneys to the repair of the blessed
Meran and St. Thomas & Becket.’ Of chapelries St.
Enodock® appears as St. Kennedius or Kennet, the me-
dizeval scribe being only too willing to write a name
he knew in place of a Celtic one which he did _ not.®
1 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 441. Query whether the name Neot
does not enter into the word Menheniot. Niot is Carew’s spelling of
Neot (Survey, p. 93). This is a curious example of a Saxon Saint having
a rededication imposed on him.
2 Leland, Itin. vol. iii. p. 838. In 1836 the church was ‘de novo
constructa,’ and it was then that it received its newname. This is the
most distinct example we have. See Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 489.
3 Tbid. p. 442. The dedication of Quethiock (perhaps ‘ Cadoc’) took
place on Oct. 18, 1259.
4 Hals, edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iii. p.177. ‘One Mar-
garet Tregoweth, of Crantock, temp. Henry VIL., gave lands in Harlyn
. . . towards the repair of the Blessed Meran and St. Thomas Becket’s
church.’
5 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 440. 8 Thid. p. 441. 7 Loe. cit.
8 In the parish of St. Minver. Martin in his map calls it Enodok,
and Norden St. Nedy. Davies Gilbert calls it St. Gwinnodock (Par.
Hist. Corn. vol iii. p. 240). Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 118, calls it
St. Kennedius.
® This mode of proceeding was followed, perhaps, in the case of the
churches of St. Ewe, dedicated, according to the scribes, to Eustachius,
and in that of Phillack to Felicitas.
K
130 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
St. Elwyn is also changed to St. Catherine ;' and St.
Rumon is in one case joined to St. Christopher.’
The general impression left on the mind by these
facts is that we have no evidence of intentional
changes made in the nomenclature of our churches,
which we can attribute to Anglo-Roman influence in
early times, but that such changes as were made
from native Saints to important Saints of the Roman
Calendar date from the thirteenth or fourteenth cen-
tury, on occasions when a bishop was consecrating
the high altar of a newly renovated church, as was
the case at Fowey, or when a monk or public notary
wrote down the word in a Latinised form. This latter
cause of error was doubtless very prevalent, and we
see it in such cases as Tallanus for Talland, Uvelus
for Eval,? Cledredus for Clether, Menefrida for Minver,
Ludowanus for Ludgvan, Ennodorus for Enoder, and
perhaps in Hermes for Ervan,* though the latter is a
real Saint found in Continental Calendars.
The utter ignorance of the transcribers was
occasionally shown in instances where the register
alternately makes the Saint’s name masculine or
feminine : e.g. St. Tudy has for patron, according to
the scribes, either St. Uda® or St. Tudius ;° St. Veep
' Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 188. The chapel is in St. Eval, ‘at
Elwynse, dedicated to St. Katherine,’ quoted from Ea. Reg.
? In the parish of ‘Ewenny,’ according to Ex. Reg., quoted by
Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 166, probably ‘ Redruth.’
5 There is a Saint Evilla in a Litany of Dunkeld. See H. and 6.
Councils, vol. ii. part i. app. C.
4 All in Oliver’s list of dedications, in the Monasticon,
° Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 448.
° There is always a great liability to affix the T of the word ‘ saint’ to
the next word if it begins with a vowel. Thus in the case of St. Just,
which the people call St. Toost, there is actually a boundary stone of
that parish at a place where three parishes join, on which a T is in-
scribed for St. Just, side by side with a B for Burian and an § for
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 131
either Vepus or Vepa.!. The result is that we have
not a few examples of an entirely spurious Hagiology,
invented by the scribe out of the names of the
parishes. St. Endelienta,’ for instance, is a purely
fictitious name, made, as we once conjectured, out
of the real name of a church, which contained in
turn that of a Saint called Teilo or Delian. Ladoca®
is a similar case: Newelina,’ probably Mabena,° and
pethaps Morwetha are equally fictitious. St. San-
credus,® though the reputed patron of two churches,
is simply a reduplication of the word Sanctus in the
case of the holy creed. The parish of Sancreed is
also called Sancrus (St. Cross), and it is therefore
curious to find that the church of Grade, another
form of ‘Creed,’ is dedicated not only to St. Grade?
but to the Holy Cross as well. Considering his claim
to a place in biography, we are not surprised to
discover that the attribute of St. Sancred was not
one calculated to inspire devotion. He was ‘ chiefly
famous,’ says Tonkin, for ‘curing all distempers in
pigs, which formerly were used to be brought from
all round the country. * The most serious maltreat-
Sancred. William of Worcester gives the name of St. Just as ‘ Yoest’
(edit. D. G. vol. iv. p. 245); there is a Welsh saint called Ust (Rees’s
Welsh Saints, p. 224), and another called Usteg (ibid. p. 297), which
reminds us that the name of Ustick was common in St. Just. There
was also a Jestyn son of Geraint (ibid. p. 232).
1 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 4438.
2 Tbid. p. 488, and Leland, Collectamea, vol. iii. p. 153. See infra,
p. 184. 3 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 440.
4 Thid. p. 441. 5 Tbid. p. 441. ® Thid. p. 442.
7 Ibid. p. 489. ‘St. Gradus’! This masculine Saint is absurd; it
is possible indeed that Sancreed may be, as Mr. Boase hints, ‘ St. Crida’
(Smith, Dict. Christ. Biog. art. ‘Crida’), although the alias in each
case of ‘Holy Cross’ would rather make me take the other view.
Compare the female name Credhe in Irish romance (O’Grady’s Silva
Gadelica, vol. i. p. 120).
8 Tonkin, MS. C., p. 11 (lost), quoted by Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 34.
K 2
132 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
ment the names of our Saints have undergone hag
been at the hands of the natives themselves. St.
Breward,' whoever he may have been, has become
Simon Ward; St. Nonna, St. Ounter ;? St. Meriadoc,
Mary Dokey, or Merrygeek ;° and St. Just, St. Toost.
I will take an instance in which a curious chain—I
will not say of positive evidence—seems to result
from the consideration of a single much-distorted
name. The island of St. Helen’s,* at Scilly, was
1 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ha. gives the name of this church as ‘S.
Bruerdi,’ p. 437. In the Taxation of Pope Nicholas (1291) it is called
‘Ecclesia de Bruwered.’ In 1696, says Hals (edit. D. G. Par. Hist.
Corn. vol. i. p. 129), it was rated under the name of Brewer. Tonkin
is responsible for the ‘Simon Ward.’ He says, ‘I conceive the name
is not derived from the imaginary Symon Ward, alias Brewer, that was
said to be King Arthur’s Brewer, as the people report’ (MS. Tonkin,
Par, Ant. vol.i. p.129). He then goes on to state his supposition that
the name was derived from Brewer, Bishop of Exeter, ‘son to the famous
William, Lord Brewer.’ Hals had, however, first given this derivation,
and, absurd as it at first seems, it is only fair to place by its side an in-
cident in the life of the said Bishop Brewer which took place in the
case of the parish of Altarnun in the year 1237. (See Oliver, Mon. Dioe.
Ex. p. 55, note.) He granted this parish to his Dean and Chapter,
one of the conditions of such grant being that they should keep his own
anniversary, and that of ‘nobilis viri laudabilis memories W. Briwer,
senioris benefici nostri.’ ‘He spent his whole time,’ adds Tonkin, ‘in
building and endowing churches; adorning and enriching his own
Cathedral and See.’
2 In the parish of Creed (Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 176, quoting
a letter from the incumbent). Tonkin (ibid.) calls it St. Naunter, and
says it was at Trevellick.
3 Persons who washed in the well of this Saint were known as
Merrasickers (Beunans Meriasek, by Whitley Stokes, p. xii).
* The church on St. Helen’s island, says Dr. Borlase, Islands of
Scilly, p. 51, ‘is the most ancient Christian building’ in Scilly. ‘It
consists of a South Isle, thirty-one feet six inches long by fourteen feet
three inches wide, from which two Arches, low and of uncouth style,
open into a North Isle twelve feet wide by nineteen feet six inches long ;
two Windows in each Isle; near the Eastern Window in the North
Isle projects a flat stone, to support, I suppose, the image of the Saint.’
In the original MS., in addition to a plan of this church, a drawing of
the arches is given. Some years since, when staying at Tresco, we
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 133
formerly called St. Lides, whose sepulchre Leland
mentions there.’ This Lides is the St. Elidius of
whom William of Worcester speaks,’ as having been
buried at Scilly. This Elidius again is the Eliud of
Giraldus Cambrensis, Bishop of Landaff in the sixth
century,’ of whom Galfridus* in his Life says that
‘in his old age he was called by the congruous name
of Elios; for that his doctrine shone like the sun ’—
an allegorical simile frequently applied to great and
popular Saints. This Elius, however, is the same as
Feliaus ° or Theliaus,’ whose name we now recognise
as that of the famous St. Teilo,’ who, during the
yellow plague, went to Armorica, and, according to
Giraldus,® accompanied David and Padarn to Jeru-
salem. In Brittany he remained with Budoc and
Samson seven months, and then comes his legendary
connection with Cornwall. In company with his
accompanied the proprietor of the islands, Mr. Augustus Smith, on an
expedition to excavate the ruins of this church. We were able to
verify Dr. Borlase’s measurements. Some curious old glass was dis-
covered, and the arch of a window slightly pointed, but very rudely
cut out of a single stone.
' Ttin. vol. iii. p. 19.
2 Bdit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 241. ‘Sancti Elidii epi-
scopi, 8 die Augusti, jacet in insula Syllys.’
3 + Bliud qui et Feliaus [als Theliaus, Bishop of Landaff] vocatur,”
Gir. Camb. 161, “unde f.S. Elidius in Sylley vulg. St. Helens.”’ Borlase,
MS. Collectanea, p. 128.
4 Quoted by Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 243. MS. Cott. Vesp. A xiv.
compiled ‘a magistro Galfrido fratre Urbani Landaw. Ecc. Episcopi,’
and therefore, says Haddan (Cowncils, vol. i. p. 159), written shortly
before 1133.
5 E.g. Todd’s St. Patrick, p. 39, note.
“ Gir. Camb. loc. cit.
7 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 242.
8 Lives, in Liber Landavensis, pp. 92-114, ut supra. Capgrave,
Leg. Nov. Ang. p. 280. Acta SS. Feb. 9, 308. (H. and 8. Councils,
vol. i. p. 159.) This attempt at identification has been disputed.
9 Quoted by Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 194.
134 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
nephew Oudoceus,! and many other Doctors and
Bishops, he arrived at the harbour of Dingerein, and
went ona visit to King Gerennius, whom he found
at the point of death. Thence he returned to
Landaff. From the form of his name, Feliaus, we can
explain the dedications of two of our Cornish
churches, St. Issey and Philleigh, or Fillie, both of
which, according to Oliver, are ascribed to St. Filius.”
But our chain does not end here. The parish of
Endellion, also called St. Delian,’ certainly bears the
name of the same Saint under another form—the
female Endelienta being simply a monkish trifling
with the word Landelian—a form which occurs twice
in Wales amongst the long list of churches? which
(under various modifications) bear the name of St.
Teilo. Hals, indeed, uses this very form, and calls
him St. Telian.? There was a chapel to St. Elente°® in
the parish; and the ‘Domesday’ manor of Deliou,’
which Mr. Carne identifies with Delionuth,® lies in
St. Teath, the parish adjoining, if it is not, as surmised
by Hals, the parish of Endellion itself.? To go one
1 Ussher, Index Chron. in ann. 596.
? Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ha. p. 489. Each of these churches is called
also Eglosros.
5 Hals. edit. D. G. vol. i. p. 382. N.B.—The feast day at Endel-
lion was unknown to Mr. Tregeare, Dr. Borlase’s correspondent in that
parish (MS. Letters, vol. v.)
* Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 247.
5 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p.108; also‘ Delyan.’ We have allowed
this passage to stand, in spite of the adverse criticism privately com-.
municated to me by a Welsh scholar of high repute—Mr. Phillimore—
who tells me that the forms Telian and Delyan are, he is convinced,
misreadings of the forn Teliaw. Mr. Boase also takes exception to the
proposed derivation.
® Thid. 7 Ex. Domesday ‘ Delio.’
* Journ. R.I.C. No. iv. Oct. 1865, pp. 52, 53.
* Edit. D. G. Par, Hist. Corn. vol. i. p. 882. There is another
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 135
step further, whose name is it that the parish of St.
Issey bears? We have seen that St. Filius was
considered its patron Saint by the scribes of the
Exeter Register, but is it possible that that name can
have become corrupted into Issey? It is just possible
that it is so,indeed. Phonetically speaking, there is
no difficulty in identifying the word Issey, through
the medium of Idgie (or Iddy) with Ide,! the name
of a large manor in the vicinity. Indeed, we have
close at hand other forms of the word in Zanzidgie,
Cannal-ige (or issy), and Porthisek. The popular
name of the parish Saint in Hals’s time was ‘ Gigey.’?
But we have reason to think that Ide and Lide, or
Lyddy, are one and the same name. At all events
they appear together once in Bishop Brantyngham’s
Register as patrons of Egloskerry, although in sub-
sequent entries the Lyddy is dropped and the Saint
becomes Ide alone.* Hals too spells the name of the
manor before referred to as Cannal-Lidgye,’ and
Lysons notices that the chapel formerly called Elente
(or Eleete) is now St. Hlick.® In Burian parish is a
chapel to St. Dillo,® which comes nearest of all to the
word Teilo. This chapel, we were informed, is now
called St. Dellan, a name which easily passes into
that of the better known St. Helen—a transition
which accounts for the present name of St. Lides’s
Domesday manor called Deliau (Ex. Dom. ‘ Delioau’), which Mr. Carne
identifies with Dellabole, also in St. Teath.
1 Lysons’s Cornwall, p. 146. 2 Hals, loc. cit.
3 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 488. In Brantyngham it is ‘ Ecc. Sane-
torum Ide et Lyddy de Egloscruc;’ in another place in the same
Register it is ‘Sancta Ida,’ and in Stafford it is ‘ Kec. Sancte Ide,
alias Egloscruke.’
+ Hals, loc. cit. ° Lysons, loc. cit.
8 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. (quoting from Tonkin, M8. E. p. 55,
lost), p. 74.
136 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Island at Scilly. Tonkin”? supposed that in the
word Duloe was to be found the name of Teilo, and
it is curious to find that a chapel existed in that
parish at a place called Hille.* In Devonshire the
name of Ide occurs in a parish of that name, as
also in Iddesford and Iddesleigh.4 The extent of
the cultus of St. Teilo, implied by the occurrence of
his name in so many places in the West of England,
need astonish no one who has observed in Welsh
documents the number of churches called by his
name in that country,? and the extraordinary
privileges attached to them in the early part of the
eleventh century.’ Probably next to St. David he
was the most popular Saint in Wales.
We have seen, then, that Issey is possibly the
same as Hlidius. We will be bold enough to try
and unravel one more knot in this tangled web.
Tonkin states that a portion of the town of Meva-
gissy was known as ‘ Port Hilly,’ a name which we
may compare with that of the chapel in Duloe just
mentioned. Carew says of Mevagissy that it had
an ‘ alias, St. Mevie and Isy (two nothing ambitious
Saints, in resting satisfied with the partage of so
pettie a limit).® Oliver mentions the reputed dedi-
cation to the same pair.’ In this Saint, Mevie, we
have the name of St. Mevanus or Méen, a Welshman
from Gwent, and the cousin of St. Samson, who,
1 E.g. Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Hx. p. 437, from the Inquisitiones Nona-
rum.
* MS. E. p. 55 (lost); quoted by Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 51.
3 Borlase, ibid.
* Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 449.
° See H. and 8. Cowncils, vol. i. p. 290, note; and Rees’s Welsh
Saints, pp. 246-249,
° Carew, Survey, edit. 1602, p. 141.
7 «$8. Meva and Ida.’ Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 441.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 137
passing into Brittany late in the fifth century,
founded the monastery of St. Méen deep in the
heart of the forest of Brékilien, where Gallic Chris-
tianity had never been able to penetrate; but which,
under Mevan, was to become the home of every
pilgrim from the shores of Britain.’ His name in
Cornwall may occur also in St. Mewan, whose patron,
according to Oliver, is Mewanus,” and perhaps again
in Mythian * Chapel in St. Agnes.‘ In Isy, if indeed
he be St. Teilo, we have a contemporary of St. Méen,
and in all probability (since both were friends of
Samson) a friend and companion. The occurrence
of the two names in this uncouth name (Meva-hag-Isy,
or Meva-ha-Gissy) may point to the fact that they
were labouring together in the mission field.» We
have seen other examples of the grouping of two
Saints together in the cases of Ye and Derwe and Uni
Gwendron; it is also found in Constantine and
Elidius at Milton Abbot in Devon; and it was
1 Lives occur in Acta SS. June 21, iv. pp. 101-104; and in Le
Grand, edit. Kerdanet, pp. 823-330, where other materials are noted.
2 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 441. In Scawen (Ant. Corn. Brit. p. 70)
Mevagissy is spelt Menagissy on four occasions, but perhaps by a mis-
print. Tonkin says that the most ancient name of Mevagissy was
Lanvoreck, in which we seem to have the name of St. Vorch, to whom
the same writer ascribes the dedication of Lanlivery.
3 Or ‘Mithian’ (Hals, edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. i. p. 7).
+ Also in Mevichurch, Devon.
5 There is another name in the same neighbourhood as Mevagissey,
which suggests a like origin, and may possibly form a link in the chain
between the words Elidius, Ide, andIssy. It is that of Menacuddle, a
noted Holy-Well and Chapelry near St. Austell, called also Manacutell.
(See Lysons, p. 24; Oliver, Mon. p. 487; and a drawing in Blight’s
Crosses of Cornwall, p. 94). The word Menabilly is worthy of notice
in the same relation. Mena-ha-Dillie, and Mena-ha-Ilic would readily
pass into Menabilly and Menacuddle, if we once admit the process of
grouping in the case of Mevagissy—a process, we may add, which is
also found in Ireland.
138 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
commonly done in that of the favourite martyrs
under Diocletian, Cyrus and Julitta—very naturally
so in their case, for they were mother and child.
St. Teilo’s companions, David, Padarn, and
Samson, have each left their names in Cornwall.
Dewstow retains that of David; and within a dis-
tance of a few miles, placed there with a sense of
appropriateness which is touching, is the reputed
shrine of his mother, St. Nonna. Similar instances
of churches or chapels bearing her name, and placed
near those of her son, occur several times! in Wales,
once in Devon,” and once at least in Brittany. The
name of her church in Cornwall, Altarnun,‘ is very
remarkable. This prefix (in place of Lan, Eglos, or
Saint) may possibly be an evidence of a custom of
very great antiquity, and when we remember the
fables of Saints like St. Crantock bringing their
altars ®° with them, round which to raise their
churches, we seem to reach back to the shadow
of some usage long since forgotten. Traditionally,
too, Altarnun was the place of St. Nonna’s burial; °
though Brittany puts in a rival claim, in which
country an uninscribed monument to her memory is
said to exist in a chapel of her son, St. Devy.’ The
Breton stone is pronounced, however, to be late, and
with even more show of reason than this we might
1 An example in Rees’s Welsh Saints, p. 48, and four others, p. 164.
? Bradstone, ibid. p. 200.
3 H. and §. Councils, vol. ii. p. 98.
4 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ha. pp. 55, 427.
5 Altoir is the Irish for Altar, and not Allor, asin Wales. St.
Nonna was said to be an Irishwoman, which was the reason Colgan
published St. David’s Life. See Adams, Jowrn. R.I.C. No. xl. 1870,
p. 156, note.
° The earliest stone altars were tombs.
7 TI. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 98 note.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 139
point to an inscribed pillar (allowed by Hiibner to be
of contemporary date) at Tregony! as possibly re-
cording her name under the form in which William
of Worcester? gives it—namely, Nonnita. The
oldest ‘Life’ of St. David? makes her no nun, as
her name has led some to infer, but a beautiful girl
with whom Cereticus, a prince in South Wales, fell
in love. Leland calls her Novita and makes her the
daughter of a ‘comes Corinie;’* in fact, as usual,
kindred peoples, wherever located, vie for the birth-
place and the sepulchre of a favourite Saint. In Corn-
wall, under the name of Ninnina, she had a chapel in
Pelynt.£ The church at Altarnun, though afterwards
dedicated to St. Mary,® was originally hers, as was a
chapelin the same parish. In Creed she had another
chapel, where she is called Naunter or Ounter.’
The story that St. David was born in Cornwall
rests solely on the statement of William of Worcester
that from the Calendar of the church of ‘ Mont
Myghell’ he copied the passage, ‘Sancta Nonnita
mater Sancti Davidis jacet apud ecclesiam ville
1 Hiibner, Inscrip. Christ. Brit. p. 4, who reads it, ‘ Nonnita,
Ercila, Viricati, tris fili Ercilinci.’ See also Journ. B.I.C. No. v. 1866,
p. 3.
2 Rdit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 247.
3 Ricemarch’s (Bishop of St. Davids, 1088) Acta SS. Mar. 1,1. 41;
with variations in Colgan, Alta SS. H1b. i. 425.
* Collect. vol. ii. 2nd edit. p. 107. See ibid. p. 17 for doubtful
identification of Corinia with Cornwall.
5 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Hz. p. 442. In the Inquisitiones Nonarum
(1342), ‘St. Neomena; in Staff. Reg. (1409),’ St. Nynnina. Ninnine
in Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 152. Whitaker, without authority, says
that the church was dedicated to her (quoted by D. G. Par. Hist.
Corn. p. 292).
6 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 55.
7 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 176. St. Nun’s day was March
3 (Welsh Saints, p. 164); or March 2 (Davies Gilbert, vol. i. p.
25).
140 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Alternoniz*...ubi natus fuit Sanctus David.’? A
Welsh poet of the twelfth century recites a vague
legend of his having been at one time in Devon,
where he suffered persecution at the hands of some
badly disposed female, and adds that he finally en-
dangered the sceptre of that country.2 Being
traditionally a great traveller, it is possible that his
presence in Devon and Cornwall is an actual fact.
The names of St. Samson and St. Padarn, both
of which are found in Cornwall, and the Legends
connected with them, recall the close connection
existing in the sixth century between Wales and
Brittany. The former,’ a Welshman of South Wales,
and educated at St. Iltyd’s College, in Glamorgan-
shire, becomes Bishop of Dol, in Brittany ; the latter,®
an Armorican, receives a crozier at Llanbadarn
Vawr, in Wales. St. Samson has left his name in
Cornwall in the reputed dedications of Golant and
Southill,° and in St. Samson’s Island at Scilly, where
he occurs side by side with his friend St. Elidius or
Teilo. In the Life of St. Petroc’ a certain Samson is
mentioned as a hermit dwelling near him; and it is
1 Davies Gilbert, Par. Hist. Corn. vol. i. p. 36. ‘Chapel of St.
Nonne’s de Nonnestonys in Alternun,’ from Ex. Reg.
* Thid. vol. iv. p. 247.
3 By Gwynfardd, in Myvyrian Arch. vol. i. p. 270.
4H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 158. Lives in Mabillon, Acta SS.
Bened. i. 165; in Liber Landav. 8-25; in F. da Base, Biblioth.
Floriac. 464-484; another by Balderic, Bishop of Dol (see Hardy,
Disc. Cat. 141, note); another in Capgrave, Leg, Nov. Ang. 276;
see also Cressy, xi. 28, and Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), 409. Day,
July 28.
5 H. and §. Cowncils, vol. i. p. 159. Life by a contemporary in
Mabillon, Acta SS. Bened. 1100-1104; in Mabill. i. 158. Surius Ap.
16, ii. 180; in Cambro-British Saints, 189; in Acta SS. April 15, ii.
378; and in Capgrave, Leg. Nov. Ang. p. 258.
® Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 442.
7 Acta SS. June 4, i. 400.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 141
significant, perhaps, to find that a Chapel of St.
Samson did actually exist at Place House, near
Padstow.! Between him, however, and the other
Samson no identity exists other than in name. The
name of Padarn, or Paternus, occurs in the supposed
dedications of North and South Petherwyn, two
parishes in Devon and Cornwall respectively.” It is
also given by Oliver, quoting from the Exeter
Registers, as an alias of Maternus or Madron.?
The next Saint of Welsh extraction,’ since, ‘ ac-
cording to his own Life, he was born in Wales, and
connected with St. Samson,’ and whose date also is
placed in the sixth century, is St. Petroc,° ‘ the cap-
tain, says Fuller, ‘of the Cornish Saints.’ Leland,
quoting from his Legend,° says, ‘He was by birth a
Camber ; studied twenty years in Ireland; returned to
his monastery in Cornwall, and died there.’ No less
than four churches in Cornwall,’ eight in Devon, two in
Wales,’ and one in France are ascribed to him.’ The
Bonedd y Saint’? make him the son of a Cornish
1 Davies Gilbert, Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iii. p. 280.
2 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. pp. 442, 452. 3 See above, p. 101.
+ Mr. Haddan remarks (Councils, vol. i. p. 157) that his name
seems to be Irish.
5 H. and 8. Cowncils, loc. cit.; Lives in Acta SS. June 4, i. 400;
Capgrave, Leg. Nov. Ang. 266; Cressy, x. 24; Ussher, Index Chron.
var. loc.
6 Ttin. vol. viii. p. 54. The name of Petroc occurs in Saxon Calen-
dars. H. and 8. Counczils, p. 35.
7 Bodmin, Little Petherick, Trevalga, Padstow. Oliver, Mon.
Dioc. Ex. pp. 487, 442, 443.
8 §t. Petrock, Newton St. Petrock, Petrockstow, South Brent, Clan.
naborough, Lidford, West Anstey, and Hollacombe (ibid.; see Devon
dedications).
® Two Llanbedrogs, in Carnarvonshire and Pembrokeshire respec-
tively.
.10 Lobineau (quoted by Mr. Adams, Journ. R.I.C. No. ix. April
1868, p. 9).
142 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
prince, while among the Welsh Saints’ he appears
as uncle of Cadoc,? brother of Gwynllaw, and
‘natione Cumber.’ With such contradictory, and
indeed, were they not so, with such utterly valueless
authorities to deal with, it is hopeless to attempt to
give any preference to either of these accounts, or to
assion any particular country as the birthplace of
Petroc.
As we have seen, it is not necessary to suppose
that the Welsh Saints at this period arrived in
Cornwall by sea at all. Nevertheless, tradition and
their Legends point to the fact that they generally
didso. The mouth of the river Alan, or Camel, under
the name of Hegelmuthe, now perhaps retained in
‘Egloshayle,’ is pointed out as the place of their land-
ing, after their coast voyage down the Severne or
Sabrina, just as the other Hayle was said to be the
port of disembarkation for those Irish Saints who
came across the Channel.
Around this estuary of the Camel, dear to the
lovers of the contemporary Arthurian fables, are
gathered a group of names mostly capable of some
sort of identification from Welsh sources, bardic or
legendary. Hither Petroc came, amongst the rest,
with three disciples, and settling down, built a
monastery in a place first called Loderic, or Laffenac,
and afterwards Petrockstow, or—as Ussher unfor-
tunately adds from his authorities *—‘ Padstow.’ We
say ‘ unfortunately,’ for it has raised a question which,
1 Rees’s Welsh Saints, p. 266.
2 H. and 8. vol. i. p. 157. From Life of St. Cadoc.
3 Ussher, Brit. Hec. Antzg. pp. 292, 298, quoting John of Tinmouth,
William of Malmesbury, and Roger of Wendover. The number of
disciples with whom Petroc had gone into retirement was twelve. See
Reeves’s Adamnan, p. 300. :
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 143
when seen in its right light, is of very slight moment
indeed, as to whether Padstow or Bodmin was the
original seat of St. Petroc and his ‘ Wallenses,’ as the
Welshmen are called who were with him. We must
first of all clear the ground of the supposition which
has given a seeming importance to this point, that
even if Petroc did settle first at Padstow, that place
was in any sense whatever the seat of an ancient
Cornish See. Native Celtic-speaking bishops in
Cornwall, at this early period, were simply, as far as
we know, ‘ episcopi in monasterlis,’ consecrated in the
form to which we have before alluded, and probably
by a single bishop. There is no evidence whatever
at this date of a Cornish bishopric in any territorial
or diocesan sense. Bishops there may have been in
plenty—two or three in a single monastery (for mon-
asteries were now beginning to be founded)—but they
had no definite sees, and the most part perhaps were
merely pilgrims tarrying on their journey. Now with
regard to Padstow: At the time of the Bodmin Manu-
missions, in the tenth century,’ the place of St. Petroc’s
monastery and the shrine of his relics was undoubtedly
at Bodmin. The first mention of the place which is
now Padstow occurs in the Taxation of Pope Nicholas
in the thirteenth century, and there it is called Alde-
stow.? Mr. Carne admits that the Prior and Canons of
St. Petroc’s at Bodmin ‘may have had a chapel there
which afterwards became parochial.’* But the fact
that the place was called the ‘Old Stow’ in the year
1291, and that it belonged to Bodmin, shows that a
1 H. and S. Cownetls, vol. i. pp. 676-683.
2 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ez. p. 462.
3 Mr. Carne on the ‘ Bishopric of Cornwall,’ Journ. R.I.C. No. vii.
April 1867, p. 200.
144 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
distinction in point of age was drawn between the
two, which is the very thing we require in order to
gain confirmation of the statement that it was here
that Petroc built his first—that is, his ‘ old ’—church.
Bodmin, indeed, could never have been described as
on or even near the river Alan; in addition to which
it is extremely probable that the same reason which
afterwards caused the monks of Bodmin to remove to
St. Germans '—namely, the fear of piratical incursions
—drove them originally further inland from such an
exposed place as Padstow, to Bodmin. In 1349 the
place is called Padstow, and also Petrockstow, having
regained, as it seems, its first name, while the parish of
Little Petherick, also bearing Petroc’s name, is close
by.” In his Legend St. Petroc is the furthest travelled
of all the Saints, extending his voyage from Jerusalem
to India. His actual presence in Cornwall, and the
important influence he exerted in organising the
monastic body, are facts beyond dispute. The cell
which he first occupied at Bosmana—that is, says
Leland, ‘mansio monachorum in valle ’—was given
up to him by St. Guron, who had resided there pre-
viously.*
The tale of his converting a heathen landowner
called Constantine, whose property lay near his cell,
to Christianity is one of those which carry us back to
the land of Sakoontala and the Saints of the furthest
; 1 In a.p. 981 ‘the Monastery of St. Petrock the Confessor was
ravaged by pirates’ (Leland, Coll. ii.188). Idem, Anglo-Saxon Chron.;
H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 683. To this Wynne and Powel add,
professedly from Welsh Chronicles, that in consequence the See was
removed to St. Germans.
? Inquisition of St. Petroc’s Priory, Bodmin, March 18, 1349 (quoted
by Mr. Carne, loc. cit.)
* «Ubi S. Guronus solitarie degens in parvo tugurio’ (Leland,
Coll. i. 75).
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 145
East. A stag, hard pressed by hunters, flies for
refuge to the little enclosure where the holy man re-
sides. The servants of Constantine, well knowing that
if they snatch the animal from its sanctuary they will
incur the malediction of the Saint (since kindness to
dumb creatures was ever a characteristic of a hermit’s
life), go and make their report to their master.
Furious at being baulked of his prey, he seeks to do
the Saint some deadly hurt, but at the thought his
body turns rigid, and in terror at the miracle he
becomes a convert, and at last is sainted too.?
A chapel to St. Constantine occurs in St. Merryn,?
the adjoining parish to Padstow, where he was com-
memorated, says Lysons, on March 9 (two days
before his feast in Constantine parish) by an annual
hurling match. ‘A shepherd’s family held one of
the farms in St. Merryn for many generations by
the annual render of a Cornish pie, made of limpets,
raisins, and sweet herbs, on the feast of St. Constan-
tine.* Thestory of the theft of the relics of St. Petroc
has been told too often to need repetition.’ Suffice
it to say that we scarcely know which to thank the
most, Prior Roger for bringing them home to Bodmin,
or Mr. Iago ® for discovering that the box in which he
brought them was still there.
St. Cadoc, abbot of Llancarvan, who received his
education from an Irish anchoret, and afterwards in
1 «The gentle roe-deer, taught to trust in man, unstartled hear our
voices.’ (King at the hermit’s cell.) Sakoontala, trans. by Monier
Williams, Hertford, 1855, p. 12.
2 Acta SS. June 4 (ut supra).
3 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 143; Lysons, p. 226.
4 Lysons, loc. cit.
5 Leland, Coll. vol. ii. p. 209.
6 Maclean’s Hist. of Trigg Minor, pt. ii. p. 282.
146 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Wales from (the also Irish) St. Tathan, was a grand.
son, so the Legends inform us, of Brechan, and one o:
the most popular of the Saints of Wales. He was «
cousin of St. David, and like him a great traveller
The tale of a miracle performed by him on the occa:
sion of his visit to St. Michael’s Mount has already
been told.’ In the parish of Padstow there is ¢
chapel to St. Cadoc,? which, like many others, escapec
being raised into a parish church, and probably there
was one also at the place known as St. Cadix in St.
Veep.’ Dr. Borlase considers that his name may alsc
be found in Quethiock, or Quedock,’ since the lette1
Q in Cornish originally had a hard sound. Another
form of his name, Docus,? may with some probability
be looked for in Landock, or Ladock—pronounced by
the Cornish ‘ Lassick.’
We have now to notice those members of the
great Brychan family who are stated by William of
Worcester’ and Leland® to have arrived in Cornwall.
Brychan himself, the supposed father of them all, is
said by Welsh writers” to have flourished as early as
1 This tale is contained in a Life of St. Cadoe published by Rees in
the Cambro-British Saints, p. 22. Another Life is in Capgrave, Leg.
Nov. Ang. p. 52, and in Acta SS. Jan. 24, ii. 602. (H. and §.
Councils, vol. i. p. 158.)
* Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 147.
3 Lysons, p. 317.
* Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 158. Quoting from Capgrave (p. 88),
he says that near the fountain which St. Cadoc was said to have
caused to spring up was built not an ‘ecclesiola’ (as in the Life in
Cambro-British Saints), but an ‘ecclesia magna in honorem 8. Cadoci,’
an instance of the exaggeration of copyists.
° Todd’s St. Patrick, p. 100.
® Cressy, bk. xi. cap. 30.
’ Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn, vot. iv. p. 247.
8 Leland, Coll. vol. iii. p. 153.
° Rees’s Welsh Saints, p. 118.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 147
the first half of the fifth century, and according to
the Bonedd y Saint’ to have had 49 children, of
whom 24 were sons and 25 were daughters. By way
of explanation of this monstrous assertion it is added
that he had three wives. Brecknockshire is also
said to derive its name from him. Now if any truth
whatever underlies such a legend as this, it must be
looked for in an allegorical and not an historical
explanation. These persons must have been natives
of the country over which Brychan once ruled.
In this sense the Children of Brychan may be
regarded in the same light as the Children of
Israel. They came from the land of Brychan. It
may be noted in passing too that Brychan,
Broichan, or Brogan was not an uncommon patrony-
mic, and that it occurs not only in the annals of
Ireland and Wales, but even on an inscribed stone
in Cornwall also. This stone, which Mr. Iago (with
his usual care) has admirably delineated, and ac-
curately read, and Sir John Maclean has published
in his account of Endellion,? bears on its face above
the inscription a cross of early Irish type, very
similar to that on the Lugnaedon Stone, figured by
Petrie. Under this are the words, ‘ Broechan hic
jacet ... . otti filius.’
That the person buried here was a Christian and
a man of some importance is clear, but, since M.
Hiibner ® considers the stone as not earlier than the
seventh century, we cannot identify him with the almost
mythological father of the holy family, the ‘regulus
Wallie’ of Leland and the Welsh genealogies. The
1 Rees’s Welsh Saints, p. 136.
2 History of Trigg Minor, ‘ Endellion,’ pt. v. p. 485.
3 Inscript. Christ. Brit. pp. xxi, 5.
LQ
148 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
list of his children we are asked to receive in the case
of Cornwall by Leland and William of Worcester (the
former from a Life of St. Nectan, the latter from the
Calendar at St. Michael’s Mount) is not quite so
monstrous as is the case in Wales.! Brochannus
had, we are told, 24 children, ‘all of whom were
holy martyrs or confessors in Cornwall and Devon,
and all of whom led the lives of hermits there.’ On
the face of the production it will appear that it was
copied by, if not the actual work of, a monk, pro-
bably not earlier than the thirteenth century, who was
already acquainted with the names of existing parishes
as they then stood. Only two, or perhaps three, of
the names agree with those in the Welsh lists. Still,
however, they may be worthy of consideration on
the ground that they embody the tradition that the
Saints commemorated in certain parishes were of
Welsh origin.
1. First on the list comes Nectanus,‘a martyr
buried at Hartland,’? says Leland, and ‘a hermit,’ adds
Hals,* ‘ of singular piety and holiness,’ whose memory
is commemorated there. His name occurs also at
the chapel of St. Nighton, in the parish of St.
Winnow.*
2. Johannes—a name far too common to be
looked for even with probability in the parish of ‘ St.
John,’ in the hundred of East.
3. Endelient—a name which we have seen to be
1 The Welsh list given by Rees (Welsh Saints, p. 138 et seq.) is
condensed by Mr. Boase in his article on ‘ Brychan,’ in Smith’s Dict,
Christ. Biography.
2 Leland, Collect. vol. iii. p. 153.
3 Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 155.
* Tbid. Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 188. Spelt either Nighton or
Nectan.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 149
fictitious ; ' not mentioned until the thirteenth century.
The real founder of the church of Endellion was not
of the Brychan family at all.
4. Menfre’—a name probably meant for St.
Minver, of whom nothing is known.
5. Dilic—possibly meant for Duloe, which may be
a form of Teilo, as conjectured by Tonkin.®
6. Tedde. This may be St. Teath.* In Wales is
a church called Landdetty, ascribed to St. Tetta.®
In the parish of St. Winnow there is also a place
called Tethe ® or Ethy.’
7. Maben: St. Mabyn, a church ascribed to St.
Mabena,® of whom nothing is known, but bearing
more probably the name of Mabon,” the brother of
Teilo and the founder of the church of Llafabon in
Wales.!° The position of St. Mabyn, at no great
distance from Endellion and St. Issey, reminds us of
the similar juxtaposition of these two brothers in
Wales, in the case of Maenor Teilo and Maenor
Fabon, which lie in the same parish.”
8. Weneu :” perhaps meant for St. Winnow, who
1 See above, p.181. The word reads ‘ Sudebrent’ in William of Wor-
cester, which would seem to be intended for South Brent, in Devon.
2 Oliver gives the reputed dedication as to ‘St. Menefrida.’ Mr,
Carne identifies the parish with that of Rosminvet in Domesday.
(Journ. R.I.C. No. iv. October 1865.) In a deed dated 28 Hen. VIII,
quoted by Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 118, it is called St. Menifyrde.
3 See above, p. 136.
4 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 448, reputed dedication to St. Tetha.
5 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 326.
6 Hals, edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 157.
7 May not this be the Ithy of Landithy ?
8 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ez. p. 441.
9 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 251.
10 Thid. p. 99, note.
1 Tbid. p. 251.
2 Dr. Borlase suggests St. Wenep (Weneppa in Oliver), ‘Gwennap,’
MS. Coll. p. 191. s
150 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
would seem to be the Gwinno of the Welsh books, a
Brecknockshire Saint who was one of the three
founders of Llantrisant in Glamorganshire. In
‘Nanquidno,’ formerly ‘Nanquinow,’ in St. Just-in-
Penwith, Gwinno’s name may also occur.
9. Wesent, unknown.
10. Merewenna. Dr. Borlase suggests for this
name St. Merrin,! a Saint who occurs in the lists of
Mr. Rice Rees as Merin, or Merini, presumed to be
the founder of Llanferin, in Monmouthshire.? Bod-
ferin, a chapel under Llaniestin, in Carnarvonshire,
signifies the place of his residence, just as Bosulval does
in the case of Wolvele, or Gulval, in West Cornwall.
11. Wenna. St. Wenn, or Gwen, appears as a
grand-daughter of Brychan in the Welsh lists. She
is said to have been buried in Brecknockshire, on the
spot where she had been murdered by Saxons.*? Her
name occurs also in the patron Saint ascribed to
Morval ;* and a chapel in St. Kew bears her name.’
Sanwinas, standing for the parish of St. Wenn, is one
of the few Saints which occur in ‘ Domesday.’ °
12. Juliana, a name which occurs as the patron
Saint of Maker (although St. Julian is more pro-
bable), and it may be also in the word Luxilian, if
that be a form of Lan Julian,’ as has been supposed.
1 MS. Coll. p. 191.
* Welsh Saints, p. 236. Merrin’s festival in Wales was January 6.
3 Ibid. p. 150.
* Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p.441. With regard to the name Morval
itself, there 1s a Morvael, or Morwal, mentioned in Girald. Camb. and
Godwin as fifth Bishop of St. Davids, David being the first and Teilo
the third (Hoare’s Giraldus, vol. ii. p. 14).
° Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 181.
® Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 440.
* This is a surmise of Tonkin. ‘The right name of this parish,’ he
says, ‘is Lansulian, the Church of St. Julian; it has now chang’d
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 151
In that case the present dedication of the church
to Cyrus and Julitta would be one superimposed
from a similarity of name between Juliana and
Julitta. This, however, is very doubtful, and rests
on no authority.
13. Yse, evidently intended for St. Issey.!
14. Morwenna. This name is clearly meant to
point to Morwenstow, a Welsh name; but the Saint
is not recorded as a daughter of Brychan in the
native lists.
15. Wymp :*St. Veep, as Dr. Borlase conjectures,
or possibly Gwennap. ‘The real Saint seems to have
been unknown, and Bishop Grandisson, on the church
being rebuilt in the fourteenth century, dedicated it
to SS. Cyrus and Julitta.®
16. Wenheder, a name seemingly meant to
signify St. Enodor. The supposed dedication of this
church to Athenodorus,* a pupil of Origen and a
martyr under Aurelian, was probably invented in
the days of the monks for their own and the public
satisfaction, since they could in no other way re-
concile this insular Saint to one in any of their own
Patron, the present being St. Cyre’ (MS. i. p. 281, lost), quoted by
Dr. Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 141). Carew, Survey, p. 92, calls it
Lasullian. The Exeter Registers give the dedication as SS. Cyricius
and Juliette, while Hals (MS., lost, at least not in D. Gilbert) gives it
as ‘Sergius and Bacchus,’ whose ‘feast was yearly celebrated under
the corrupt name of St. Syre.’ Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 141. This
latter statement rests on no authority. The name of Nanjulian is that
of a family in the parishes of Luxilian and Lanlivery.
1 See above, p. 134.
2 Might this be ‘ Wenep’ in the original MS. ?
3 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 448; date of dedication 1336, previously
bearing indiscriminately the names of Vepus and Vepa.
4 Both Hals and Tonkin adopt this view, the former professing to
have been told it by persons in the parish. See D. G. Par. Hist. Corn.
vol. i. pp. 386, 388.
152 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Calendars. The ‘ Ennodorus’ given as the patron by
Oliver is less wide of the mark.’ St. Enodock,’ or
Wenedock, to whom there is a chapel in the adjoin-
ing parish of St. Minver, would seem to be the Saint
implied, and William of Worcester® mentions this
name as occurring in the Bodmin Calendar. Amongst
the daughters of Brychan in the Welsh lists we have a
Gwenddydd, who may possibly be the same person.‘
17. Cleder, St. Cleather. The forms Clederus, or
Cledredus, given in the Exeter books? as forms of the
name of the patron Saint® of the parish of St. Cleather,
are probably fictitious. In the Life of St. Cadoc
mention is made of ‘ an old man’ called Clechre, lord
of a district in Wales, ‘who departs to Cornwall,
where he gives up his happy soul to the Lord.’?
18. Keri, a name found in Egloskerry, ascribed in
Oliver’s dedications, however, not to this Saint but to
SS. Ide and Lyddy.®
Ld, Iona (7)
20. Kananc. For this Dr. Borlase suggests St.
Keyne,’ of whom in her real relation we shall pre-
sently have occasion to speak. The Legend of Keyne
is a late fiction, and the Saint as recorded in it had
no existence (according to Mr. Haddan) at all.!”
21. Kerender. On the same principle by which
1 Mon. Dioc. Ha. p. 438.
? Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 118; and Martin’s map.
3 Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 236. Coupled with Feli-
citas. Day, March 7.
4 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 149. 5 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 487.
° Hals, edit. D.G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. i. p. 197.
7 Rees, Cambro-British Saints, in Life of St. Cadoc.
® Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 438. ® MS. Collect. p. 191.
1° Councils, vol. i. p. 157. Lives in Capgrave, Leg. Nov. Ang. 204,
and Acta SS. Oct. 8, iv. 275 (see also note a by Mr. Haddan,
Councils, vol. i. p. 156).
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 153
we made Wenedoc out of Ennoder and Wenheder
we can make Karentoc or Crantoc out of Kerender.
This Saint bore no relationship whatever to Father
Brychan.
22. Adwen—the parish of Advent. This parish
bore, as we know, another name, and one of consider-
able importance. Dr. Borlase in his MS. notes! states
that it was originally ‘St. Taathan, a name which
not only occurred in old deeds, but had survived to
modern times under the form of St. Tane. This
Tathan, or Tathai (an Irishman who settled in Wales),
was a member of the College of Iltyd, and the founder
of Llandathan, in Glamorganshire.? From other
sources we learn that he was tutor to St. Cadoc,? a
statement which would be irreconcilable with another
tradition that he was brother of St. Samson.? This,
however, has nothing to do with the word Advent.
In Lanteglos by Camelford there was a chapel known
as Andewin,’ ‘now perhaps corruptly called Advent,
also St. Tane,’ says Dr. Borlase. The double name here
as elsewhere can be accounted for by the fact that
where two chapels of equal repute existed in a district
the one which finally became parochial sometimes
merged the other into itself. In the ‘Inquisitiones No-
narum’ the name of Advent is Athewenna.® Tonkin
says that the right name is Athawyn.’ Carew calls
it also Athawyn.’ But Andewin is the same as Lan
Dewin, just as Endellion is the same as Lan Delian,
1 Par. Mem. p. 84.
2 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 256. Life of, in Cambro-British Saints,
p. 255 et seq. H. and S. Councils, vol. i. p. 158.
3 Cressy, bk. x. cap. 21. 4 H. and 8. loc. cit.
5 MS. Par. Mem. p. 84. ® Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 487.
7 Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. i. p. 2. Alhawyn is a misprint for
Athawyn; see the original MS. 8 Carew, Survey, p. 92.
154 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
and Llandwyn is a church in Anglesey, called by
the name of Dwynwen,! one of Brychan’s daughters
on the Welsh list. It is she, then, who is the founder
of Advent, and we shall find her again presently in
another Cornish parish, where her name would be
looked for even less than in this.” In the case of a
sister Saint we shall also see that she is not alone in
dropping the final syllable of her name.’ But to
proceed with the list :
23. Helie.? Unless a form of Elidius, not easily to
be identified.
24. Tamalance (?)
The Welsh list of the children of Brychan as given
by Mr. Rees contains a few other names which appear
again in Cornwall. A certain Gerwyn, who is there
said to have settled in this county, can hardly be
the Guron or Goran who once lived a hermit’s life,
as Leland tells us, in a little hut at Bosmana, which,
when he quitted the district, he handed over, as we
have seen, to St. Petrock.® Tonkin adds a tradition
that he was of Irish extraction, and accompanied
St. Piran.’ His name is found in the parish of St.
Goron.* One of the Welsh lists gives one of the
daughters of Brychan as Mwynan,® who may be
found in the parish of Mawnan, if that Saint is not
’
1 Rees, Welsh Saints, p.151. Upon the surmise that En, or An, is
a corruption of Lan the writer no longer insists. He allows the
passage, however, to stand as he wrote it.
2 In Ludgvan : see below. 5 Keyne and Kenwyn: see below.
4 There is a Domesday manor called by this name, ‘ Heli,’ which
Mr. Carne identifies (doubtfully) with Hille in Duloe. Journ. B.I.C,
No. iv. October 1865, p. 28. ° Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 142.
° See above, p. 144. 7 Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. ii. p. 118.
8 Carew spells it Goriann, p. 44. There is a Goruan mentioned in
Ussher as a disciple of Dubricius. Prim. p. 445. See Borlase, MS.
Par. Mem. p. 70. ° Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 142.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 155
St. Marnanus, or, as would accord better with its
position, an unrecorded Armorican. Another daughter
was Tydié,' which looks very like St. Tudy, and
certainly carries more show of probability than either
of the totally unknown names Uda or Tudius,’ which
occur in Oliver. A daughter of Brychan, too, was
Ceinwen,’ from whom two churches in Anglesey de-
rive their names. Her name in full is found in the
parish of Kenwyn.* A shortened form of it we have
reason to believe occurs in St. Keyne, or Kayne, the
same as Ceneu, a name which we have seen was also
given as that of a daughter of Brychan.? The
evidence of identity between them rests first on the
fact that the two names do not occur in the same
list, and secondly that Ceneu’s feast day, like that
of Ceinwyn, is October 8. There is a Church of
Llangeneu, near Abergavenny. In St. Cadoc’s Life
St. Keyna is spoken of as his aunt, and mentioned in
connection with his visit to Cornwall. Around her
name a strange web of fiction has wound itself.’ It
was probably this which drew forth the indignation
of Norden against a harmless and perhaps a good
woman, whose fanaticism in an age when it could still
be admired has kept her name still moving ‘down
the ringing grooves of change.’ ‘This Kayne,’ he
says,® ‘is sayde to be a woman saynte, but it better
1 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 149. 2 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ha. p. 4438.
3 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 151. A Kenwin, Prince of Cornwall, is
mentioned in a Pedigree of the Tudors, London Mag. for July 1772, p.
348 (Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 98).
4 Dwynwen and Keinwen are linked together as sisters by Row-
land (Mon. Antig. p. 157).
5 Ibid. p. 153. 6 Cambro-British Saints, p. 22 et seq.
7 See Cressy (chiefly from Capgrave, Leg. Nov. Ang. 204), bk. x.
cap. 14.
8 Spec. Brit., Desc. Corn. p. 86.
156 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
resembleth Kayne the devill, who had the shape of
aman, the name of an apostle, the quallytie of a
traytor, and the handes of a Bryber.’
Of the Saint whose name occurs at ‘St. Austell’
various accounts have been given. In the margin of
Leland’s ‘ Itinerary ’ he is said to have been a hermit,!
and it was perhaps from his Legend existing at the
time that this statement was derived.? Others have
supposed the word to be a contraction of Augustulus,
and Dr. Milles identifies him with Auxilius, a nephew
of St. Patrick.? There is, however, in the list of the
Brychan family a female Saint, Hawystl,* who lived
at Caer Hawystl, and who, although we are not aware
that her name has been mentioned in this connection
before, seems to have a fair claim to be the person
required. Carew’s spelling of ‘ Awstle’ comes very
near it indeed.°
Amongst other Saints which may belong to Wales
we have Mawgan, twice repeated, who perhaps is the
same as the Maugantius mentioned by Giraldus, as
brought up in the school of Dubricius.® He is the
same as Meugan or Meigant,’ mentioned by Mr. Rees
as a poet and the reputed founder of a church at
Llanfeugan, in Brecknockshire, as also of two chapels
called respectively St. Moughan and St. Meugan.
The name of a Welsh Saint Illog® is reproduced
perhaps in Ilogan, spelt variously, says Dr. Borlase
(quoting from family papers at Tehidy), ‘ Ecclesia
Itin. vol. vii. p. 120.
MS. Par. Mem. p. 54. 3 Thid.
Rees, Welsh Saints, p.152.
Carew, Survey, p. 91.
Quoted by Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 49.
Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 269. 8 Ibid. p. 308.
NY a wim wD
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 157
Sancti Lugani’! and ‘ Tlloygan.’? St. Collen, whom
we know in the name of the parish of Colan, was the
founder of a church at Llangollan, in Denbighshire ; *
but, as is the case with the names on the inscribed
stones so common in this age, nothing is known of
him but his own name and that of his father, Gwynog.
William of Worcester found in the calendar of
the Antiphones of St. Thomas’s Church at Bodmin
the name of St. Ydroc,* the founder, we may suppose,
of the Church of Lanhydrock. He was probably of
Welsh origin, although we have no proof that such
was the case.
St. Kew > may bear the name of Ciwa,® found in
Llangiwa, in Monmouthshire. In St. Ilduictus, or
Titutus, to whom there is a chapel in St. Dominick,
we have the famous St. Illtyd, principal of the
college of Bangor Illtyd in the sixth century.’ In
Lamorran we may have St. Morhaiarn,® to whom a
church is ascribed in Anglesey, and whose feast is
November 1.
Who St. Eval may have been it is impossible to
say, but the name of Evilla occurs in the Litany of
Dunkeld,® and an inscribed stone in Pembrokeshire,
1 MS. Par. Mem. p. 78. From a deed dated October 15, 1343.
2 [bid. From a grant by Richard Basset, 6 Ric. IT., ‘in Tonkin’s
copy of Mr. Anstis’s Pedigree of Basset.’ Is this St. Illog the St.
Vylloe of William of Worcester? Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv.
. 240.
e 3 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 302. His commemoration day, May 20.
4 Edit. D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. p. 236.
5 This parish was also called Lannow, or Lanow, which Borlase
considers (MS. Par. Mem. p. 131) as a corruption of Lan Kew. Carew
(p. 48) calls it ‘ Lanowseynt.’
6 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 307.
7 Tid. p. 178. 8 Ibid. p. 808.
9 H. and S. Councils, vol. ii. p. 281.
158 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
mentioned by Hiibner,! bears the words ‘ Evali fili
Dencui, &c. In Mr. Rees’s ‘ Welsh Saints’? we hear
of a certain St. Higron, who founded a church in
Cornwall, but the name does not seem to have
survived.
Sometimes the test by feast days, though by no
means infallible (since some have been altered and
several are of late origin), is of no slight assistance
in an attempt to rehabilitate our mutilated names of
churches in their pristine dress.? It had occurred to
me, for example, that the word Ludgvan might be a
corruption of Lan (or La) Dwynwen—the Church of
Dwynwen, or Dwyn, one of the daughters of Brychan,
whose name we have previously seen in Andewin, or
Advent. She was the patron Saint of lovers, and the
founder of two churches in Anglesey. This seemed the
more likely from the fact that Ludgvan is believed
to be the Luduham or Luduam of the ‘ Domes-
days;’* that it occurs once at least in the Exeter
Registers as Lutwin;° that Leland spells the name
Ludewin ;® and Carew Luduan,’ or Luddeuan.’®
Now St. Dwynwen’s commemoration in Wales occurs
on January 25,° and since, on enquiry, we have
found that Ludgvan feast is held on the nearest
Sunday to that day, we cannot forego expressing a con-
viction that in this case we have been able to discover
1 Inscript. Christ. Brit. p. 35. 2 P. 230.
3 In the same way the fairs in Wales were of great assistance to.
Mr. Rice Rees, p. 240.
4 Mr. Carne, ‘Domesday Manors,’ Journ. R.I.C. No. iv. October
1865, p. 34.
5 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 10, No. 8. In Staff. Reg. it is called
‘Kec. Paroch. Sti Luduoni,’ ibid. No. 7.
6 Ttin. vol. iii. p. 17. ‘ Alias Ludevaulles.’
7 Survey, p. 91. 8 Thid. p. 46.
° Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 151.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 159
an identification previously unknown, and certainly
very unlooked for.! The reason why the feast day
was kept on the nearest Sunday, instead of on the
actual day, is explained by Dr. Borlase, who says that
it being very inconvenient to keep it on the week day,
especially in harvest time, it was by the Bishop’s
authority transferred to the following Sunday.”
Parish feast days in Cornwall have always been
observed as great occasions. Carew says, ‘The
Saint’s Feast is kept upon the Dedication Day (not,
be it observed, on that of the death of the Saint] by
every householder in the parish, within his own
dores, each entertaining such forrayne acquaintance
as will not fayle, when their like turne cometh about,
to requite them with a like kindness.’ ®
In Gluvias we have, seemingly, an interesting
identification in the Welsh lists with Glywys Cerniw
—i.e. Gluvius of Cornwall.* He was the son of
Gwynllyw, brother of Cadoc, and the founder of a
church at Coed Cerniw, or ‘ the Cornishman’s wood,’
in Monmouthshire. This leads us to the consideration
of those Saints which Cornwall can specially claim as
her own. With perhaps one exception they are con-
fined to a single family group. The Welsh genea-
logies supply us with the name of Cystennyn Gorneu,
i.e. Constantine of Cornwall,’ the founder of a family
in the fifth century. He had two sons, Erbin and
1 The absence of the final syllable in Dwyngwen has a parallel
case in Keyne, and Kenwyn, and also in Andewin. The word Llan-
ddwyn, in Anglesey, has similarly dropped it (Rees, Welsh Saints,
p. 151).
.* Nat. Hist. Corn. p. 301. 3 Survey, p. 69.
4 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 288. Oliver gives the reputed dedication
as ‘§. Gluviacus, martyr’ (Mon. Dioc. Ha. p. 489).
5 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 113.
160 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Digain, ‘to the latter of whom,’ says Mr. Rees, ‘ the
foundation of the Church of Llangerniw, i.e. the
Cornishman’s Church,’ in Denbighshire, is attributed.’!
Nothing appears to be known of him in Cornwall;
but his elder brother’s name, Erbin, may be preserved
in that of St. Ervan, although it bears in Oliver’s
list a reputed dedication to St. Hermes.” Erbin,
again, 1s stated to have been the father of Geraint,? ‘a
chieftain of Dynfaint, or Devon,’ ‘ who iscalled a Saint.’
He was more of a warrior, however, than a recluse,
and, according to a poem by Llywarch Hen, he died
—as a fine old Cornish gentleman of those days
generally did die—‘ slaughtering his enemies in the
woodlands of Devon.’ This seems scarcely consistent
with the story of the Geraint whom St. Teilo* visited
on his deathbed ; but we can make no more out of
it than this, and must let the accounts stand side by
side, and hope that such a person did really exist
at all who founded the church of Gerrans. ‘ Tradi-
tion, says Mr. Adams *—and, if he meant by this
oral tradition in the locality, his statement is of some
importance—‘ says that the family of Geraint had an
ancestral abode at Dingerein in Veryan.’ Geraint
had five sons,® and of these three, Cyngar, Jestyn, and
1 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 184. His festival is November 21.
2 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 438. Hals givesit the alias of St. Erbyn,
and considers it the same as Erbin and not Hermes. Edit. D. G. Par.
Hist. Corn. vol. i. p, 404.
3 Rees, Welsh Saints, p.169. Mr. Boase (article ‘ Buriena,’ Smith’s
Dict. Christ. Biog.) calls attention to the statement that there were three
persons of the name of Geraint, or Gerontius, in Cornish history, living
respectively in the beginning and end of the sixth century and in the
beginning of the eighth.
4 Ussher, Ind. Chron. in ann. 596.
5 Journ. R.I.C. No. viii. 1867, p. 314.
© Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 113 (Genealogy).
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 161
Selyf, claim our attention. Cyngar, Cunger, or Conger,!
is the person from whom Cungresbury, in Somerset-
shire, is said to take its name. MHals calls hima
‘religious hermit.’ He is associated also with
another church in that county, and with two in
Anglesey. In Cornwall his name is retained in the
chapel and well of Conger, in the parish of Lanivet.?
His brother Jestyn ap Geraint * was founder of two
churches, both caJled Llaniestin, in Anglesey, and,
considering that St. Just-in-Roseland joins the parish
of Gerrans, it is worth questioning whether the re-
puted St. Justus in Oliver’s dedications ® may not be
attributable either to a natural monkish reading or to
a late intentional amendment of the older Celtic name.
We have seen enough of the explanations of names,
supposed to be furnished by the entries of so-called
dedications inthe Exeter Registers, from the thirteenth
century onwards, to be quite sure that, so far from
rendering us any assistance in clearing up the
obscurity of earlier times, they only tend to make
the confusion worse confounded. We have to realise
the fact that in some senses as great a change took
place after the Saxon invasion, when the Anglo-Roman
clergy began to settle themselves down into the seats
of their native predecessors, as that which took place
six centuries later, when the Reformation clergy in
turn supplanted them. The ignorance of the former
with regard to the native Saints whose names they
came across in their parishes must have been just
1 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 232.
2 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 137 (quoting from a lost part of the
Hals M8.)
3 Ibid. 4 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 282.
5 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ez. p. 440. Dr. Borlase in his MS. draws a
clear distinction between the two St. Justs.
M
162 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
about on a par with that of the Cromwellian divines
with respect to those of the Roman Calendar. Hence
the fictions and errors we have so repeatedly noticed ;
and hence amongst the rest there is just a remote
chance that St. Just may be, in this case, not Justus,
but Jestyn, the son of his next neighbour and father,
St. Gerrans.
But the most important member of this family is
the son of Selyf, or Solomon, and the grandson of
Geraint—namely, Kebius, Keby, Cuby, or locally
Kubby. His Legend’ makes him a nephew of St.
David his mother being Gwen, the sister of Nonna.
At seven years old he began to read, and he remained
at home until he was twenty, when he went, as usual,
to Jerusalem. Returning to Cornwall, he was offered
his father’s kingdom, but he refused it and departed
to Wales. Mr. Adams mentions that he was said to
be the brother of St. Melyan, who, like his son
Melorus, was murdered by a kinsman. He is repre-
sented as a bishop, though without a see, and it is
added that for a while he settled in Anglesey (with
which part of Wales the Geraint family seem specially
connected), where he founded a religious society at
Caergybi, or Holyhead. Several churches called
Llangybi bear his name, and two wells, side by side,
are shown where he and a neighbouring Saint used
to meet once in every week. In Cornwall the parish of
Cuby bears his name, and he is also patron of Duloe,
where there is a Cuby’s Well in Kippiscombe Lane.
Norden says that St. Kea is called in records St. Keby.?
' Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 266. See also Cambro-British Saints, p.
183; Capgrave, Leg. Nov. Ang. 203; Mr. Adams, Jowrn. R.I.C. No.
vill. 1865 ; H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 159.
* Spec. Brit. Desc. Corn. p. 57.
WELSH SAINTS IN CORNWALL 163
The only remaining Cornish Saint is Constantine,
after whom a parish takes its name, and to whom
chapels are ascribed in Ilogan! and St. Merryn.?
His Legend,’ says Mr. Haddan, makes him ‘ the son
of Paternus, or Padarn, King of Cornwall,’ and states
that he ‘died a.p. 576 ;’ but he is in reality ‘iden-
tical’ with the Constantine who ‘ left his kingdom (in
589) to enter St. David’s Monastery, going thence
again’ into some far distant country (perhaps
Scotland), ‘where he founded a monastery.’ ‘ His
Legend is specially fabulous,’ and the opinions of
historians as to his character differ most widely. In
the account of him in the Aberdeen Breviary? his
retirement from the world is attributed to the death
of his wife, an Armorican princess, while Gildas ®
says he divorced her, and calls him ‘the tyrannous
whelp of the filthy lioness of Dumnonia,’ who
had murdered two royal children in a church the
very year he wrote—that is, in 547. His feast
day at Constantine is March 9; at St. Merryn he
was commemorated on March 10, and the editors
of the ‘Acta Sanctorum’ give him a place on
March 11.
‘No purely Welsh or Cornish Saint,’ says Mr.
Haddan, ‘of this (the great) period of Welsh hagio-
logy found admittance into the ancient Martyro-
logies or Calendars of the Western Church until
St. David’s canonisation in A.D. 1120.’ °
1 Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 78. * Thid. p. 143.
3 H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. pp. 157, 120 and note. See ‘St. David’s
Life,’ by Ricemarch, Camb.-Brit. Saints, p. 126. His own Life is in
the Aberdeen Breviary, March 11; also see Acta SS. March 11, ii. 64.
4 See Mr. Laing’s splendid facsimile edition of the Aberdeen Brev.,
printed by Toovey in 1854, fol. lxvii. Prop. Sane. (Pars Hyem.)
5 Gildas’s Hist. Sec. 28. 6 H. and 8. Cownctls, vol. i. p. 161.
u 2
164 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
We will close the Welsh and Cornish period with a
note on the several prefixes which we find attached
to Cornish parish churches. Of those which bear
the prefix of ‘Saint’ there are 56; of those which
bear the name of a Saint without any prefix whatever
there are 68; of those with the prefix Lan there are
26 (of which four are aliases); of those compounded
with Eglos there are 5 (two of which are aliases);
Lan and Eglos both are in two instances found to-
gether in the same word; Altar occurs once; and
there are 59 parishes whose names have nothing to
do with hagiology at all. Leaving out of the question
the unique word in Cornwall, Altar, it would seem
that the oldest names are those with the prefix of
Lan. This is the prevalent form in Wales in a vast
majority of cases, so that it is possible to conceive
that many of those churches in which the Saint’s
name is alone retained in Cornwall may once have
possessed it also. For instance, Llanbadarn in Wales
has become plain Madron, only recently ‘St. Madron,’
in Cornwall. In some cases we seem to see the
change taking place, as in Lanow for St. Kew.
Next in age comes ‘ Kglos;’ and lastly our present
term of ‘Saint,’ probably not commonly used prior to
the tenth century. It is curious to notice that in
some cases, such as Burian and Sennen, the recent
tendency to resume medieval forms has brought
back the prefix of Saint, in use, it is true, amongst
the monks of the thirteenth century, who spoke of the
‘Kecclesia Ste Buriane,’ but, as far as we can tell,
certainly foreign to the original native practice.
CHAPTER XIII
ARMORICAN SAINTS—450—700—AND THE SUBSEQUENT
BRETON INFLUENCE ON CHRISTIANITY IN CORNWALL
As early as the commencement of the fifth century we
find Armorica existing as a separate State under a
king of its own, whose territory embraced all the
district west of the Seine and the Loire. A hundred
years later it had been restricted to the district west
of a line drawn north and south through Rennes and
Nantes to the Loire and the Bay of Mont St. Michel.
The promontory included in this area became the
nucleus of immigration from Britain. To the Irish it
was known as Letha, and to the Welsh as Llydaw, to
the Cornish as a new Cornugallia and Dumnonia,}
and by the world in general as Britannia Minor.
Thither in the middle of the fifth century (as appears
from the Life of St. Winoch”) came King Howel‘ cum
multitudine navium ;’ in short, the fugitives from the
Saxon invasion all sought shelter there. In the year
513 the stream was still flowing southwards with
unabated force; ‘the Britons who dwelt beyond the
sea were still passing over into Lesser Britain.’* At
the opening of the seventeenth century the Armorican
Britons still spoke the same language as the Welsh,
and to that country (‘quamvis dividerentur spatio
1 H. and §. vol. ii. p. 72, note. Zeuss, Die Deutschen, p. 576.
2 Quoted ibid. 3 Chron. in Morice, i. 3.
166 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
terrarum ’!), as well as to the intermediate province of
Cornwall, they were allied by the closest ties of con-
sanguinity and friendship. With Cornwall the inter-
communication was frequent and reciprocal. As is
the case in our modern colonies, the names of the old
country were repeated in the new. For each ancient
Legend a new habitat was discovered, and so inter-
woven are the events stated under the guise of
history by writers in the Romance age, that it is
often hard to tell whether they occurred at all, or if
they did whether it was in Cornwall or in Armorica.
In the parish of St. Breock we have the name of
Brioc or Briocus, a native of Cardigan, said to have
gone to Gaul with St. Germanus, and to have founded
first the monastery of Tréguier and then that of St.
Brieuc, in Brittany.” His bell is said to have been
still preserved in the year 1210.* In the name
Gunwallo and also in the patron Saint of Landa-
wednack we have St. Winwaloéi,’ the son of a British
prince who fled to Armorica. As St. Brioc is asso-
ciated with Germanus, so Winwaloéi is associated in
his Legend with St. Martin of Tours. He died in the
commencement of the sixth century, having founded
the monastery of Landavenech, of which he became
* Lib. Landav, p. 172. H. and 8. Cowncils, vol. ii. p. 70.
? See H. and 8. Councils, vol. ii. p. 86. Life in Acta SS. May 1,
i. 92; also in Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), pp. 251-259, where other
authorities are cited. See also Mr. Boase in Smith's Dict. Christ. Biog.
art. ‘ Briocus.’
* Old bells similar to those of Wales and Ireland, said to have be-
longed to the Saints, existed in Brittany. See Arch. Camb. ii. sec. 315.
' See H. and 8. Cowncils, vol. ii. p.86. Life in Acta SS. March 3,
i. 250, 254; a second ibid. 254, 255; a third by Gurdestinus, Abbot of
Landevenech in the ninth century, ibid. 256, 261; a fourth in Surins,
abbreviated in Capgrave, Leg., Nov., Ang. 312. See also a combination
of Lives in Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), pp. 49, 60.
~
ARMORICAN SAINTS 167
abbot. In connection with the name of this place
it is very curious to find the parish of Landawednack,
in the Lizard district, placed so close to that of Gun-
wallo, and, like that, associated with St. Winwaloéi
as its patron.' Fremenville mentions the Saint’s
tomb at Landavenech,? but it is of late date.
His feast day in his Cornish parish, the nearest
Sunday to March 3, agrees with his day in the ‘ Acta
Sanctorum. ® There is a chapel at Cradock, in St.
Clere, ascribed to St. Winwaloc, said to be a brother
or cousin of St. Winwaloéi, who went to Ireland in
Patrick’s time, but it is probably intended for the
name of this same Saint. Cury gives us the name of
Corentin,* a bishop said to have been consecrated by
St. Martin, and therefore, like Brioc and Gunwallo,
connected with the Church inGaul. He founded the
See of Quimper, in Brittany, formerly Cornugallia or
Cornubia. In Sezni,® mentioned in a Breton Life as
belonging, in common with Brioc, Gunwallo, and Co-
rentin, to the fifth century, we may possibly have the
name of Sithny ;° while in St. Ronan,’ mentioned also
in the Breton Lists as an Irish anchoret of the same
1 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. pp. 489, 440.
> Antiquités du Finisteére, vol. ui. p. 40.
3 Hist. of Cury and Gunwallo, p. 123.
* Accounts of him are collected in Acta SS. July 12, iii. 807, 308.
See also an account of Corentin in Cumming’s Hist. of Cury and
Gunwallo, pp. 1-7, where it is stated that ‘the Exeter Martyrology’ gives
his day as May 1. Mr. Haddan (Councils, vol. ii. p. 87, note) makes
the Cornish St. Corentinus a distinct person from the Breton bishop,
but there is no reason assigned for the statement. See also his Life in
Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), December 12, pp. 798- 806.
5 Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), pp. 528-533.
6 There is a monastery of Sithiu mentioned in connection with the
Life of St. Winoc ; see Cressy, bk. xvi.cap.15. Oliver (Mon. Dioc. Ha.
p. 442) gives the patron as Siduinus or Sithiuinus.
7 Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), pp. 286, 290.
168 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
period, we find, as has been noticed before, St. Ruan.
The feast day at Mullyon, November 6,' points to
St. Melanius as the person represented there, since
his festival at Rennes was kept on that day.? He
was a native of Brittany; is said to have been Bishop
of Vannes, and to have died in 5380. He is stated in
Kerdanet’s notes to Le Grand to be the patron of
eight churches at least in Brittany.? St. Meen or
Mevanus has been already mentioned.* The name of
Madron or Madderne has been identified, as we have
seen, by some authorities with that of St. Paternus or
Padarn, Bishop of Vannes, on account of this alias
occurring in the Exeter Registers. The feast days,
however, do not coincide.’ St. Paul de Leon was
‘a Briton from Cornwall,’ says Haddan, ‘ and cousin
of St. Samson.’ He is supposed to give his name to
the parish of Paul.° So entirely had this Saint iden-
tified himself with the Church in Brittany that he
was made the bishop of a new see at Leon, in Cornu-
' Harvey’s Hist. of Mullyon, p. 22.
? H. and 8. Councils, vol. ii. p. 87. Life in Acta SS. Jan. 6, i.
328 -333.
3 P. 690. Fora Life of St. Melaine see pp. 682-690. Le Grand
distinctly separates this St. Melaine or Melan, whose feast was Nov. 6,
from St. Malo or Machutus (Cressy ‘ Mahutus’), whose feast was on
Nov. 15. Mr. Harvey in his account of Mullyon considered them the
same.
4 See before, p. 136.
° Le Grand gives Padern’s day as April 16, p. 244; in the Acta
Sanct. it occurs on the 15th; see H. and S. Councils, vol. i. p. 160.
Madron feast is Advent Sunday. The names of Mathaiarn and Madrun
(or Madryn) in the Welsh lists (Rees, Welsh Saints, pp. 48, 164) raise
the possibility that a Welsh Saint preceded the Armorican dedication.
It is even possible that an Irish Saint preceded them both, and that
Madron has in turn been called by the names of Landithy, Madron,
and St. Paternus. See above.
° H. and 8. Councils, vol. ii. p. 87, where several Lives and notices
are mentioned.
ARMORICAN SAINTS 169
gallia. Alan, an Armorican by birth, who (in the
sixth century) left his country to study at the college
St. Illtyd, is found possibly in the Cornish parish
St. Allen.! Maclorius, or Machutus,? with his French
alias of Malo*—a Welshman connected with St.
Samson, but who identified himself with Brittany
and founded the See of Aleth—has left his name
perhaps in Malo’s Moor, in the parish of Mullyon,!
and also in St. Mawes and St. Just in Roseland.
Leland mentions that the Saint who gave his name to
St. Mawes was a bishop of Brittany, whose name was
Mauditus, and that ‘he (was) painted’ [perhaps on a
fresco then existing, or in an illuminated MS.] <‘ as
a schoolmaster.’® Dr. Lyttelton quotes Bishop Old-
ham’s Register at Exeter for the spelling of the name
of this chapel as that of ‘St. Madch,’® which comes
nearer to another French alias, ‘ Macon,’’ and to
‘Machutus,’ than either of the other names. There
was also a Hiberno-Breton Saint, Maudez,® living at
the same time. The name of Winoc or Vennoc,
with its Welsh forms Gwynno and Gwynnoc, and its
Cornish ones Winnow ® and Pinock,!® seems to have
1 Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 221.
? H.and8. Councils, vol. ii. p.87. Several notices of his Life. He
died in 565; his day is Nov. 15.
5 Le Grand (Kerdanet), p. 708.
* Harvey’s Hist. of Mullyon, loc. cit.
° Itin. vol. iii. p. 30.
® Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 71.
7 Le Grand, loc. cit.
8 H. and 8. Councils, vol. ii. p. 88,note. In Le Grand (Kerdanet),
pp. 722, 726. His day was Nov. 18.
° Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 448, gives St. Winnocus as patron. Hals,
quoting the Inquis., 1294, gives ‘ Winothus’ (MS. Borlase, Par. Mem.
p. 133).
10 Oliver, ibid. p. 442, gives ‘Pynocus.’ Hals quotes ‘8. Pinoc’
(MS. ibid. p. 96).
170 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
been a very common one throughout the ‘ Age of the
Saints.’ It must have been from some person of this
name that Landavenech (Cornubicé Landawednack)
and perhaps Towednack ! also were originally derived.
In Wales there was Gwenog, a virgin,’ and Gwynno,?
the founder of several churches and a member of the
College of St. Cadoc—the latter im the sixth, the
former in the seventh century. In Brittany there
was a St. Winoc as late as the eighth century, men-
tioned as an abbot, and of whom two Lives are ex-
tant ;* and there was also a previous Winoc besides in
the end of the sixth century, who perhaps, with as
much probability as either of the others, may be
identified with our St. Pinock. Sigebert mentions in
582 that ‘Winoc was famous for his sanctity in
Britain,’ ? and Gregory of Tours, also quoted by Mr.
Haddan, says, in speaking of the year 578,‘ At that
time Uuinochus Britto in the height of his abstinence
came from the Britons to Tours, being desirous of
going to Jerusalem, having nothing wherewith to
clothe himself but sheepskins shorn of their wool.’ ®
He appears (under the name of Vennochus Britto) *
to have suffered a horrible death in the year 586.
The parish name of St. Winnow may perhaps be
‘In the beginning of the fifteenth century it was called St.
‘Tewynnoce,’ and at that time was not parochial (Oliver, ibid. p. 440).
Carew (Survey, p.91) calls it St. Twynnock. Borlase (Par. Mem. MS.
p. 13), who gives it the alias of Landwynnok, and Tonkin (edit. D. G.
Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iv. p. 53) both think it is the Church of St. Wynnoc.
The change of the first » into d is characteristic of the modern Cornish
language. Nanquidno, in St. Just, which may also contain Gwynno’s
name, was anciently Nanquinowe. See MS. tithe book of the parish
in 1582. There was an old chapel at that place, now destroyed.
* Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 807. 3 Tbid. p. 257.
* H. and 8. Councils, vol. ii. p. 89. ® Tbid. p. 78.
° Greg. Tur. v, 24. Ibid. viii. 84.
ARMORICAN SAINTS Ev
looked for rather in the Welsh Saint Gwynno. St.
Budoc, who gives his name to a parish near Falmouth,
was, we may suppose, the abbot of that name who
was Bishop of Dol in the latter end of the sixth
century.’ He has been confused, however, with at
least one other Budoc, and his day (November 18)
in the Breton lists” no longer corresponds with that
kept in Cornwall (December 8). St. Melarius,? who
under the name of Melorus is placed by a spurious
English Legend as early as 411,’ appears in Brittany
as a Breton prince. He was a pupil of St. Corentin,
and was murdered by his uncle in the seventh
century. There seems no doubt that Mylor bears his
name.° The amusing suggestion of Hals that the
adjoining parish of Mabe," taken together with Mylor,
means ‘Mylor and Son,’ is, we fear, not more worthy of
credit than a hundred other derivations in which he
1 Mr. Boase, in his article on ‘Budocus’ (Smith’s Dict. Christ.
Biog.), considers he is the person intended. Leland (Itin. vol. iii. p.
25) calls him an ‘Irisch man, who cam into Cornewalle and thear
dwellid.’ See his Life in Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), pp. 727-768.
See Rees, Welsh Saints, p. 251 et seq. This Budoc or Budic was
associated with Samson and Teilo, and ‘related to the chieftains of
Armorica.’ Another Budoc is similarly associated with SS. Patrick
and Martin of Tours in the Life of St. Winwaloei (H. and 8S. Coun-
cils, vol. ii. p. 86). The name was probably the same as Buadach,
which occurs in the Annals of Ireland (O’Donovan) four times, and
was a common Celtic name.
2 Le Grand. For the Cornish date I quote Mr. Boase’s article.
3-H. and S. Councils, vol. ii. p. 89. Acta SS. Oct. 2,1. 2, 317,
319; Jan. 8, i. 186, 137. Leland, vol. iii. p. 195; Oliver, Mon. Dvoc.
Ex. Add. Supp. p. 6. Le Grand (edit. Kerdanet), pp. 608-619.
4 H. and 8. Councils, vol. 1. p. 36.
> Leland, loc. cit.
° Hals (edit. D. G.), Par. Hist. Corn. vol. iii. p. 59. ‘Tonkin men-
tions that Mabe was also called La Vabe (ibid. p. 61), or Levabe [MS.
(lost), C. 105], for which Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 82, suggests Lan
Vab ; but the question who was Mabe or Vab remains unanswered.
172 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
and Tonkin rival each other in the absurdities
of their pedantry. In the seventh century also is
placed Meriadoc, son of a Breton prince,’ to whom
the dedication of Camborne? is ascribed. The miracle-
play bearing his name, recently discovered, and so
admirably edited by Mr. Whitley Stokes,*® shows how
continuously down to the fifteenth or sixteenth century
the name of a Breton Saint had been remembered in
the locality.
The last name which has been associated with
Armorican hagiologies is an extremely doubtful one,
—that of Gulval. There is certainly a Gurval or
Gudwal found in Le Grand,' also in the ‘ Acta Sanc-
torum,® under the date June 6, said to have been
Bishop of Aleth or St. Malo. His name occurs in two
Breton Litanies ascribed to the tenth century ;° but
Mr. Haddan pronounces his Life fictitious,’ and
asserts that his name was not even known until his
relics were discovered in the middle of the tenth
century.’ But, fictitious though he may have been,
1 Life in Le Grand (Kerdanet), pp. 293-295.
? In Redman’s Register (circ. 1490) the church is styled ‘ Ecc. de
Sti Meriadoci de Cambron.’ Borlase, MS. Par. Mem. p. 16, says, ‘In
a document among the family deeds at Tyhydy’ (1848) it is called
‘Kee. Sti Martini de Cambron.’ As no better meaning for the word
Camborne has hitherto been found, we would venture to suggest that it
was part of the name of Meriadoc himself, and that, like another Ar-
morican Saint—Victor de Campbon in Le Grand, p. 525—he may have
brought it with him from the ‘ vicus Campi-boni,’ or ‘ Campibonensis,’
in the diocese of Nantes.
3 Published by Triibner, 1872.
4 Edit. Kerdanet, p. 290 et seq.
> Also Capgrave, Leg. Nov. Ang. 167.
° That published by H. and §S. Councils, vol. ii. p. 81, where the
name is ‘Guoidwale;’ and that of St. Vougay in Le Grand (Kerdanet),
p, 299, where it is ‘ Guidguale.’
7 Councils, vol. ii. p. 85, note.
8 Ibid. vol. i. p. 161.
ARMORICAN SAINTS Lis
his name might still, for reasons which we shall
presently see, have been associated with the parish of
Gulval, were there any local evidence to corroborate
the supposition, but there is not much. The oldest
name of the parish was Lanesly, and the church
appears in the Taxation of Pope Nicholas as ‘ Ecclesia
de Lanesly.’* In Bishop Stafford’s Register (1395-
1419) it appears as ‘ Eccles. Paroch. Ste Gwdvele,
alias Wolvele de Lanyseley.’? Oliver notes a dedica-
tion to St. Gudwal, but gives no authorities.? Carew,
however, calls the parish Wolvele,* just as he gives
Golden the alias of Wolvedon;° and that the G was
locally dropped appears from the word Bosulval,® or
‘Ulval’s’ (that is, ‘ Gulval’s ’) ‘house,’ which is in the
parish. That there was a Saint Wolvele or Welvele
is shown in the dedication attributed to Laneast,7
where her name is coupled with that of Sativola, the
Sithewelle ® (Sidwell) of Leland and the Sancta Vola
of William of Worcester.’ ‘Gulval feast’ is held on
November 12, whereas that of St. Gudwal is June 6.
On the whole we are rather inclined to think that,
although the name of some older Saint underlies the
word (as we suspect also is the case with Madron),
Armorican influence, perhaps in the tenth century,
superintroduced the name of a then popular Saint,
1 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ea. p. 461.
2 Vol. ii. fol. cliii., Dean Lyttelton’s Extracts in Borlase, MS. Par.
Mem. p. 9.
3 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 4389.
4 Survey, p. 91. 5 Ibid. p. 140.
® Borlase, MS. Mems. relating to the Cornish Tongue, 1749, p. 129.
7 Oliver, Mon. Dioc. Ex. p. 440. Is there any connection between
Laneast and Lanesly ? Wolvele de Laneast and Wolvele de Lanesley
is a curious coincidence, if nothing more.
8 Itin. vol. iii. p. 60.
® Quoted by Whitaker, vol. i. p. 283.
174 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
the translation of whose relics occurred at that time.
The other name, ‘ Lanesly,’ may point to something
earlier than either.
Indeed, the stamp which Armorican influence left
in Cornwall seems to have been as marked as it was
permanent. It was the last phase of native Christianity
previous to its absorption into the English mould.
It may be as well in conclusion just to glance at how
this came to be so. Down to the beginning of the
sixth century the Britons of Armorica had kept up an
amicable intercourse with the then Gallo-Roman See
of Tours, and with the successors of St. Martin, who
occupied it. In this Gallic Church—as it would seem
also in the earliest British Church, which had origi-
nally been reflected from it—certain customs were
observed which Christianity in Britain (and Ireland
especially) seems to have lost after its separation from
the Continent in the fifth century. As time went on
other customs were subsequently adopted in obedience
to Councils, and finally to rules laid down at Rome.
Amongst the usages retained from primitive times was
that, for example, of having Diocesan Bishops. In
Treland, however (as if some new customs had crept
in from external sources,, as we have seen it possible
that they did), and in Wales too in the sixth century,
we find that a habit had arisen of appointing honorary
or titular bishops, who either presided over religious
houses or colleges, or simply dwelt with others ‘in
monasteries. This became the constant practice in
the British portion of Christendom, although cx-
ceptions to it may be taken in the case of Wales.!
In Armorica, however, it never seems to have been
the case. ‘The earliest immigrant Saints are spoken
' H. and 8. Cownceils, vol. i. p. 142.
ARMORICAN SAINTS 175
of as founding Sees—in connection with St. Martin
or St. Germanus and their successors, who represented
the Gallican forms. Much later on—namely, in the
ninth century—we find the Britons there actually
carrying on a controversy with the Frankish Metro-
politan at Tours, and laying claim to a separate
Archiepiscopate at Dol.’ A similar state of things
was taking place simultaneously” in Wales. There is
no mention, however, either earlier or later, of any-
thing at all approaching to a Diocesan Bishopric in
Cornwall previous to the time of Conan in 931.7 In
early days that country was merely a mission field,
traversed by pilgrims, many of them no doubt bishops,
passing on to other lands. In later times it appears to
have been content with bishops who were ‘ elected,’
like Kenstec in 833, each in his own monastery,* ac-
cording, as we have no reason not to suppose, to the
constant native custom. Again, the Cornish being
still free had not the motives or the desire which
actuated the Welsh and Armoricans to raise up for
themselves the phantom of an ancient Episcopal See
which should gain them independence of Saxon or
Frankish Episcopal rule. If such an attempt had
been made, we should undoubtedly have heard of
it. As it is we have on the one hand the letter of
H. and 8S. Cowncils, vol. ii. p. 91 et seq.
Ibid. vol. i. p. 96, note.
Thid. vol. i. p. 676.
Ibid. vol. i. p. 674. ‘[Ad] Episcopalem Sedem in gente Cornubia
in monasterio quod lingua Brittonum appellatur Dinnurrin electus’—
‘elected,’ that is, ‘to an Episcopal seat among the people of Cornwall
in the monastery which in their own tongue the Britons call Dinurrin.’
Mr. Haddan’s difficulty (note, p. 674) arises from calling Kenstec the
Cornish Bishop ‘instead of a bishop in Cornwall. The list of bishops
as given by Whitaker is guess-work pure and simple.
Pe Co DY
176 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Aldhelm to King Gerontius in 731,' bitterly, nay,
violently complaining of and condemning the
practices in the Dumnonian province at that date,
and on the other (as if in proof that those ancient
errors, and the want of a Diocesan Bishop amongst
them, were still going on as ever), after a lapse of
nearly two centuries, we have, in the year 909,’ a
document in which Archbishop Plegmund, in consti-
tuting the See of Crediton, adds to it three parishes in
Cornwall, so that the Bishop ‘ may every year pay a
visit to the Cornish people for the purpose of rooting
out their errors. For before that time, as much asin
them lay, they resisted the truth, and would not obey
the Apostolic decrees.’ In 926, or thereabout, came
/Ethelstan’s conquest of the whole of Cornwall, and
this fact above all others leads us to suppose that
when, five years later, an Episcopal seat was erected at
St. Germans,* Cornwall, being then an acknowledged
portion of the Saxon dominions (no part of which
could be allowed to be without a bishop), was then
first absolutely included in a Diocesan jurisdiction
under Conan.
A tendency, however, to other than the native and
earlier forms of Christianity had meantime been
reaching Cornwall from another route than that by
which the Saxons were pressing forward. Ever since
the arrival of the Saxons at the Severne, and all
through the period of their conquest of the West, the
relations between Cornwall and Brittany had been
! This letter is translated in full in Cressy, Saints of Brittany (i.e.
Great Britain), book xix. cap. 17.
2 H. and 8. Councils, vol. i. p. 674, note, and p. 676, from Leofric’s
Missal, fol. 2.
3H. and S. Cowncils, vol. ii. p. 81.
ARMORICAN SAINTS Lie
welding themselves closer than ever, and a communi-
cation was kept up which, as we learn from the
incident of the theft of the Bodmin relics in 1177, had
not been lost sight of even in the twelfth century.
But Brittany, through the medium of its Gallic con-
nection, had, as we have seen, assimilated to itself
from the very first many of the Gallic and afterwards
Gallo-Roman forms. If traces of these, then, are
observable in Cornwall, it is to this influence rather
than to that of the Saxons that we must look for an
explanation ofthe circumstance. Whence, for instance,
came the dedications‘ (for such indeed they seem to
be) to such Saints as Hermes,* Symphorian,” Columba
the Virgin,’ and others? They are not the ordinary
Saints of the Roman Calendars, though some of them
may appear there, but they are the ordinary Saints of
Gallic Martyrologies and the Breton Litanies of the
tenth century, such as that of St. Vougay” and the
one edited by Mr. Haddan. They were the popular
Saints of early Gaul, the cultus of some of them handed
down from the times of the Diocletian persecution,’
1 Leland, Collect. i. 74, quoted by H. and 8. Cowncils, vol. i.
p. 676.
4 St. Erme, St. Ervan, and Marazion Chapel. i Sioa
> Veryan and Forrabury. | Saints in next page.
¢ The two St. Columbs.
nw
In Le Grand (Kerdanet), p. 299.
3 To this Armorican influence (though some may be of a much
later date) may perhaps be attributed (1) Churches :—Blasius* (St.
Blazey); Dominica? (St. Dominick); Ivo?* (Ive); Genesius* (St.
Gennis); Helena ?° (Helland); Justus ?f (St. Just); Marcelliana*’ and
Materiana” (Tintagell); Cornelius * (Cornelly); Protasius! (Blisland) ;
Probus™ (Probus); Julitta (St. Juliot and Lanteglos): or with Cyriacus"
(Luxulion ?); Dionysius® (St. Denys); Hugh? (Quethiock ?); Eusta-
chius! (St. Ewe ? ?); Felicitas" (Phillack??); George* (Treneglos) ;
Clarust (St. Clare)—all in Oliver’s Mon. p. 437 et seq. (2) Chapels :—
N
178 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
2nd others of nativefame. But more than this, Brioc,
Melor, Corentine, Gunwallo, Samson, Mevin, Gudwal,
not to say Paul de Leon, Cuthbert, Hilary of Poictiers,!
Martin, and Germanus appear in these same Litanies,
and considering what the forms of the Armorican
Church were, it is not improbable that where these
names occur in Cornwall they may be actual dedica-
tions to absent persons also. Taking this into con-
sideration, it is curious to note, in the case of St.
Brioc, that his parish feast-day in Breock is held on
May 1, the day of his translation (that is to say, the
translation of his relics to Angers), an event which
did not occur till the end of the ninth century.?
This fact points to a late date for the naming of the
church,’ and looks like an indication of that influence
Amphibelus? (Amble," or Amblhell, in St. Kew); Ambrosia’ (Ambrusca
at Crantock).
1 Hilary of Poictiers (St. Hilary). The parish feast-day is the same
as that of this St. Hilary.
2 H. and 8. Cownctis, vol ii. p. 87.
3 The same would apply in the case of Gulval, if St. Gudwal is
indeed the patron, as see before, p. 173.
® Martyr in Armenia (A.D. 316), patron of wool-combers, identified with St. Blaise in
Scotland.
b Incert.
© Fictitious, says Haddan, Councils, vol.i. p. 31, note, but of reputed Persian origin.
4 Of Auvergne, in seventh century.
€ Mother of Constantine.
‘ A person of this name accompanied Augustine to England, but query if the same.
si Qu. Marcellina (July 17), sister of St. Ambrose, died after A.D. 397.
Incert.
« There was a Bishop of Antioch in the second century and a Bishop of Rome in the third
of this name. The latter is the more probable,
' Called_by Tonkin in his lost MS. E, p. 23 (quoted by Borlase, MS. Pur. Mem. p. 204),
¢Proto, or Pratt,’ Bishop of Milan in fourth century.
m Probus, called Lanbrebois in Domesday, near Sherborn, in Dorsetshire, is another
ancient dedication to Probus.
n Martyrs under Diocletian.
© Martyr under Aurelius (according to Sulp. Severus).
P Of the five Hughs mentioned by Butler all appear to be late,
4 Martyr under Hadrian (September 20),
® Martyr under Antoninus Pius (July 10), or under Severus (March 7).
8 Martyr under Diocletian (April 23),
t Apostle of Aquitaine, first century.
« Occurs in the Litany of Dunkeld, H. and §, vol. ii. p. 278.
v Incert.
Hermes was a martyr at Rome, under Hadrian, in the second century. Symphorian was
a martyr in Burgundy (third century). Columba was a martyr at Senus, in Gaul, under
Aurelian. Her Life, written in Cornish, was said to be extant in Camden’s time (Hals
edit, D. G. Par. Hist. Corn. vol.i. p.14). Other names, such as Augustine (chapel in Dewstow,
&e.), Gregory, Clement, &c., might come from any source, and are probably as late as the
more important Calendar Saints, as also are dedications of chapels to SS. Nicholas, Francis
Leonard, &c, &e., 3 2
ARMORICAN SAINTS 179
which was leading the Cornish Christians away from
their native traditions toward the Continental forms.
It was in all probability a genuine dedication. We
can readily imagine that the natives would adopt
changes from their brethren in Armorica, while the
Saxons might strive in vain to force them upon them.
The Briton was stubborn and unbending, and he is so
to this day. He might be led, but he would never
be driven. His errors, if they were errors (and this
we may be quite sure he did not admit‘), would be
dearer to him than an orthodoxy enforced by the
conquerors, and hereafter to be worn by him as one
of the badges of his vanquished race. Of all the
host of Cornish Saints not half a dozen are of Saxon
origin.”
1 The ancient Briton’s opinion of other people’s religion may be
gathered from Cummian, Epist. ad Seg. (a.p. 634): ‘Roma errat ;
Hierosolyma errat; Alexandria errat; Antiochia errat; totus mundus
errat; soli tantum Scoti et Britones rectum sapiunt!’ In such a pas-
sage we cannot but recognise the religion of John Bull in germ.
2 St. Neot (St. Neot’s and Menheniot); St. Dunstan (Lanlivery and
Lanreath—in each case joined to a Celtic name); Werburgha? (Warb-
stow); and the chapels of Ethelred and Adhelm (‘ Chap. of Ammel
ded. to Adhelm’), respectively in St. Dominick and St. Kew (Borlase,
MS. Par. Mem. pp. 114, 181).
180 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CHAPTER XIV
CHRISTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY OF CORNWALL FROM THE
SIXTH TO THE NINTH CENTURY INCLUSIVE
Ir is unfortunate that the same sheltering cause—
namely, the sand dunes which have preserved to us
two relics of the Irish period at Gwithian and Piran—
did not extend itself into those parts of the country
occupied by Welsh and Breton Saints as well. Al-
though there are many structures which might be as
old as the sixth century, there is positively not one to
which we can point with any degree of certainty what-
ever. Doubtless the oldest of these holy places are
those which have survived the longest. New founda-
tions would not command the respect which antiquity
alone could give. They would probably perish with
their founders. But the reverence for the pristine
superstition which hung round the more ancient ones
would and did preserve them down to the times of
the Reformation, and even beyond it, so that it was
left for the soldiers of Cromwell to destroy them.
They were lucrative to their owners, the attendant
priests, and their profits often form the subject of
erants in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
Still these are the very places which were sure to be
rebuilt, or enlarged or renovated, as occasion required.
A glance at the drawings in Mr. Blight’s work will
show that the greater portion of them are compara-
ARCHAOLOGY, SIXTH TO NINTH CENTURY 181
tively modern. Take, for instance, the Well Chapel at
Menacuddle (vol. ii.), p. 94, Dupath Well, p. 97, and
Rialton, p.99. Earlier than these, again, may be such
structures as the hermitage at Roche, p. 106, the
Holy Well, Laneast (p. 85), and the Chapel which
once stood on Chapel Carn Brea.! But in those cases,
again, the string-courses prove them to be late, and
we are still far removed from anything as early as the
sixth or even ninth century. In Parc-an-Chapel at
St. Just, known as St. Helen’s Oratory ;? in the struc-
ture which once stood at Chapel Uny (of which some
arches remain, and of which there is a plan in Dr.
Borlase’s MSS.*); in the church at St. Helen’s at
Scilly,* and in the chapel at Sancreed’ are features
which may carry us back a century or two further,
though evidences of reconstruction are manifest in
some of these. Madron Well Chapel® (although
occupied as a place of worship as long as the
Pre-Reformation régime continued) seems to have
suffered least of all from renovation. Nothing could
be more primitive before it fell in than the masonry
of the sink in the 8.W. corner, into which the water
of the holy well was brought by a drain. The altar
is a flat block of stone, shapeless at the sides, show-
ing, it is said, that it was never consecrated. In this
structure, then, if anywhere, we may have a building
dating back to the days of the Welsh Saints; and
perhaps the same may be said of the chapel of St.
Dellan? in Burian. The tiny structure, whose foun-
' Borlase, MS. Inscriptions, p. 81, and the frontispiece of the present
work. 2 Blight, Crosses, i. p. viii.
5 Borlase, MS. Inscriptions, p. 63.
* See before, p. 132, note 4.
5 Journ. R.I.C. No. i. March 1864, p. 38. ® Blight, i. 58.
7? Tbid. ii. 108. Erroneously called ‘St. Eloy.’ See Plate II. p. 100,
182 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
dations are visible at the Gurnard’s Head, and many
other similar ones may come under the same category.
They would very probably repay a careful investiga-
tion, such as that which Mr. Masterman has bestowed
on that at St. Levan. Some, too, of our own crosses
reach back to these times, although the period during
which the greater portion of them were erected was
several centuries later. The one at St. Clement’s '—a
perfectly plain cross surrounded by a circle, carved on
GROUND PLAN OF MADRON WELL CHAPEL (FROM BLIGHT)
the summit of a stone nine feet high—bears beneath
it an inscription (‘Isnioc Vitali fili Torrici’), which may
perhaps be attributed to a period including the sixth
and seventh centuries. There is no reason why other
uninscribed crosses of this plain and very early type,
such as that at Boskenna Gate in Burian,? should not be
of equal age. Nine more of our inscribed stones may
possibly be placed in the sixth and seventh centuries—
namely, those at St. Just, Lanyon (Madron), Barlowena
1 Blight, Crosses, ii. 125. For a list of chapels see ibid. i. p. vii.
2? Thid. i. 36.
ARCHAOLOGY, SIXTH TO NINTH CENTURY 183
(Gulval), St. Hilary, Mawgan (Meneage), Tregony,
St. Cubert, Worthyvale (Camelford), and Castledown
(near Fowey). Upon that at Lanyon! Mr. Iago has
detected crosses, simply formed by one line rudely
drawn across another.? A newly discovered inscribed
stone near Karn Kenidjack, in St. Just, has been lately
added to the list by Mr. G. B. Millett. It appears to
be of the same type as that in the parish church. To
the seventh and eighth centuries perhaps belong six
other Cornish inscribed stones—those at Roseworthy
(Gwinear), now at Lanherne Nunnery (Mawgan),
Mitchell, Endellion, Lanivet, Cardinham, and Phil-
lack. On the Roseworthy Stone the letters are 4
written on a blank panel, specially left, as it would
seem, for an inscription, under a piece of interlaced
ornament which occupies the rest of the shaft, while
the cross itself, which surmounts this, is of a very
common type in Cornwall (the Greek type, as Mr.
Blight calls it), perforated, and bearing a figure of
Christ. If the letters are contemporary with this
cross, which seems to be the case, then we have here
a proof that the interlaced ornament ° (in use in early
1 Inserip. Christ. Brit. pp. 1-8, and xx, xxi, also p. 88.
2 Journ. R.I.C. No. xiii. April 1872.
3 Inscrip. Christ. Brit. loc. cit. * Blight, ii. p. 81.
5 The finest example of the interlaced pattern in the West of Eng-
land is the Coplestone Cross, in Devonshire, of which an engraving
will be found in the Proceedings of the Arch. Association, vol. xxxiv.
pt. ii. It is said to have been erected on the spot where a bishop was
murdered in the early half of the tenth century. Some curious marks
immediately beneath the figure of a man on horseback appear, from a
sketch of them made by Dean Milles and sent to Dr. Borlase, to be
five or six Saxon letters—E, A, B, E (fifth uncertain)—and a cross.
The history of the interlaced pattern in architecture and illumina-
tion, which, originating, perhaps, in India (see Birdwood’s Handbook
of the Indian Section in the Paris Exhibition, 1878, p. 107), spread
northwards on the line of commerce through Byzantium to Scandi-
184 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
times in Ireland, and so richly developed in that
country, Scotland, the Isle of Man, and Scandinavia)
was in use in Cornwall also in the seventh and eighth
centuries ; and more than.this, that the other crosses
of this peculiar form may be assigned to that period
also. M. Hiibner has so systematically studied the
details of these early inscriptions that we cannot do
better than accept his view as to the sequence in
point of age which he has seen fit to adopt for the
various forms of lettering and ornament which we find
on these stones. Other examples of the interlaced
pattern may be found in St. Columb churchyard, on a
tomb at Lanivet, at St. Breward, and at St. Just.
Crosses of the type of that at Lanivet are specially
common in West Cornwall—e.g. at Phillack, Sancreed,
Paul, and Burian.’ Mr. Iago is of opinion that Anglo-
Saxon influence is observable in the letters on the
Lanherne Stone, as it is also in the case of the altar at
Camborne, the ‘ Other-half-stone’ (so called, at Redgate,
the inscribed cross at Cardinham,? and that at Trevena,
near Tintagell, for deciphering which latter we owe him
our thanks. In common with other Cornish crosses,
the Trevena Cross bears a general likeness to those
of the Isle of Man, often inscribed with names, and
navia, leaving traces of its progress and developments in Armenia on
its way (see Grimm’s Architecture en Arménie), and finally attaining
such richness and beauty on the sword-hilts of Scandinavia from the
fifth to the eighth century (see Montelius, La Suéde Préhistorique,
p. 108), and on the ‘ Sculptural Stones’ of Scotland and Ireland in the
ages immediately succeeding that period, is one of the most interesting
in the history of decorative art. Beginning in the East with an imita-
tion of the tendrils of a plant, the idea was carried out by the net-
makers of our northern shores with a simplicity and exactness which
(considering the intricacies of the pattern) is truly marvellous. See
before, p. 118, and p. 121, note.
* See Blight’s Crosses.
* Journ, RIC. No. xix. November 1877, p. 363.
ARCHAOLOGY, SIXTH TO NINTH CENTURY 185
dating from the tenth or the eleventh century. The
interlaced pattern and form of the Lanherne Cross
(with the exception of the figure which is omitted)
are also exactly reproduced in that island.’ The
only instance of a name in any of these Cornish
inscriptions being capable of identification with that
of an historical personage is found in the stone at
Redgate, in St. Cleer.2 The words are, ‘ Doniert
rogavit pro anima, and this has been supposed to
yy yt eh Hy,
a, ME ee He Ez Wf
Ce
ov Y”)
Ban
Ee
PARC-AN CHAPEL (FROM BLIGHT’S ‘ CROSSES’)
point to Dungerth, King of Cornwall, drowned in the
year 875.> A unique example of a legend written
not only in Saxon letters but in the Saxon language
occurs at Castlegoff, in the parish of Lanteglos.* The
inscription reads, ‘ Ailseth and Genereth wrohte
thysne Sybstel for Ailwyneys Saul and for heysel.’
But this brings us to times beyond the limits of this
essay.
1 Cumming’s Runic Mon. of the Isle of Man, plates x. and xii.
(For an ornament like that round the Camborne altar see pl. xi., and
compare it with Hiibner, p. 3.)
2 Blight, ii. p. 128.
3 H. and S. Councils, vol. i. p. 675.
4 Maclean’s Trigg Minor, pt. ix., ‘ Lanteglos,’ p. 281. Drawn and
engraved by Mr. Iago.
186 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
CONCLUSION
THE reader who has had the kindness to follow us
through the pages of this book will perhaps be able
to arrive at some sort of idea of the difficulties and
complications by which the subject is surrounded.
The task of endeavouring to make anything like a
succinct history of the ‘ Age of the Saints’ out of the
fragments at our disposal we have constantly felt to be
not unlike that of gathering up the broken pieces of
pottery from some ancient tomb, with the hope of
fitting them together so as to make one large and
perfect vase, but finding, during the process, that they
belong to several vessels, not one of which is capable
of restoration as a whole, though some faint notion
of the pristine shape of each may be gained from the
general pattern and contour of itsshards. All that we
can say is that the materials at hand with respect to
the early Saints whose names are familiar to us in
Cornwall have appeared to us to divide themselves
under three tolerably distinct heads. Firstly, those
which belong to an Irish period—when Christianity,
cut off from its trunk, presents itself to us in the weird
form it had assumed under the influence of pagan assi-
milation. Secondly, those pertaining to a Welsh period,
during which we see the native form of the Faith in
its highest state of development, arrived at its most
popular and widely extended phase, its missionaries
CONCLUSION 187
meanwhile exercising their greatest amount of in-
fluence. Thirdly, those of a Breton or Armorican
period, during which we seem to catch a glimpse of a
reaction from the Continent, of a stream tinged with
fresh colours flowing back to the source from whence
it had formerly been derived, of forms which through
habit had become native giving place to others of an
older type mixed with later developments unknown
to early times. And further that such influences
were paving the way amongst the inhabitants of
Cornwall for the almost unconscious reception of a
similar phase of Christianity, including under it
a system of Diocesan Episcopacy, to be finally
imposed on them in the tenth century through the
medium of a conquering race.
With regard to the difficulties of the subject,
apart from the utter absence of history truly so
called displayed in the Legend Lives, we have en-
deavoured to show how the confusion has been worse
confounded (1) by the changes in the names of
churches, which seem to have been effected in early
times by the natives themselves; (2) by a similar
process taking place to some extent on the incoming
of the Anglo-Roman clergy; (3) by the ignorance or
wilful misreading of names of early native Saints
ascribable to copyists during the thirteenth century ;
and (4) by the subsequent distortion of names which
crept in during the decay of the Cornish language.
Looking, indeed, at these and other kindred facts,
there seems to be little ground for hope that we shall
be ever able to gain a perfectly true insight into the
history of the epoch with which we have attempted to
deal, or to unravel the meshes of so tangled a web.
Meanwhile there aretwo subjects for study which might
188 THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
be of some little importance to a further elucidation
of the matter—(1) a collection of parish feast days,
and (2) a careful search in the earliest records for
spellings of ancient names. An accumulation of
facts like these, taken together with such legends as
may yet be afloat, are, we may fear, the last sources
from which we may ever hope to see any light thrown,
from within at least, upon so obscure a subject as the
‘ Age of the Saints’!
' Not long since the writer was informed that a MS. had been dis-
covered at Cambridge containing several ‘Legend#’ of Cornish Saints.
He has been unable, however, to gain any accurate information on the
subject, and can only hope that it may be before long given to the
world by those to whom it is known. To the lovers of Cornish to-
pography it would come as a pleasant surprise.
INDEX
ABERDEEN Breviary, the, 13, 163
Abergavenny, 155
Abury, xxvii
Abyssinia, 121 n.
Achebrann, 78
‘ Achebranni, Canonici Sancti,’ 78
Adamnan, Life of St. Columba, 7,
8 n., 16 7.
Adams, Rev. John, 1, 15; quoted,
19, 71
Adhelm, St., 179 n.
Advent, par. of, 153, 154, 158
Adwen, St., 153
ZElseth, 185
fEilwyney, 185
Aengus, Feilire or Litany of, 121,
123
Atthelstan, Athelstan, or Ethelstan,
his conquest, 176. See Athelstan
Agnes, St., island of, Scilly, 73
— — par. of, 100, 137
Agricola, xx, XXi, XxiV
Ailbhe, St., 35, 79
Ainos, xvii
Alan, an Armorican Saint, 169
— the river, 62, 142, 144. See
Camel
Alava, province of, xiv
Aldestowe, 143
Aldhelm, St., 84 ”., 176
Aleth, Bishop of, 172
— see of, 169
Alexandria, 120, 179 7.
Alhawyn, 153 n.
Allen, Mr. (quoted), 121
— St., par. of, 66, 169
Allhallow E’n, xii, 58
Allor, 138 n.
Alsace, inscription in, 37
Altar, a prefix, 164
— underground, 55
Altarnun, Alternone, Alternonia,
name and par. of, 99, 128, 132,
138_40
Altoir, 1388 n.
Amble, 178 x.
Amblhell, 178 n.
Ambresbury, 54
Ambrose, St., 178 . g
Ambrosia, 178 n.
Ambrusca, 178 n.
Ammel, 179, n.
Ammianus Marcellinus, quoted, xxi
Ammonius, 40
Amphibelus, 178 n.
Ancestors, the worship of, xviii
Anchorets, 118
Andewin, 153, 158, 159
Andrew, St., 48
Anglesey, xxvii, 154, 157-9, 161, 162
Anglo-Roman clergy, 161, 187
— domination, 127
— influence, 128-30
Anglo-Saxon influence in art, 184
Anglo-Saxons, the, 56
Ani (in Armenia), 118
Anselm, St., 68
Anstey, West, 141
Anstis, John, quoted, 157 2.
Anthony, St., 20, 129
Antioch, Antiochia, 115, 179 n.
— Bishop of, 178 n, k
— Council of, 119
— schools of, 30
Antoninus Pius, 178 2. r
Apollim Granno, 38
— Granno Mogouno, 37
— Mapono, 38
Apollo, the worship of, in Gaul an
Britain, 37, 38, 40, 43
— the priests of, 42
Aquitaine, 178 n. t
190
Arabs, 115
Architecture, 107 et seqq., 116
Ardmore, 91, 92, 95
Argonautic expedition, 75
Arles, Council of, 31
‘Armagh, The Book of,’ 33; quoted,
35
— holy well near, 103
Armenia, 9, 116 m., 118, 121 1.,
178 nn. a, 184 n., See Nes-
torian
Armenian, interlaced ornament, 118,
121
Armenians, 115
Armorica, 43, 68, 74-6, 133, 140,
163, 166. See Brittany
Armorican Litany, 67
— period, 187
— Saints, 165 e¢ seqq.
Armoricans, 23
Armthwaite, 38
Arnold, Dr., quoted, 17
— Matthew, quoted, 27
Arthur, King, his brewer, 132 2.
Arthur’s, King Castle, 123
Arthurian Cycle, Romances
Legends of, 16, 21, 69, 142
Arundell Papers, quoted, 64 n.
— Sir John, 81
Aryans, the, xix
As (name of Odin), xxvii
Asceticism, 118
Asch (name of Odin and of Beli),
XXVii
Aschbiri, xxvii 1.
Ascodrugite, 114
Asia Minor, 113, 116
Asia, Seven Churches of, 119
Athawyn, 153
Athelstan, 72 ”.
Athenodorus, 151
Athewenna, 153
Athos, Mount, 118
Atomic Philosophy, the School of,
27
Attius Patéra, 40
— Tiro Delphidius, 40
Augustine, St., 178 ». and n. f
Augustulus, 156
Aurelian, 151, 178 n.
Aurelius, M., 178 . 0
Ausonius, quoted, 40, 42
Austell, St. 137 »., 156
Auvergnat type, the, xv
Auvergne, 178 n.d
Auxilius, 156
Awstle, St., 156
Ayrshire, xxiii
and
THE AGE OF THE SALNTS
Baccuus, 114
— St., 151
Baldar, xxvi
‘Ballymote, Book of,’ quoted, 75
Balmano, 101
Balor, xxvi
Baltic, the, xix, xxii
Bangor, 32
— Illtyd, 157
Bannauem Tabernie, 34
Baptisteries, 116
Bardic literature of Wales, 125
Bards, 125
Barham, Dr., 53
Barlaam, 113 ».
Barlowena, 182
Barnstaple, 80
Barricius, 64 .
Barricus, 64
Barrocus, 64 n.
Basilicas, 116
Basque Provinces, x
Basset, Richard, 157 2.
— pedigree of, quoted, 157 .
Bayeux, 40
Beal, Rev. James, quoted, 113 n.
Beddoe, Dr., quoted, xvi
Bede, Venerable, quoted, xxii, 16,
68
Beehive huts, 50
Bel, xxvi
Belent editwus, 40
Belenus, 40, 41
Belge, and Belgic settlers, xxi
Beli, xxvi
Beliocasses, 40
Beltine, 58
Benan, St., altar of, 46
Bernard, St., 17, 30
Bethgellert, 90
Beunans Meriasek, 132 n.
Beuno, St., 127
Birdwood, Mr., quoted, 183 n.
Birr, St. Brendan of, 81
Bishopric of Cornwall, 1, 143
Bishops, Frankish, 175
— in monasteries, not diocesan, 175
— Saxon, 175
Black Crom’s Friday, 46
Blaise, Blasius, Blazey, St., 177 2.
and ». a
Blight, J. T., quoted, 9,111, 180, 183,
et passive
| — Mr., senr., 96
Blisland, 177 1.
Boase, Rev. C. W., 10; quoted, 16,
17, 62, 68, 71, 122, 134, 148, et
passim
INDEX
Bodferin, 150
Bodleian Library, MS. in, 74
Bodmin, 141 n., 143-5, 157
— Calendar, 152
— manumissions, 12, 143
— relies, 177
Bollandus, 10
Bolor range, 102
Bonedd y Saint, quoted, 141, 147
Bonemimori fillt Tribuni, 106
Bordeaux, 40, 43
Borlase, Dr. William, MSS., quoted,
v, 12, 14, 70, 72, 78, 88, 95, 98-
100, 111, 124, 127-9, et pas-
sim
Boskenna, 107, 182
Bosmana, 144, 154
Bosporthennis, 51, 52
Bosulval, 150, 173
Bothnia, Gulf of, xxv
— West, xxv
Bourbon, Etienne de, 90
Bowles, Charles, quoted, 63 n., 64 .
Bowssening, bowsening, bowzing, the
practice of, 99, 100
Boyne, the river, 63 n.
Brabant, North, xi, xix
Brachycephalic type, xvii
Bradstone, 138 n.
Brahmanism, 114
Brantyngham, Bishop, Register of,
quoted, 128, 135
Breaca, St., 63, 66, 67, 73, 122 n.
Breace campus, 63 n.
Breaga, 64 n.
Breage, 96
Brechan, 146. See Brychan
Brecknockshire, 65 n., 125, 147, 150,
156
Brehon Laws, the, 123
Brékilien, 137
Brendan, St., of Birr, 81 7.
— — of Clonfert, 81 n.
Brendanus, St., a tooth of, 80
Brendon, St., his oratory, 51. See
Brendan
—— church of, near Barnstaple,
80
Breock, St., 166, 178
Breton Legends, 69
— Litanies, 177
Breviaries, destruction of, 13
Breward, St., 132, 184
Brewer, Bishop of Exeter, 132 n.
— William, Lord, 132 n.
— King Arthur’s, 132 ».
Brieuc, St., 166
Briget, St., 39, 44
191
Brigid, St., 63 2. “
Brigida, St., 63 7”. } See Briget
Brioe, or Briocus, St., 166, 167, 178
Britains, the (Britannia), 34
Britanni, xxii
Britannia Minor, 165
British Church, origin of the, 31
Britones, 179
Britons, the, 60; their opinion of
their religion, 179
Brittany, 24, 69, 78, 120, 122, 128,
133, 137, 166. See Armorica
Britto, Uninochus, 170
Briwer, 132 ». See Brewer
Brochannus, 148
Broechan hic jacet . .
147
Brogan, 147
Broichan, 147
Bronescombe, Bishop of Exeter, Re-
gister of, 12 »., 70
Bronze Age, vii, xviii
Bruerdus, St., 132 ».
Bruinecha, 71
Bruinet, 71 and n., 72
Bruinsech the Slender, 71
Bryce, Prof., quoted, 114
Brychan, family of, 18 2., 146, 148 7.,
149-56, 158
Buadach, 171 n.
Buddhism, 114
Buddhist monasteries in China, 118
Budic, 171 n.
Budoe, Budocus, St., 133, 171
Buidi, pillar-stone of, 58
Bull, John, the religion of, 179 n.
Buller, Rev. James, 111 n.
Burgundians, 56
Burgundy, 178 n.
Burian, Buriana, Buriena, 15 1.,
18 n., 71-73, 105 n., 180 n., 135,
160, 164, 181, 182, 184
Burmah, 114
Byzantine inscription, 118
Byzantium, 184 n.
- otti filius,
Canprix, St., 146
Cadoe, St., 20 and n., 21 7., 97, 129
m., 142 n.,145, 146, 152, 153, 155,
159, 170
Cadroe, St., xxiv
Cadurigi, 38
Caergybi, 162
Caer Hawystl, 156
Cesar, Julius, xx, xxi
Cairnech, St., 123, 124
Cairns, pagan, xi
192
Caithness, xxv
Caldones, xxi
Caledonians, xx
Callee, 94
Callista, 18
Calporn, Calpornius, 34, 35
Camber, a, 141
Camborne, 65, 172; altar at, 184,
185 ».
Cambrensis, Giraldus, quoted, 133
et passim
Cambridge, MS. at, 188
Cambron, 172 n.
Camel (or Alan), the river, 62, 142.
See Alan
Camelford, 183
Camp (in Kerry), 102
Campbon, 172 ».
Campibonensis, or Campiboni, vicus,
172 n.
Candida Casa, 32
Cangas de Onis, x
Cannalige, 135
Cannalissy, 135
Cannal-Lidgye, 135
‘Canonici Sancti Achebranni,’ 78
— — Pirani, 23
Canterbury, 32
Cape Clear, 24, 79
Capgrave, quoted, 10, 22, 80, et
passim
Cardiganshire, 87, 124, 125, 166
Cardinham, 183, 184
Carew (‘ Survey’), quoted, 73, 97, 99,
128, et passim
Carnac, x
Carnarvonshire, xxvii, 141 ., 150
Carn-Brea, Chapel, the mound and
chapel at, v. e¢ seg., 111, 181
Carne, Rev. John, 1, 14; quoted, 77
et passim
Carran, 124
Carrow, 124
Casan Padruig, the, 46
Cashel, 117
Caspian, the, 103
Castel uchel coed, xxvii n.
Castledown, 183
Castlegoff, 107, 185
Castrum fatale, xxvii ”.
Catacombs, 116
Catherine, St., 66, 130
Cattegat, xxii
Caturiges, 36
Caturigian Apollo, 31
Caturigos, 36
Cavities, the custom of crawling
through, 44
THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Ceinwen, or Ceinwyn, St., 155
Cemeteries, pagan, x
Ceneu, 155
Cereticus, 139
Cesnola, Gen., quoted, 89 2.
Chagga, 117
Chapel Carn Brea, the mound at, v
et seq., 181
Chapel Uny, 66 .,181; the Well,
99
Chapelries, modern origin of, 128
Chapels, the, 52 and ».
Charlemagne, xxvi
Chieftain, the (a title of St. Patrick),
116
China, 61, 79, 114, 118, 121 n.
Chinese eyes, xvii
Chittlehampton, 70
Christian art, 116
Christianity, influence of, in Gaul
and Britain, 26, 33
Christopher, St., 130
Churches, the mode of founding, 82,
85
— of stone, 116
— of wood, 116
Chysoister, 52
Ciaran, St., 24 and m., 78
Cimbric Chersonese, xxiii, 76
Circles, emblematic of the sun, 46
Ciricius, St., 128 ».
Cities, sunken, the belief in, 44
Ciwa, 157
Clannaborough, 141 2.
Clare, St., 177 n.
Clarus, St., 177 7.
Cleather, St., 152
Clechre, 152
Cleder, St., 152
Clederus, St., 152
Cledredus, St., 130, 152
Cleer, St., 185
Clement, St., 178 7.
Clement’s, St., chapel at, 182
Clere, St., 167
Clether, St., 130
Clifford, Prof., 30
Clito, 68
Clochoir, the, xxvi
Cloghar, 59
Clondalkin, the Round Tower at,
118
Clonfert, St. Brendan of, 81
Clonmacnoise, 78
Clyde, the Firth of, xxiii
Clyvedhas, 64 1.
Codex Valicellanus, quoted, 42
Coed Cerniw, 159
INDEX
Colan, St., 157
— Little, 97
Colgan, John, 10; quoted, 72, 77,
81 1n., et passim
Collen, St., 157
Collins, Rey. C. M. E., 3 n.
— Rev. Mr., MSS. quoted, 68, 70, 71,
110, et passim
Columb, Columba, St., of Hy, 16 x.,
73 n., 82
— St. (the Virgin), 177, 178 n.
— 8t., parish of, 184
— St. (Minor), parish of, 106
Colwynydhiaeth, 64 1.
Comgall, St., 61 2.
Conan, Bishop, 175
Conarditone, 64 n.
Conerton (see Connerton), 63 1.
Conetconia, 64, 65
Conger (see Cunger, Cyngar)
Conn, the cairn of, 58
Connaught, kings of, xxiv
Connerton, 64, 65 7., 68
— Chapel, 70 x.
Consecration of churches, 85
Constantine (see Cystennyn Ger-
niew), 159
— parish of, 107 n.
— $t., 15 ., 18 2., 19 »., 137, 144,
145, 163
— the Great, 116, 178. e
— Stone, the, 53
Constantinople, 120
Constantius (author of ‘Life of St.
Germanus’), 16 ».
Coplestone, Cross at, 183 7.
Corb, 39
Corentin, Corentine, St., 167, 178
Corinia, comes, 139
Cork, 95
Cormac, Glossary of, quoted, 46
Cornelius, 177 n.
Cornelly, 177 .
Cornewaul, 64
Cornish antiquities, 57
— language, the; ‘ Life of Columba’
written in, 178
— — decay of, 187
— literature, destruction of, 12
Cornouaille, 69
Cornubia, 69, 167-9
Cornugallia, 165, 167-9
Cornwall, bishopric of, 143
— — origin of the, 175
— John of, quoted, xxvii and n.
Corpus Christi, 101
Costa, Sr. Joaquin, quoted, 38
Cothraighe, 36
193
Couch, T. Q., quoted, 101
Councils, Edicts of, against super-
stitions, 44
Cradock, 167
Crania of the tumuli, xv
Crantoc, or Crantock, St., 15 .,
21 n., 87, 123, 129 n., 138, 153, 178
Credhe, 131 n.
Crediton, the See of, 176
Creed, parish of, and St., 95, 131,
132 n., 139
Creeping, the practice of, 89
Cremation, xix
Cressy, quoted,
passim
Crewenna, St., 16 2., 63, 67
Crida, St., 131 7.
Croagh Patrick (Mecca of Ireland),
superstitions and observances at,
45-8
Crom, meaning of, 123
— Cruach, or Cruaich, xxvi, 123
— — Dubh, 45
Cronan, St., 117
Cross, St., 131
Crosses, 107
Crowan, 67
Crowza Downs, 96
Cruc, xiii
Cruithné (the Picts), xxi, xxii, 104
Cubert, St., 183
— Well, 99
Cuby, St., 15 n., 97, 162
Cuculla, 83
Cumber, 142
Cumbria, 55
Cummian, quoted, 179 n.
Cummings, Rey. J. G., 9
Cunedda, the sons of, Conquest of
the Irish in Wales and South
Britain by, xxvii
Cunger (Conger, Cyngar), 161
Cungresbury, 161
Cury, 74, 167
Cuthbert, St., Life of, by Bede, 16 7.
Cuypers, Prosper, quoted, xi 7.
Cyclopean architecture, 117
73 n., 80, et
| — buildings, 50
— church, 108
Cymbil, 85 n.
Cyngar (Conger, Cunger), 160, 161
Cyprus, 89 2.
Cyre, St., 151 ».
Cyriacus, 177 n.
Cyricius, St., 151 n.
Cyrus, St., 138, 151
Cystennan Gerniew, or Cystennyn
Gorneu (see Constantine), 18 7.,159
O
194
Dana, xiii
Danes, the, 12
Danish islands, xxiii
David, St., 15, 19, 48, 73, 133, 136,
138-40, 146, 150, 162-4
Davies-Gilbert, quoted, 78, 87, 89,
et passim
Declan, St., 35, 44,79; superstitions
at his rock, 91
Decorative art, 183 et seqq.
Det terrenit, xiii
Delian, St., 131, 134
Deliau, 135 n.
Delio, 134 2.
Delioau, 134 1.
Delionuth, 134
Deliou, 134
Dellabole, 134 .
Dellan, St., 135; chapel of, 181
Delphidius, Attius Tiro, 40,
Delyan, 134 n.
Denbighshire, 157, 160
Dencuti, 158
Denmark, xiv, xvi, xxii
Denys, St., 48, 77, 177
Deo Mapono, 38
Deo Mogonti Cad., 37
Deo Mogonti Vitire S(ancto), 37
Deo Mogti, 37
Deo Mouno Cad., 37
Deo Sancto Apollint Mapon, 38
Derva, 65 n.
Dervacus, 65
Derwe, 65 and n., 137
Desii, the Patrick of the, 35
Desiul, or dessil, the, xiii, 44, 93.
See Turas
Deus Belli (see Sucat, name of St.
Patrick), 36
De Vogiié, quoted, 9, 117
Devon, Devonshire, 70, 74, 136, 137,
140, 160, 183 7.
Devy, 138
Dewstow, 138, 178 7.
Dicalidones, the, xxi
Dickinson, F. H., quoted, 13 n.
Digain, 160
Dilic, 149
Dinan, 64
Dingerein, 134, 160
Dinurrin, or Dinnurrin, 175 n.
Diocesan episcopacy, 187
Diocletian, persecution under, 138,
177, 178 n. s.
Dionysius, St., 177 7.
Dipping against the sun, practice of,
99
Disert Ulidh, 121
THE AGE OF
THE SAINTS
Docus, 146
Dog saint, a, 91
Dogmael, St., 127
Dokey, Mary, 132
Dol, archbishopric of, 175
— Bishop of, 140, 171
Dolichocephalic type, xvii
Dolmen mounds of Japan, xviii
Dolmens, 58
‘Domesday,’ the Exeter, 12; quoted,
124 et passim
— the Royal, 12 ».; quoted, 23
Dominica, St., 177 n.
Dominick, St., 128 »., 157, 177 x.,
179 n.
Domnu, xxiii, xxiv
Domuel, 80
Donaghmore, doorway
Tower, 108
Donatists, 31
Donegal, county of, 97 7.
— Martyrology of, quoted, 71
— mountains of, 76 .
Doniert, 185
Dorsetshire, 178 n. m
Downpatrick, 48
Drenthe, Province of, xiv, 89
Dress of the Saints, 82 et seqq.
Druids, 39, 41, 42, 58, 59, 82, 84,
120
Dublin, xxiv, xxvii
Dubricius, 154 2., 156
Duloe, 97, 136, 149, 154 ., 162
Dumbarton, xxiii
Dumbo, xxv
Dumbrian Sea, xxv
Dumbslandia, xxv
Dumbus, King, xxv
Dumn’s EBja, xxv
Dumna, xxv
Dumne’s Nes, xxv
Dumnic Sea, xxv
Dumnon, xxiv
Dumnonia, 50, 55, 80, 124, 163, 176
— in Brittany, 165
Dumnonian promontory, 127
— Saints, 127
Dumnonii, xxiii, xxv, xxvii
Dumnonios, xxiv
Dumnonos, xxiv
Dumuu, xxiii
Dumnus, xxv
Dungerth, King of Cornwall, 185
Dunkeld, the Litany of, quoted 130 .,
157, 178 n. u
Dunlewy, Dun-Lewy, 76 7.
Dunraven, the Earl of, 8; quoted, 51
and ., 109, 117
of Round
INDEX
Dunstan, St., 129, 179 n.
Dupath Well, 181
Duyvel’s Kutte, the, 89
Dwarfs, xxiv
Dwyn, 158
Dwyngwen, 159 n.
Dwynwen, 154, 155, 158
Dynfaint, 160
East, the hundred of, 148
Easter, 60, 61
Ecclesiola, an, 97
Edessa, monks of, 118, 119
Edgar, King, 104
Edinburgh, xxvii
Edward the Confessor, King, 23, 124
Eglos, the prefix, 138, 164
Eglosberrie, 72 7.
Egloscruc, or
and n.
Egloshayle, 63, 142
Egloskerry, 135, 152
Eglosros, 134 .
Egypt, anchoret monks of, 118; in
Ireland, 121
Higron, St., 158
Eime, 39
Elbe, the, xix, xxii
Eleete, 135
Elente, 135
Elerky, 128
Elider, St., 126
Elidius, St., 133, 186, 137, 140,
154
Elios, St., 133
Eliud, 133
Elius, 133
Elizabeth, Queen, 64 n.
Eloy, St., Chapel of, plate facing
p- 100, 181 n.
Elves, xii
Elwine, St., 64
Elwinus, St., 63, 66
Elwyn, St., 130
Elwynse, 66, 130 .
Emain, 103
Emmius, Ubbo, quoted, 90
Ems, the, xxii
Endelient, Endelienta, 131, 134, 148
Endellion, 134, 147, 149, 154, 183
Ennoder, Ennodor, Ennodorus, St.,
130, 151-3
Enodock, Enodok, St., 129, 152
Episcopacy, diocesan, 187
Episcopi vagantes, 119 n.
’Eriocxomo: cxoAd (ores, 119
Erbin, Erbyn, St., 159, 160 and ».
Egloseruke, 135
195
Ercila, 139 7.
Ercilincus, 139 x.
Ercus, 71
Ercy, 71
Ergh, 70, 71
Ericus, 71
Erme, St., 177 n.
Erminius, 65 n.
Evris, xxiv
Erth, St., 68 ., 70
Ervan, St., 130, 160, 177 2.
Eseloor’s Berg, xxv
Esthonians, xix
Est-Lo, 64, 68
Etha, 63, 67, 128 ».
Ethelred, St., 179 n.
Ethy, 149
Etienne de Bourbon, quoted, 90
Euinus, 65 ».
Eumenius, quoted, xxi
Euny Lelant, 65 n.
Eustachius, St., 129 »., 177 ».
Eval, St., 66, 130, 157
Eval filt Dencui, 158
Evilla, St., 130 »., 157
Ewe, St., 129 2., 177 n.
Ewenny, 130 n.
Ewinus, St., 2.
Ewny, 65
— Lelant, 65
— Redruth 65 and 7
Exeter, 78
— Cathedral of, 80
— ‘Domesday,’ 12; quoted, passim
— Registers, quoted, 71 et passim
Fasioua, 18
Fabulous tales, 13
Fal, a god, xxvi
— the River, 87
Falearragh, 97 2.
Falemutha, 74
Falmouth, 171
Families of Saints, successors of
pagan hierarchieal families, 41
Fardel Manor, 106 ».
Feast days, 188;
Sundays, 159
Fechin, St., Chureh of, 117, plate
facing 118
‘Feen, Die, in Europa,’ quoted, 97 n.
Feinné, 90
Feliaus, 133, 134
Felicitas, St., 70, 129 m., 152 n.,
177 n.
Females, exclusion of, 118
Feoca, Feock, Feock, St., 76, 77
0 2
why kept on
196
Fergusson, ‘Hist. of Architecture,’
quoted, 113 »., 117
Fiace, St., 76, 77; bis Hymn, xi
Fidh Nemhedh, 75, 76
Fife, xxiii
Filedh, 56
Filius, St., 134, 135
Fillie, 134
Fimbar, St., 129
Fin MacCumhail, 47, 48
Fingar, 68
Finns, xv
Finno-Ugric stock, xii, xix, 104;
influence of, 89, 103
Fir-Bolg, xxiv, 51 7.
Fir-Domnann, xxiii, xxiv, xxv
Fir-Galeoin, -Galiuin, -Galiuind,
XXIV, XXV
Fishes, the worship of, 44
Fol-coét, College of, 69
Fomori, Fomorians, xxiv, 21, 76
Fore, 117
Forrabury, 177 n.
Forth, the Firth of, xxiii, xxiv,
31
Fothadh, 58
Fothreve, xxiii
Fowey, 129, 130, 183
Francis, St., 178
Franks, the, 56, 60
Freeth, Mr., 64 2.
Fremenville, 11 x.
Frisian Island, xxii
— king with ass’s ears, xxv
Froude, John Anthony, quoted, 18
Fuller, quoted, 19
Gaatta, 31, 76 n., 120
Galfridus, his Life of St. Elidius,
quoted, 133 and n.
Gallerus, oratory of, 117, 118
Gallic forms, 177
— martyrologies, 177
Gallican bishops, 31
— mission, 56
Gallicans, orthodox, 32
Gallo-Roman forms, 177
— influence, 128
Galloway, 32
Gandhara, sculptures at, 113 n.
GAng-grifter, xiv
Garb of the Saints, 82 et seqq.
Gaul, xxiii, 112, 115, 116, 166, 167
177
— Church of, 31
— missionaries of, 60
Gauls, the (Gallia), 34
THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Gauls, the (Gallt), 115
Genereth, 185
Genesius, 177 2.
Gennis, St., 177 n.
Gentilities, the, 125
Geoffry of Monmouth, quoted, 69
George, St., 48, 177 n.
Georgia, 116 n.
Geraint, 131, 160-2
Gerennius, St., 134
German Ocean, the, xxii
— type of Tacitus in Cornwall,
xxl
Germanic tribes, 76 1.
Germans, Germanus, St., 167., 22,
31, 32 1. 144, 166, 175, 176,
178
Germany, xiv, xvi, xix, xxvi
Germo Lane, 96
— &t., 18 2., 64, 67, 87. See Ger-
mochus
Germo’s, St., chair, 67
Germochus, 63, 67
Gernac, 124
Gerontius, St, 160, 176. See
Gerrans and Geruntius
Gerrans, St., 160-2
Geruntius, St., 72 2., 84 .
Gerwyn, 154
Giants, xxiv, 86, 95; who they
were, Xx
— country of, xxv
— graves, viii, xiv, 89
— quoits, 90
— tribes of, 76 1.
Gibraltar, 112, 120
Giggy, St., 1385
Gilbert de Stone, 13
Gildas, 19; quoted, passim
Gille-Christ, 39
Glamorganshire, 140, 150, 153
Glass, chalices of, 56
Glastonbury, 62
Glendalough, 109, 118
Gliick, quoted, 37
Gluviacus, St., 159 ».
Gluvias, Gluvius, 159
Glyvedhas, 64 n.
Glywys Cerniw, 159
Godwin, 150 n.
Goidelic romance, 57
Golant, 140
Golden, 173
Goran, Goriann, Goron, Goruan, 154
and 7.
Gothian, St., 68
Granada, xiv
Grade, Gradus, St., 131 and ».
INDEX
Greco-Roman inscription, 118
Grandisson, Bishop; Registers of,
12 n.; quoted, 20 and m., 151, et
passim
Graveran, M., 11.
Greece, 116; churches in, 110
Green (‘ Hist. Engl. People’), quoted,
29
Gregory the Great, St., 178 ».
— of Tours, St., 170
Greiné, 38
Greith, Carl, quoted, xxvii n.
Grian, 38
Grimm (‘ Architect. en Arménie’), 9;
quoted, 118, 184 n.
— (‘Teuton. Mythology’), quoted,
xxvi
Grouping together two Saints, 137
Gubba, xxvi
Gudwal, St., 172, 173, 178
Guellit, 124
Guerith Karanctance, 124
Guidguale, 172 2.
Guigner, 68
Guinefort, St., 91, 103
Guiner, St., 69
Gulval, 52, 97, 128, 150, 172, 183
— Well, 98
Gump, the, xiii
Gunwallo, or Gunwalloe, St., 15 x.,
74, 166, 167, 178
Guoidwale, 172 n.
Gurdestinus, quoted, 166 n.
Gurnard’s Head, Chapel
182
Guron, St., 144, 154
Gurval, 172
Gwdvele, St., 173
Gwen, St., 150, 162.
Gwenddydd, 152
Gwendron, 66, 137.
Gwennap, 149, 151
Gwenog, 170
Gwent, 136
Gwinear, St., 63 ”., 65 and ., 68,
70, 74, 183
Gwinno, St., 150. See Winnow
Gwinnodock, St., 129 n.
Gwithian, or Gwythian, Gwithianus,
63-5, 68, 107, 109, 180
Gwynfardd, 140 n.
Gwynllew, 142
Gwynllyw, 159
Gwynno, St., 169-71.
and Gwinno
Gwynnoc, 169
Gwynog, 157
Gyermochus, 67 7.
of, 51,
See Wenn
See Wendron
See Winnow
197
Happan, 6; quoted, 22, 31, 54, 57,
68, et passim
Hadrian, persecution under,
n.q
Hags, 90
Haile Mont, 62
Hals, 3, 14; quoted, 98, 129, et pas-
sum
Hanway, quoted, 103
Hardy, P. D., quoted, 95 n.
Harlyn, 129 x.
Hartland, 148
Haslam, quoted, 53, 107 ., 108
Hawystl, 156
Hayle, 62, 65, 68, 70, 73, 106, 142
— Ryver, 63
Heal, 65
Heaven, conception of, among the
Britons, 29
Hedges, quoted, 88
Hegelmuthe, 142
Helen, St., 1385, Church of, Scilly,
132 and n., 181; Oratory of, St.
Just, 181
Helena, St., 63, 67, 177 n.
Heli, 154 n.
Helie, 154
Helland, 177 x.
Henry VII., 129 n.
Henry VIII., 12
Hercynian forest, 120
Hermes, St., 130, 160, 177, 178 7.
Hermits, 60
Heroes, xxiv
Hervor-Saga, the, quoted, xxv
Herygh, 70
Hexham, 38
Hia, St., 65
Hierosolyma, 179 n.
Hierytha, St., 70
Hilary, St., parish of, 53, 183
— of Poictiers, 178
Hille, 136, 154 n.
Hindustan, 94, 114
Holed stones, 44; in Cyprus, 89 x.
Hollacombe, 141 1.
Holland, xiv, xxiv, 89
Holyhead, 162
Holywell, 13
Horg, xiii
Howel, King, 165
Hiibner, Emil, 9; quoted, 53, 65 n.
106, 158, et passim
Hugh, St., 129, 277 2., 178 n. p
Hundeson, Karl, 39 n.
Hiinebedden, xiv, 89, 90
Hunt, Robert, quoted, 64 7., 72, 96
Hut-clusters, 50
178
198
Hy, 82
Hya, St., 66, 68
Ia, St., 18 7., 63, 64, 66, 70
Tago, Rev. W., 9; quoted, 107, 145,
147, 183, 184
Ibar, 79
Iberes, xx
Iberian Peninsula, xii
Ictian Sea, xxii
Icts, xxii
Ida, St., 135 2., 136 2.
Iddesford, 136
Iddesleigh, 136
Iddy, St., 135
Ide, St., 185, 137 ., 152
Idgie, 135
Idols introduced, xxvi
Tes, St., 64
Ilduictus, St., 157
Tllick, St., 135
Tllog, St., 156, 157 ».
Tllogan, 156, 163
Illtyd, St., 157, 169; College of, 140,
153
Iltutus, St., 128 n.
Indech, xxiv
India, 20, 79, 117, 118, 144:
Indus, the, 113
Ingenwi (Cornish ogham inscription),
107 n.
Inis-Celtra, 109 2.
Inishmurray, Cashel, 51, 52
Instantius, Bishop, 54
Interlaced patterns, 118
Inver Domnann, xxiv
Iona, 152
Tot, iotr, otun, xx
Iétunheim, xxv
Ireland, passim
— art in, 184
— beehive dwellings in, 51, and
Plate I., opposite p. 50
-— centre of culture, 57
— Christianity in, 55
— crosses of, 9
Trish Canons, 42
-— Christianity, Oriental element in,
112 et seqq.
— Invasion of South Wales and
Cornwall, xxvii
— Period, the, 186
— Saints in Cornwall, 62 et seqq.
— — archeology of the time of,
106
Irminsul, xxvi
Iron Age, the, vii, xx
THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Irrus Domnann, xxiv
Ismaelite, 115
Isnioc Vitali filt Torrici, 182
Issey, Issy, or Isy, St., 88, 134-7
149, 151
Ithy, 149 ».
Ive, St., 177 .
Ives, St., 13 ., 62, 64 n.
Ivo, St., 177 1.
Ivybridge, 106
James, St., 48, 127
Japan, 102, 114, 121
Japanese, xvii, 103
Jerome, St., quoted, 41, 115
Jerusalem, 20, 97, 133, 144, 162, 170
Jestyn, 131 2., 160-2
Jesuits, 114
Johanna, 72
Johannes, 148
— Cornubiensis, xxvii
John, St., Baptist, 67
John’s Eve, St., 45
— parish of St., 148
— the Almoner, Life of, quoted,
120 n.
Jordan, the River, 97
Josaphat, 113 n.
Jove, 40
Joyce, Prof., quoted, 36
Julian, St., 150, 151 »:
Juliana, St., 150, 151
Juliette, St., 128 2., 151 n.
Juliot, St., 177 ».
Julitta, St., 138, 151, 177 2.
Just, St., 95, 96, 162, 177
— parish of, in Roseland, 161, 169
— — in Penrith, xxi, 111, 128,
130 m., 132, 170 1. 177 2.,
181-4
Justs, the two St., 161 7.
Justus, St., 65 2., 161, 162, 177 1.
Katr-BELLI, xxvii n.
Kami, 103
Kamtschatka, 103
Kanane, 152
Karentoc, Karentocus, St., 123, 153
Karl, 39 2.
— Hundeson, 39 7.
Karn Kenidjack, 183
Katherine, St., 130 2.
Kayne, St., 155
— the Deyil, 156
Ké, St., 77
Kea, St., 77, 100, 162
INDEX
Kea’s, St., boat, 87
Kebius, St., 162
Keby, St., 18, 19, 21, 77, 162
Keinwen, 155
Kelat-Sema’n, 117
‘Kells, the Book of,’ 121 n.
Kenerine, 78 n.
Kenidjack, Karn, 183
Kennedius, St., 129
Kennet, St., 129
Kenstec, Bishop, 175
Kent, xxi
Kenwin, Prince of Cornwall, 155 7.
Kenwyn, 154 n., 155, 159 n.
Kerdanet, M. D. L. Miorcec de,
quoted, 11 .
Kerender, 153
Keri, St., 152
Kerrian, St., 78
Kerry, 102
Kerslake, Mr., quoted, 70
Keveran, Keverine, 78, 78 n. See
Keverne
Keverne, St., 24, 77, 95, 96
Kevin, St., 117
Kew, St., 150, 157, 164, 178 »., 179 1.
Key pattern, 121 n.
Keyna, Keyne, St., 152, 154, 155, 159
— — — the Well of, 97
Kherbet Hass, 117
Kiaran, Kieran, Kieranus, St., 24, 58,
78-80, 83. See Kyran, Ciaran,
Piran, &c.
Kieran’s, St., Strand, 24
King, Mr., 7
Kippiscombe Lane, 162
Klemm, quoted, xix
Kora, the, 102
Kubby, 162
Kyran, St., 78
Lasrarp Longsech, xxiv
Ladoca, Ladock, 131, 146
Lafroodha, 128 n.
Lafroudha, 128 n.
Lagenians, xxv
Lagonia, 63
Laighinns, xxv
Laighné, xxv
Lakes, worship of, 44
Lamorran, 157
Lampiran, 23
Lan, prefix of, 138, 164
Lanant, 65 n.
Lanark, xxiii
Lanbrebois, 178 2. m
Landaff, 133, 134
199
Landavenech, 167, 170. See Lan-
devenech
Landawednack, 166, 167, 170
Landege, 77
Landelian, 134, 154
Landetty, 149
Landevenech, 166
Lan-Dewin, 153, 154
Landigay, 77
Landithy, 68 ., 128, 149 ., 168 2».
Landock, 146
Land’s End, 89; district, 71, 122
Landwynnok, 170 .
Lan-Dwynwen, 158
. Laneast, 173; Well at, 181
Lanesly, 128 ., 173, 174
Lanfrowdha, 128
Langobardi, 103
Languengar, 69
Lanherne, 107, 183-5
Lanhydrock, 157
Lanisley, 128
Lanivel, 161, 183, 184
Lan-Julian, 150
Lan-Kew, 157 n.
Lanlivery, 129,137 »., 151 1.,179 n.
Lannachebran, 78
Lannow, 157 n.
Lanow, 157 ., 164
Lanowseynt, 157 n.
Lanquinow, 150
Lanreath, 129, 179 n.
Lanreython, 74
Lansulian, 151 n.
Lansullian, 151 n.
Lanteglos, 153, 177 ., 185 and n.
Lan-Vab, 171 n.
Lan-Voreck, 137 n.
Lanyon, 182, 183
Lanyseley, 173
Lapland, 89
Laplanders, Lapps, xii, xiv, xv, 89
n., 103
Lassick, 146. See Ladock
Lateran Museum, bas-reliefsin, 1137.
La Vabe, 171 n.
Lavethas, 64 n.
Leaba-na-Feinné, xiv, 90
‘ Lecan, The Yellow Book of,’ quoted,
xii 2.
‘Lecoy de la Marche,’ M., quoted, 90
Leem, quoted, 89 .
‘Legenda Sanctorum’ of Bishop
Grandisson, 12 .
Legende books, 13
— Sarum, 13 2.
Legendary literature of Wales, 125
-— Lives, 10, 187
200 THE AGE OF
Legendary Lives, method of com-
pilation, and contents, 18-21
— — value of, &c., 16
Le Grand, F. G. A., 11; quoted, 69,
74, et passim
Leinster, xxv. 63
Leland, 12; quoted, 62-4, 66, 67,
71-4, 78, 86, 133, et passim
Lelant, 65 and n., 66
Leo the Great, 55
Leofrics’ Missal, 12; quoted, 23 7.,
176 n.
Léon, St. Paul de, 168, 178
Leonard, St., 178 n.
Lesser Britain, 165
Letha, 165
Levabe, 171 n.
Levan, St., x, 71-3, 88. See Levin
— — Chapel at, 100, 182
— — Church of, 88
—- — Cleft Stone at, 88
— — Well under chapel at, 100
Levin, St., 72, 88. See Levan
Lia Fail, xxvi
Lide, 135
Lides, St., 86, 133, 135
Lidford, 141 x.
Liffey, the, 63 2.
Lightfoot, Dr., quoted, 31, 120
Limenach, 107 x.
Limerick, 109
Lindsay, Lord, quoted, 116
Litanies, Breton, quoted, 177
Lives of Cornish Saints, MS. at
Cambridge, 188 x.
Lizard district, 122, 167
Llanbadarn, 140, 164
Llanbedrog, 141 n.
Llanearvan, 145
Llandathan, 153
Llanddwyn, 159 n.
Llandwyn, 154
Llanferin, 150
Llanfeugan, 156
Llangeneu, 155
Llangerniw, 160
Llangiwa, 157
Llangollan, 157
Llangrannoc, 124
Llangybi, 162
Llaniestin, 150, 161
Llantrisant, 150
Llydaw, 165
Llywarch Hén, 160
Loch-na-Corra, 45
Loire, the, 165
Long Stone, the(St. Austell Downs),95
Loonius, atlas of, quoted, xxv 2.
THE SAINTS
Lough Derg, 47, 48; superstitions
at, 45
Louth, county of, x
Lucian, quoted, 28
Luddeuan, 158 n.
Ludevaulles, 158 7.
Ludewanus, 130
Ludewin, 158
Ludgvan, St., 130, 154 »., 158
Luduam, 158
Luduan, 158
Luduham, 158
Luduonus, 158 7.
Luganus, St., 157
Lugdunum, 76 n.
Lugnaedon, 107 ., 147
Lutwin, 158
Luxilian, Luxilion, 150, 151, 177 n.
Lycia, 117
Lyddy, St., 185, 152
Lyons, 31, 90
Lyttelton, Rev. Dr., 12 14
Maz, 28
Mabe, 171
Maben, Mabena, 131, 149
Mabon, 149
Mabyn, 149
Maccon, Mael, 39 2.
Machutus, St., 168 2., 169
Maclean, Sir John, quoted, 9 ., 147,
et passim
Maclorius, St., 169
Macon, 169
Madch, St., 169
Madderne, St., 128 »., 168; Well,
101
Maddick, St., 88
Madern, St., 128
Madron, St., 68 2., 89, 128 and .,
141, 164, 168, 173, 182
— Well Chapel, 181; ground plan,
182; elevation, Plate II., facing
100
Mael, 38
— Brigte, 39
— Maccon, 39 n.
— Uma, 39
Maen, xxiv
Maenor Fabon, 149
— Teilo, 149
Magel, 38
Magh Breagh, 63
Magherees, 51
Magi, 37, 82
Magianism, 119 n.
Magians, 114
INDEX 201
Magonius, 36, 37, 39, 42
Magontiacum, 37
Magonus, 37, 38
Magu, 38
Magula, 38
Magunus, 37
Magus, 39
— (Gothic) 38
— Simon, 84
— the Persian, 119
Maguzoha, 38
Maguzoho, 38
Mahutus, St., 168 7.
Main, 37
Maker, 150
Malachi, St., 17, 30
Malahide Bay, xxiv
Malmesbury, William of, quoted, 54
Malo, St., Bishop of, 172
— — 168 n., 169
Malo’s Moor, 169
Man, Isle of, 9,52 n., 185 .; art in,
184
Manaccan, St., 72, 73 n.
Manacus, St., 129
Manacutell, 137 n.
Manau Guotodin, xxviii
Manicheans, 114, 119
Manumissions, the Bodmin, 12
Map, 38
Marazion, 96
— Chapel, 177 n.
Marcelliana, 177 n.
Marcellina, 178 n. g
Marcellinus, Ammianus, xxi
Marcus Aurelius, quoted, 28
Marnanus, St., 63, 66, 155
Martin, St., 16 »., 31, 80, 128 x,
166, 167, 171 ., 174, 175, 178
Martinus, 42
— de Cambron, 172 n.
Martyrologies, Gallic, 177
Mary, St., 128, 139
— — dedications to, 126, 127
— — Well of, 97
Mary Dokey, 152
Maskell, Rev. W., quoted, 13
Masses, diverse, 116
Masterman, Mr., 100, 182
Materiana, St., 177 x.
Maternus, St., 141
Mather, 64 n.
Maudez, St., 169
Mauditus, St., 169
Maugantius, 156
Maul-na-holtora, 102
Maunanus, St., 67 and 7.
Mawes, St., 169. See Maws
Mawgan, St., 123, 156, 183
Mawnan, Mawnanus, St., 67,129, 154
Maws, St., 87
Max Miiller, Prof., 57
May Day, 58
Mayence, 37
Mayo, xxiv
Mediadog, St., 132
Méen, St., 136, 137, 168
Megalithic monuments, supersti-
tions attached to, perpetuated by
Christians, 102
Meigant, 156
Melaine, St., 168 7.
Melan, St., 168 7.
Melania, St., 20
Melanius, St., 168
Melarius, St., 171
Melior, St., 54
Melor, Melorus, St., 20, 54, 162, 171,
178
Melyan, St., 162
Menabilly, 137 n.
Menacuddle, 137 ., 181
Menadarva, 65 7.
Menagissy, 137 .
Mena-ha-Dillie, 137 n.
Mena-ha-Illic, 187 n.
Mén-an-tol, 89
Meneage, 74, 78, 96, 183
Menefrida, St., 130, 149 ».
Menég, 74
Menfré, 149
Menheniot, 129, 179 7.
Menhirion, 58
Menifyrde, St., 149 n.
Menteith, xxiii
Meran, St., 129
Merewenna, 150
Meriadoc, Meriadocus, St.,172 and n.
Meriasek, St., 63. See Meriadoc
Merin, 150. See Merrin
Merini, 150
‘Merlin, The Prophecy of,’ xxvii 7.
Merrasickers, 132 n.
Merrin, St., 129,150. See Merryn
Merrygeek, 132
Merryn, St., 145, 163
Merthen, 66
Mertherder,wa, 65
Mertherum 66
Merthyr, 65 n.
— Uni, 66,107 »
Meugan, 156
Meunan, 67
Meva, 136 n.
Meva-ha-Gissy, 137
Mevan, Mevanus, St., 136, 137, 168
202
Mevichurch, 137 7.
Mevie, St., 136
Mevin, 178
Mewan, Mewanus, St., 137
Michael, St., dedications to, 126, 127
Michael’s, St., Mount, 146
— — — Calendar of, 148
Midas, the Phrygian, xxiv
Midsummer Eve, 48
— fires, 44
Milan, Bishop of, 171 ”. 1
Milchu, 36
Milles, Rev. Dr., 14; quoted, 65 et
passim
Millett, G. B., 183
Milor, St., 18 ».
Milton Abbot, 137
Mitchell, 183
Mithian, 137 n.
Minver, St., 129 7., 180, 149, 152
Missal, the Leofric, 12
Moab, 117, 118
Meenis, 37
Meenus, 37
Moga, 38
Mogan, 38
Mogh, 38, 39
Mogh Corb, 39
— Ruith, 39
Mogin, 37
Mogon, 38
Mogons, 38
Mogontia, 37
Mogontiacum, 37
Mogouno, 38
Mogounos, 37, 38
Mogr, 38
Mohammedanism, 103
Mohammedans, 101
Mohin, 37
Moin, 37
Monachi_ Scotici
tonsure of, 83 7.
Monasterboice, x
Mongoloid race, xvii
— type, xvi
Monmouthshire, 150, 157, 159
Mont Myghell, 66
— — Calendar of, 139
— St. Michel, 165
Montanist revival, 31
Montelius, O., quoted, 184 n.
Moore, Mr., quoted, 95
— Thomas, 75
Morgan, 31
Morhaiarn, St., 157
Morse, Edw. S., quoted, xviii 7.
(Irish monks),
THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Morwenna, 151
Morwenstow, 151
Morwetha, 131
Moses, 20
Moughan, St., 156
Mounti Deo, 37
Mount’s Bay, 122
— — dark type on shores of, xvii
Mousehole, 80
Moyle, Johannes, 128 n.
Moytura, mythical battle of, xxiv, 21
Muellenhoff, quoted, xxvi
Mug, 38, 39
Mug Eime, 39
Mullyon, 168, 169
Munster, 35, 62, 122
Murray, Mr., quoted, 87 n.
Musselborough, 38
Mwynan, 154
Mylor, St., 171
Myrath, 97 n.
Mythian Chapel, 137
Names, ancient spellings of, 188
— of Welsh Saints classified, 126
Nanjulian, 151 n.
Nanquidno, 150, 170 .
Nanquinowe, 170 n.
Nant’s Well, 97
Nantes, diocese of, 172 n.
Naunter, St., 132 ., 139
Navan Fort, 103
Nectan, Nectanus, St., 148
Nedy, St., 129 ».
Neiden, mountain of, 89
Nemea Silva, the Nemzan Wood,
74-6
Nemed, 75
Nemedh, 76 n.
Nemet, 76 n.
Nemetes, 76
Nemhiath, 75
Nennius, the Irish, 104
Neolithic Age, xv, xix
Neomena, St., 139 ».
Neot, St., 128, 129, 179
Neots, St. (Huntingdonshire), 18
‘ Nera, Expedition of,’ quoted, xii 7.
Nessan, St., 109
Nestorian Church, 121 ».
— ornament in MSS., 121 ».
Netherby, 37
Nevet, 76
— forest of, 74
Nevvy, 76 .
Newelina, 131
Morvael, Morval, Morwal, 150 and . | Newman, Cardinal, 17
7 INDEX
Newton St. Petrock, 141 2.
Niackkem-Karg, 89
Nicholas [V., Pope, Taxation of,
12 n.; quoted, 143, 173, et passim
— 8t., 129,178 n.
Nighton, St., 148
Nigrescence, prevalence of, in Corn-
wall, xvi
Nikenor, 65 1.
Ninian, St., 31
Ninnina, Ninnine, 139 and ».
Niot, St., 129 1. See Neot
Niphon, 102
Nonna, Nonne, St., 128, 132, 138,
140 n., 162
Nonnestonys, 140 n.
Nonnita, 139
Norden, quoted, 66, 77, e¢ passim
Norsemen, the, xii, xxv
Norse mythology, xx
North Brabant, xi n.
Novante, xxiii
November Eve, xi, 44
Novita, 139
Norway, xxii, xxiii
Nuada, 21
Nun, Nunne, St., 139 n.
Nun’s, St., Well, 99
Nurses of Saints, 64
Nynnina, St., 139 .
O’Conor, Dr., 75
Odin, xxvii
Odinic mythology, 46
O’Donovan, John, quoted, 36, 46,
75, 76
Ogham inscriptions in Cornwall and
Devon, 106, 107
O’Grady, Standish H., quoted, 79,
131
Oliver, ‘ Monasticon Exon.,’ 12 n.;
quoted, 67, 70, 76, 78
O’Malleys, the, 45
O'Neill, H., 9
‘Ordines’ of Saints; ‘Ordo primus,’
116 ; ‘Ordo secundus,’ 115; ‘ Ordo
tertius,’ 60
‘Ordo sanctissimus,’ 56, 60; ‘ Ordo
sanctior,’ 60; ‘Ordo sanctus,’ 60
Ordulf, Duke of Cornwall, 74
Oriental element in Irish Chris-
tianity, 112
Orientalism, 116
Origen, 151; quoted, 30
Orkney Isles, 101
Ossianic poems, 30
Ossory, 79
205
Ostrigé, 80
Other-hali-Stone, the, 184
Oudoceus, 134
Ounter, St., 132, 139
Owen, Elias, quoted, 51
Paparn, St., 19 7., 128 n., 183, 138,
140, 141, 163, 168
Padstow, 53, 80, 141 »., 141-6
Pagan cemeteries, x
— superstitions, 82 et seqq.
Paganism in Western Europe, 44
Paikto, xxv
Paiktona, xxv
Palestine, 113
Palladius, 20 and n., 35, 42, 56 7.
Pallium, 83
Palm Sunday, 97
Paotr, 42 n.
Parc-an Chapel,
185
Parish feast-days, 188
Parsonstown, 78
Passe-varek, 89
Patéra, an official sacerdotal title,
40, 42, 43
— Attius, 40
Paterius, 42
Patern, Paternus, St., 128, »., 141,
163, 168
Patricius, 36. See Patrick
Patrick, St., xi, 22, 32, 33-49, 55,
56, 60, 62, 66, 68, 71, 76, 79, 84,
87, 95, 109, 114, 116, 123, 156,
167, 171”. ‘Tripartite Life of,’
8 n., 16.
Patrick’s, St., Bed, 47
— — Chair, 48
— — cultus, significance of, 49
— — Grave, 48
— — Knee, 47
— — Name, 35
— — Rag-Well, 103
— — ritual attached to the cultus
of, 43-9
— — Stone, 59
Patricks, several, 35
Patterns (festival days), 44
— interlaced, 56
Paul, St., 129
Paul de Léon, St., 168, 178
Paul, parish of, 168, 184
Pedigrees of Saints (Welsh), 125
Pedlar, E. H., 1, 14
Pelagius, 30, 31
Pelynt, 139
Pembrokeshire, 141 7., 157
181; sketch of,
204
Pencair, 63
Pendinas, 64
Penitential beds, 48
Penrith, 37
Pentyr, 99
Penwith, the hundred of, 63 7., 65
— West, custom in, 104, 105
Peperelle, Thomas, 66
Perran Arworthal, 77
— Uthnoe, 77
— Well, 99
— Zabuloe, 77, 78; Plate III, facing
106 ; 107, 109, 110, 122
Persia, 101, 114, 178 2. c
Persian Magus, 119
— priests, 39
Persians, 115
Peter, St., 129
— — and St. Paul, 77 .
Petherick, Little, 141 n.
Petherwyn, North and South, 141 n.
Petia, xxv
Petrie, George, 8; quoted 51, 107,
109, 117, 147, et passim
Petroc, Petrock, St., 15 ., 19 x.,
20 n., 140-5, 154
Petrockstow, 80, 141 7., 142
Pettaland Firth, xxv
Phillack, 63 »., 70, 107, 129 1x.,
177 2., 183, 184
Philleigh, 134
Phillimore, Mr., 134 n.
Philosophus, 56
Pheebitius of Beliocasses, 40, 41
Phol, xxvi
Physiognomical types in Cornwall,
xvi
Piala, St., 65, 68, 70
Pict, importance of definition of
the name, xxi
Pictanei, xxiv
Pictland, xxv
Picts, the, xxi, xxii, xxiv, xxvi,
xxvii, 104
Pieran, Pieranus, St., 77 1., 80, 81
Piksies. See Pisgies
Pilgrimages, 115 et seqg.; to Croagh
Patrick, 46
Pinoce, Pinock, St., 169 and n., 170
Piran, Piranus, St., 22-4, 71, 77, 78,
and n., 80, 81, 87, 89, 108, 123,154,
180
— — — Church of, 23, 112. See
Perran
— — — visit of, to Cornwall, 22-5
Pisgies, piskies, xiii
Pisgy-stones, 104
Pitha Elf, xxv
THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Pithea, xxv
Pitholm, xxv
Place House, 141
Plegmund, Archbishop, 176
Pliny, quoted, 39
Plumpton Wall, 37
Poictiers, Hilary of, 178 and n.
Polites, 75
Politus, 34
Port Hilly, 136
Porth Curnow Chapel, x ; sketch of,
110
Porthleven, 73
Porthya, 64 n.
Pratt, 178 . 1
Prefixes (Saint, Lan, Eglos, Altar),
164
Priam, 75
Priscilline heresy, 54
Probus, 177 ., 178 ». m
‘Prophecy of Merlin, The,’ xxvii 7.
Protasius, 177 n.
Proto, 178 2. 1
Prydein, xxii
Prydyn, xxii
Ptolemy, quoted, xxi, xxiii
Puritans, 97
Pyeran, St., 81
Pynocus, St., 169 .
Pyrrhus, 75
QuveEpock, Quethiock, 129, 146,177 7.
Quimper, 167
Quimperleé, 78
RaG-oFFERINGS, 101 et seqq.; formula
used in Ireland, 104
Raighe, meaning of, 36
Rashleigh, Jonathan, 66 2.
Ratass, 108; doorway at, Plate IV.,
facing 118
Redgate, 184, 185
Redman, Register of, quoted, 172 n.
Redruth, 65 and n., 74,130
Rees, Rey. Rice, 11; quoted xxvii,
16, 17, 85, 125, 126, et passim
—-—- W.J., 11
Reeves, Dr., 7, 8; quoted, 16 n., 60,
et passim
Registers, the Episcopal, at Exeter,
12; quoted, passim
Relic Mhuiré, 47
Renan, St., 74
Renfrew, xxiii
Rennes, 165, 168
Revier, 70 2.
INDEX
Revyer, 63
Rhetoricians of France, the, 43
Rhine, the, xix, xxii, 76
Rhys, Prof., quoted, xxi, xxiii, 39 n.
Rialton, 181
Ribchester, 38
Risaland, xxv
Risingham, 37
Robinson, Mr. J. L., quoted, 121 ».
Roche Rock and Hermitage, vi, 181
Rock-Worship, 89
Roger, Prior of Bodmin, 145
Roget de Belloguet, M. le Baron,
quoted, 42
Roma, 179 n. See Rome
Roman Britain, xxiv
— Calendar, quoted, 67 »., 126, 129,
162,177
— merchants, 50
—road and pottery in Cornwall,
53
— pantheon, the, 27
— provincial deities, 41
— provincials, xx
— Wall, 37
Romans, the, 60
Rome, 20, 40, 66, 80, 84, 92, 96, 97,
120, 174, 178 2.
— Bishop of, 178, n. k
Ronan, St., 74, 167
Roseland, St. Just in, 169
Roseworthy, 183
Rosminvet, 149
Round-barrow men, xviii
Ruan, St., 74, 168
— Lanyhorne, 74
Rudbeck, quoted, xxv
Ruith, 39
Rumon, St., 74, 130
Rumonsleigh, 74
Runnier, 70 n.
Ryvier, 63
SaBrina, 142
Sacerdotal families in Gaul, 40
— systems in Gaul, 43
Sacerdotalism in the West, 33
Sacrifices to ancestors, xii, xiii
Saighir, 58, 78, 79
Saint as a prefix, 138, 164
— title of, 86
Saints (in Cornwall.)
— — — Armorican, 165-79
— — — Cornish (native), 159-63
— — — Dumnonian, 127
— — — Irish, 62-81
— — — Welsh, 122-64
205
Saints, last of the, 98
—- pedigrees of, 125
— Saxon, 179
Sakoontala, 144, 145 ».
Sakya Muni, 113
Samhain, 58
Samian ware, 50
Samson, St., 15 2., 19 2., 133, 136-8,
140, 141, 153, 168, 169, 171,
178
Sancred, Sancredus, Sancreed, St.,
66, 131 and »., 184
Sancreed, Chapel at, 181
Sancrus, 131
Sancta Vola, 173
Sanctifying Stone, 89
Santa Cruz, x
San-Viock, 77
Sanwinas, 150
Sativola, St., 20 2., 173
Saviock, 77
Saxon Calendars, 141 2.
— Conquest, 122
— influence, 107
— invasion, 120, 161, 165
— language and letters, 185
— mythology, 29
— Saints, 179
Saxons, the, 28, 56, 124, 129, 150,
176, 177
Scandinavia,
art in, 184
Scawen, quoted, 32 and n., 101
Schonhovius, A., quoted, 90 2.
Schrader, quoted, xix
Schreiber, Dr. H., quoted, 97 n.
Scilly, Isles of, xiv, 54, 73, 86, 132,
1338, 136, 140, 181
Scone, 59
Scoti, 55, 179 n.
Scotland, xvi, xxiii, 101, 163, 178
n. a
— art in, 184
— sculptured stones of, 9 n.
Scots, 34, 56, 60
Scotus Hiberniensis (St. Rumon),
74
Seine, the, 165
Seirkieran, 79
Selena, 73
XXvi, xxvii, 76 7.;
| Selgova, xxiii
| Selyf, 162
Senach, St., 51
Senan, Sennen, St., 71, 73 and 1.,
83, 88, 164
Sens, 178 n.
Sepulchral chambers of the pagans
under Christian shrines, x
206
Sepulchral pottery, xix
Sergius, St., 151 ».
Serpent Idol, 123
Service-Books, destruction of, 13
Seven, the number, 118
-— Churches of Asia, 119
Severi, 106
Severn, Severne, the river; the
Severne Sea; xxiv, 80, 87, 123,
125, 142, 176
Severus, persecution under, 178 n. r
— Sulpicius, 16 ».; quoted, 54, 178
Seviock, 77 n.
Sezni, 167
Sherborn, 178 . m
Sheviock, 77, 129
Shinto (Sinto), Shintoists, xviii, 102
Siberia, Southern, 102
Sidhe, the, xi-xiii, xxvi, 103
Siduinus, 167
Sidwell, 173
Sigebert, quoted, 170
Siluan, Siluanus, St., 73
Silura, the Island of, 86 n.
Silures, the, xx
Silvanus, 73
Simeon Stylites, 115
Simon Magus, 39
— Ward, 132
Sininus, Sinninus, St., 63, 66, 73
Sinto, 103. See Shinto
Sithewelle, 173
Sithiu, 167 n.
Sithiuinus, 167
Sithny, 167
Sitte, the, xii, 103
Skager Rack, the, xxii
Skene, quoted, xxiii
Slemish, Mount, 47
Sletty, 76
Slevan, 73
Smirke, Sir Edward, quoted, 120 n.
Smith, Augustus, 133 n.
Smiths, spells of, 59
Sneezing, superstition about, 59
Solinus, quoted, 86 2.
Solomon, 162
Solway, the, xxiii
South Brent, 141 7., 149 n.
Southill, 140 ; ogham at, 107 x.
Somersetshire, xxi, 161
Sozomen, quoted, 56
Spain, xv
Spaniards, 115
Spanish ship, xvii
Spells, 59
Stafford’s Register, quoted, 135 x.,
173, et passim
THE AGE OF THE SAINTS
Stations, 102
Stephen, St., 67, 129
Stirling, xxiii
Stokes, Dr. Whitley, quoted, 8 2.,
33, 34, 36, 172; Miss Margaret,
8
Stone Age, the, vii
— Churches, 116
— Gilbert de, 13
— Worship, 58, 86, 97, 104
Stonehenge, the builders of, xviii
Stratherne, xxiii
Struel, superstitions at, 45, 48
Stuart, John, 9 n.
Stubbs, Dr. W., 6; quoted, passim
Stylites, Simeon, St., 115, 117
Sucat, a name of St. Patrick, 36
Sudebrent, 149 n.
Suez, 103
Sulpicius Severus, quoted, 54, 178
nN. O
Surius, quoted, 166 n.
Sutherlandshire, xxv
Sweden, xiv, xv, xxii, xxiii
Swedes, xxvi
Sybstel, 185
Sylina, Insula, 54
Syllys, 133 ».
Symon Ward, 132 7.
Symphorian, 128, 177, 178 n.
Syria, 116, 117
— Central, 9, 117
Syrian churches, 117
— masonry, 118
Taaruan, St., 153
Tacitus, quoted, xx, xxi
Talland, Tallanus, 130
Talmenith, 63
Tamalane, 154
Tamar, the River, 127
Tane, St., 153
Taouists, 115; Taouist Saints, 86
Tara, xxiv, xxvi. See Temhai
Tathai, 153
Tathan, St., 146, 153
Tavistock, 66, 74
Taxation of Pope Nicholas, 12 7.
Tay, the, xxiii
Teampull Padruig, 47
Teath, St., 134, 149
Tecla, St., 63, 67
Tedde, 149
Teila, St., 19 ., 131, 133-8, 140,
149, 150 »., 160, 171 n.
Telanissus, 115
Telian, St., 134
INDEX
Teliau, 134 7.
Temhair, xxiv, xxvi.
Tempul Benen, 117
— -na-Naam, 109
— -na-Trinoite, 109, 117
Tertullian, quoted, 27
Tetha, Tethe, St., 149 and x.
Teutonic mythology, 46
Tewder, 63
Tewynnoc, 170 n.
Thebaid, the, 61
Thecla, 67 n.
Theliaus, 133
Theodore, 63. See Theodoric
Theodoret, quoted, 115, 119
Theodoric, King of Cornwall, 65, 69
Thibet (Tibet), 61, 114
Thirty Tyrants, the, ix
Thomas, St., 127
— — Church of, Bodmin, 157
— — a Becket, 14, 129
Thor, xxvi
Tiberianus, 54
Tibet (Thibet), 61, 114
Tiermes, xxvi
Tighearnmas, xxvi
Tin trade, the, 50
Tinmuth, John of, quoted, 77, 78
Tinners, the, St. Piran patron of, 24
Tintagell, 77, 177 n., 184
Todd, Dr.,7, 8; quoted, 59, 79, 119,
124, et passim
Tonkin, Thomas, 3 and 1x. 14;
quoted, 24, 131, et passim
Tonsura, tonsure, 83
— — of the British Church, 84
— — — — Buddhists, 83
— — — — Druids, 84, 85
— — — — Greeks, 83
— — — — Irish monks, 83 n.
— — — — Romans, 83
— —— — Persian Magi, 84 n.
Toorybrenell, Inishmurray, Plate L,
facing 50
Toost, St., 130 ., 132
Torrict, 112
Tours, 170, 174
— Council of, 104
— Frankish metropolitan of, 175
— Gregory of, 170
— Martin of, 166, 171
Towednack, 170
Trahaun-a-Chorreas,
Plate I., facing 50
Tra-Kieran, 24
Tralee, 109
Transcaucasia, 114
Tree, miraculous, 97
See Tara
Inishmurray,
207
Tregony, 139, 183
Tregoweth, Margaret, 129 n.
Tréguier, 166
Tre-men-heverne, 96
Treneglos, 177 n.
Trenewith, 63
Trenwith, 63 n.
Tresco, 132 n.
Trevalga, 141 7.
Trevellick, 132 n.
Trevena, 184
Treverven, 107 n.
Trewardreva, 107
Tribunt, 106
Trinity College, Dublin, 33
‘Tripartite Life of St. Patrick,’ 167.,
33
Troutbeck, 73
Troy, 75
Tuatha-De-Danann, xiii, 21, 51
Tudius, Tudy, St., 130, 155
Tunica, 83
Turas, the, xiii, 44.
Dessil
Turkey, 101
Twynnock, St., 170 ».
Tydié, 155
Tyhydy, 172 n.
Tyrrhene Sea, the, 35
See Desiul,
Ucut Mama, 117
Uda, St., 130,155
Ulcagni fili Severt, 106
Ulster, 63
Ultonia, 63
Ulval, 173
Uma, 39
Uni, St., 63-6, 70. See Uny
— Gwendron, 66, 137
Uny, St., 66. See Uni and Ewny
— Chapel, 181
Urbanus, 133 n.
Urns, pagan, under Christian shrines,
x
Ussher, James, 11; quoted, 60, 62,
68, 80, ef passum
Ust, St., 131 n.
Usteg, St., 131 7.
Ustick, 131 n.
Uuinochus Britto, 170
Uvelus, 130
VAs, 171
Vettir, xiii
Valicella, Oratory of St. Maria de,
42 n.
208
Vannes, 168
Vecturiones, xxi
Veep, St., 130, 146, 151
Vennes, the Cathedral of, 69
Vennoe, St., 169
Vepa, 131, 151 n.
Vepe, St., 128 n.
Vepus, St., 131, 151 n.
Verelius, quoted, xxv
Veryan, 128, 160, 177 n.
Victor, the Angel, 46
— de Campbon, 172 n.
Vigfusson, quoted, xiii
Viricati, 139 n.
Vistula, the, xxii
Vitah, 182
Vola, Sancta, 173
Volga, the Middle, xix
Vorburg, xxiv
Vorch, St., 137 2.
Vougay, St., 172 2., 177
Vuy, 66
Vylloc, St., 157 n.
WavEBRIDGE, 106
Wales, 55 et passim; North Wales,
51. See West Wales
Wallenses, 143
Wallia, regulus, 147
Warbstow, 179 n.
Ward, Simon, 132
Warna, St., 73
Warne’s, St., Bay,, 73
Warton, quoted, 31
Water, superstition associating it
with death and burial, 44
Waterford, 91, 95
Well-Worship, 44, 58, 86, 97, 104
Welsh period, 186
— Saints in Cornwall,
seqq.
-— — names of, classified, 126
— — of the race of Cunedda’s sons,
Xxvili
Welvele, 173
Wendover, Roger of, quoted, 142
Wendron, 66, 107. See Gwendron
Wenedoc, Wenedock, St., 152, 153
Wenep, Weneppa, 149, 151 n.
122 et
THE AGE OF
THE SAINTS
Wener Lake, xv
Wenheder, 151, 153
Wenn, Wenna, St., 97, 150
Werburgha, 197 x.
Wesent, 150
Weser, the, xxvi
Wesley, John, 29
West Wales, 55, 124, 125
— Weeallas, the, 124
Whitaker, quoted, 14, 71, 78
White women, legends about, 90
Wight, xiii
Wiltshire, xxvi
Windle, MSS., quoted, 102, 104
Wingela, 80
Winnocus, St., 169 n. See Winoc
Winnow, St., 128, 148, 149, 169, 171
Winoec, Winoch, St., 165, 167 1.,
169, 170
Winothus, 169 n.
Winwaloc, St., 167
Winwaloéi, St., 166, 167, 171 n.
Wiseman, Cardinal, 18
Wolvedon, 173
Wolvele, 128 ., 150, 173
Women, spells of, 59
Worcester, William of, 12; quoted,
63, 64, 66, 67, 70, 133, et passim
Worthyvale, 183
Wymerus, 63 n.
Wymp, 151
Wynner, Wynnerus, St., 63, 64 7.,
68
Wynnoe, St., 61, 170 ».
Yproc, St., 157
Ye, 137
Ye and Derwe, Sts., 65
Yellow plague, the, 133
Yesso, xvii
Yezeedees, 101
Yoest, St., 131 7.
Yse, 151
Yth, 68, 128 ».
Yuchts, xxii
ZANZIDGIE, 135
Zennor, 51
Zeuss, quoted, 38
PRINTED BY
SPOTTIBWOONE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE
LONDON
Rigi atess
3
es
co
sees