Chapter V: Part 5

As the result of the above examination it will be observed that of the twenty-six religious houses about one-half afford evidence of Celtic origin. In some cases the evidence is convincing; in some it is of itself insufficient to convince. Taken as a whole, it adds considerably to the weight of the argument which is here advanced, namely, that in Cornwall the Celtic form of Christianity had not wholly disappeared at the time of the Norman Conquest. Of its secure and comprehensive hold upon the religious life of the whole county at an earlier period there is abundant proof in the names of the parishes. Excluding those which have been considered, fifteen bear the prefix _Lan_, the mark of monastic settlement. Others, like St. Erth (Lanudno), St. Madron (Landithy), St. Just-in-Penwith (Lafrowda), Kea (Landegy), Gulval (Lanisley), Lelant (Lananta), Lezant (Lansant), retained the prefix for a time, in an _alias_, which in some cases suggests an earlier dedication; or, as in the case of Lanherne, Langunnet, Lanyhorne and Lanhadron still retain it in the name of the manor to which the advowson of the church was appendant; while a very large number bear, without prefix or affix, the names of Celtic saints, many of them unknown to the outside world. From one end of the county to the other the impress of Celtic Christianity can be clearly traced. It is monastic in character. But it is not a monasticism which has intruded within the confines of parishes already formed, but a monasticism which has occupied the whole territory from the very first. This it is which, in the tenth and eleventh centuries, either finds itself gradually superseded by the newer parochialism, or which ensures, in some sort, its survival in collegiate bodies or in recognised monastic orders by submitting to new conditions and new ideas.

-----

Footnote 86:

Inspeximi is a convenient plural of the word _inspeximus_ (we have
inspected). Royal grants of liberties and privileges are frequently
based upon earlier grants which the Royal grantor declares he has
_inspected_. The charters of these earlier grants in many instances no
longer exist.

Footnote 87:

_Jour. Arch. Assocn._, XXXIX, 282.

Footnote 88:

Pat. Roll, 18 Edw. III, 1345.

Footnote 89:

Another honour is mentioned in the same record, viz. that of St.
Cheus, which awaits identification. The Exeter book reads correctly
that Tremar uustel is _de honore S. Chei_, whereas the Exchequer
version has belongs _ad honore S. Chei_. This led General James to
translate the words “belongs to the honours of Chei”: _honore_ is
probably an abbreviation for _honorem_ and the full stop after the _S_
a contraction of _Sancti_.

Footnote 90:

_Monasticon_, p. 72.

Footnote 91:

Loth, _Les Noms des Saints bretons_, p. 19.

Footnote 92:

Gasquet, _English Monastic Life_, p. 214.

Footnote 93:

Mr. Thurstan C. Peter has written an interesting and reliable account
of _Glasney Collegiate Church_ (Camborne, 1903).

Footnote 94:

_Monasticon_, p. 135.

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IX

CORNISH HERMITS

The subject of English hermits and anchorites has been so exhaustively dealt with by Miss Rotha M. Clay[95] that a writer may well hesitate before he ventures to enter upon a small portion of the ground which she has covered. Miss Clay has performed her task with great judgment, learning and literary skill and with consummate diligence. So conscientiously and so impartially has she performed her task that the reader will seek in vain to discover whether she is in full sympathy with the hermit’s vocation or the reverse. Her book will be read with pleasure and with profit by all.

The present writer wishes to acknowledge his obligations to Miss Clay, whose researches have both confirmed and supplemented conclusions already formed. The titles of the several chapters of her book are illuminating and suggestive, and the contents abundantly justify the distinction she has made between one type and another. We find ourselves introduced in succession to hermits of island and fen, forest and hillside, cave, lighthouse, highway and bridge, town, church and cloister.

Unless the student keeps in mind the fact that the eremitical impulse fulfilled itself in varied activities he will fail to understand its true nature and purpose. Here was no lawless spirit, disdaining the restraints of an ordered life, but “the fiery glow that whirls the spirit from itself away” to make it the ready instrument in God’s hands for works of mercy, charity, counsel and service while seeking by prayer, meditation, vigil and fasting to attain unto perfection.

Again, while it is allowable to assume that the hermit who dwelt apart and in solitude was the precursor of the conventual body—the word monk implies as much—it nevertheless seems certain that, at the time when he first emerges into the clear light of Celtic history he is not, as popular fancy has imagined, a distraught enthusiast seeking refuge and rest from an evil and adulterous generation, but a tried soldier who has learnt in the convent by precept and by practice the art of war, and who goes forth in all the panoply of celestial might to fight singly and alone the enemies of his soul and to bring deliverance to others. No sooner has he achieved his own salvation than he sets about the salvation of his fellow-men. He has little in common with the self-regarding Christian of the _Pilgrim’s Progress_. He is eager to be of use. He becomes a minister to the dwellers amid untrodden ways and in remote corners, it may be as a waywarden, a bridge repairer, or a light keeper, but in any case as the guide, the counsellor, the friend of all. Inevitably his sphere of influence widens out. Soon he has become equally necessary to the pilgrim, the traveller and to those who are round about him. As time goes on his cell and the little sanctuary where he and they have met for worship become hallowed by association, and, when he dies, a successor must be sought to carry on the tradition. The hermitage thus remains as a memorial of its founder long after his name has been forgotten.

Or, it may be, the hermit is joined by others like-minded and founds a religious community, a _lan_ whose growth and permanence are promoted by the industry and self-denial of its members. This would seem to have been the normal course of events in Cornwall. In this case the individual founder is often content to leave his work to be carried on by others during his lifetime. He may be a bishop, priest, deacon or layman who determines to undergo the hardships of the wilderness for a season, but who has no intention of devoting his whole life to solitude. Diversities of gifts under the spell of a common impulse give rise to diversities of ministration and of operation.

Of the hermits of the Celtic period in Cornwall we have very little historical evidence. Presumptive evidence we have which, if it told against the traditional interpretation of early Christianity, would doubtless be held to possess great value. For example, we have, in the lives of the saints, references to ecclesiastical types and economic conditions which had been obsolete for centuries when some of those lives are held to have assumed their present literary form.

We have holy wells bearing the names of saints which are not the names of the patron saints of the parishes in which the wells are situated. We have legends which, for the purpose of comparative mythology, are highly esteemed. There are, for example, holy wells at St. Ingunger, Chapel Uny (St. Uny’s) and Jetwells, but these are not the patrons of the parishes, though they are all three well-known Celtic saints. On the other hand, there are wells bearing the names of St. Levan, St. Madron, St. Clether, St. Keyne and St. Just (Venton—east) situated in the parishes which do bear their names. If the ancient Cornish churches derived their names from their founders or founders’ kin it seems probable that the holy wells acquired their names from association with the saints whose names they bear.

There would be the same inducement for a hermit to fix his abode near a spring of water as there is for an Australian squatter to choose a similar spot for the headquarters of his sheep or cattle station. So late as A.D. 1086, when Domesday Book was compiled, the county of Cornwall was very sparsely populated. In the place-names may be recognised traces of a fauna long extinct but nevertheless extant in Celtic times.[96] It is necessary to bear in mind the transformation of the county, which during the last thirteen centuries has resulted from increased settlement and the more extensive cultivation of land, in order to be in a position to estimate the value of the evidence supplied by the hagiographer.

Early in the sixth century St. Petrock succeeded St. Guron at Bodmin; such is the tradition. Leland (circa 1540) thus records the event,[97] _Bosmana, id est, mansio monachorum in valle, ubi St. Guronus solitarie degens in parvo tugurio, quod reliquen(s) tradidit St. Petroco_. Guron was doubtless a hermit. Petrock enlarged the hermitage, which was situated in the valley where the town now stands and near the well which still bears the hermit’s name, so as to make it capable of sheltering himself and three brethren. Guron is probably the same as Goran, the name-saint of the parish in the ancient deanery of Powder. Traces of the name are to be found in Brittany.[98]

William of Worcester (1478) introduces us to three Cornish hermits, Vylloc or Willow, Mybbard and Mancus. They were companions.

The first is described as a hermit and martyr born in Ireland and beheaded by Melyn’s kinsfolk (_Melyn ys kynrede_) near the place (in Lanteglos-by-Fowey) where Walter, bishop of Norwich, was born.

From this place to the bridge of St. Willow, a distance of half a mile, he carried his (head) to a spot where the said church was built in his honour.[99] Mybbard, otherwise Calrogus, is stated to have been a hermit, the son of a King of Ireland, and his body is said to rest within the shrine (_scrinio_) of Cardynham Church. Mancus, their companion and a hermit, is said, on the authority of Robert Bracey, to lie in the church of Lanreath, within two miles of Fowey, and, on the authority of the canons of Launceston, in the parish of Lanteglos presumably at Bodinnick. All three are said to be commemorated on the same day, viz. the Thursday next before Whitsunday. William of Worcester’s account of the three hermits is prefaced by the sentence “there were three brothers under the name of St. Genesius and each carried his head, one of them archbishop of Lismore.” Is it possible that St. Gennys may be a corruption of a Latinised Greek word συγγενεις (kinsmen)? It is curious, in any case, that the feast of Cardynham and St. Gennys should be held on Whitsunday, that of Lanteglos having been abandoned and that of Lanreath, whose patron is now given as Marnarch, being kept on the third of August. Anciently there was a chapel at Bodinnick bearing the name of St. John the Baptist. St. Willow is regarded as the patron of Lanteglos and Mybbard as the patron of Cardynham. When all due allowance has been made for accretions and errors in transmission it seems impossible to doubt that three Irish hermits were martyred at or near Lanteglos and commemorated by churches built in their honour.

St. Neot represents a prevalent type of religious which, from the first days of British Christianity until the eleventh century, combined the habits and aspirations of the hermit with the practical usefulness of the missionary. Neot was born in the earlier years of the ninth century of parents who were nearly related in blood to the West-Saxon Kings. Forsaking a military career for which he had been intended, he entered the monastery of Glastonbury, where he received Holy Orders and became eminent for piety, learning, wisdom and counsel. The fear of popular applause drove him forth into the wilderness. He fixed his abode in the Cornish parish which now bears his name, near to a hamlet then known as Hamstoke and therefore apparently already a Saxon settlement. Here he lived seven years. At the end of that time he visited Rome and was advised by the Holy Father to renounce his habit of solitary devotion to return home and scatter the word of God among the people of Cornwall.

He came back to Hamstoke and founded there the college of priests of which mention is made in Domesday Book. At Hamstoke he was visited more than once by his kinsman Alfred the Great, who hunted in the neighbourhood and who is said to have been healed at the shrine of St. Guerir of a malady which had afflicted him from boyhood.

St. Neot’s hermitage was near the spring which is about half a mile west of the church and is known as St. Neot’s well. In his day there appear to have been two pools, one of them with an unique unfailing supply of three fishes, of which one only was to be caught in a day, and the other, a pool in which the saint was wont to stand daily while repeating the Psalter. Many stories are told of the saint’s sojourn by the well. The fox which stole his shoe, the rescue of the doe from the hounds, the theft of his working bullocks and the employment of stags for the ploughing of his land are sufficiently well known.

By the advice of St. Neot King Alfred is said to have restored the English school at Rome. The saint continued to be abbot of his own foundation until his death, which took place on the 31st of July, 877. He was buried in the church which he had built on the site of the chapel of St. Guerir. About a century later his bones were fraudulently removed to the monastery of Eynesbury in Huntingdonshire.

There are several points of interest. There does not appear to have been any marked difference between St. Neot’s eremitical career and that of others of Cornish origin. This may be owing to the late composition of the lives of many of the saints. The substitution of St. Neot for St. Guerir as the name-saint of the church has many precedents and would call for no remark here did it not afford a good example of what was also in Cornwall a fairly general practice, of which the proofs are not abundant—that of calling churches after the names of their founders.[100]

At this point it is convenient to call attention to the story of _Tristan and Iseult_, which has been shown to be of Cornish origin and which assumed literary form probably towards the end of the eleventh century. Most of the places mentioned in the story are found in Cornwall and, although the actors in the drama are presumed to have lived some five centuries before their deeds were committed to writing, there are nevertheless inferences to be derived from the record of them which have a direct bearing upon our subject even if we suppose the setting of the story to have been, at the time, comparatively modern. The following episode is an example. During the sojourn of Tristan and Iseult in the forest of Morrois (Moreske), which then extended from the Fal to the Helford river, they meet with a hermit, Ogrin by name, who does not hesitate to give them some much-needed advice. He calls them to repentance and then listens patiently to Tristan’s excuses. It is not suggested that in admonishing them he is exceeding his duty. He is described as a hermit with a hermitage in the forest, a personage quite distinct from the parish priest, whose sphere of influence had already become a recognised geographical unit, as is shown by the following passage:

En Cornoualle n’a parroise
Ou la novele n’en angoise
Que, qui porroit Tristan trover
Qu’il en feïst le cri lever.

Ogrin, as a man of sense, advises the Queen to return home, and himself undertakes the delicate task of reconciling the lovers to King Mark.

Throughout the narrative he is represented as a man of God. It does not seem to have occurred to the romancer that there is something slightly incongruous in selecting a hermit for a shopping expedition to the market of St. Michael’s Mount, where, for the fair Iseult:

Assés achate ver et gris
Dras de soie et de porpre bis,
Escarlates et blanc chainsil,
Asez plus blanc que flor de lil,
Et palefroi souef amblant
Bien atorné d’or flanboiant.

The hermit, as a man of affairs, may have been familiar to those for whose ears the romance was intended. It is difficult, otherwise, to assign a reason why the writer exaggerated his character beyond the bounds of recognition. The position which the hermit occupied in the popular estimation, august as it undoubtedly was, was not more exalted than that which was voluntarily conceded to him by those who were highly placed. To this fact must doubtless be attributed the more or less successful attempts to perpetuate the office when its occupant was removed by death. It is therefore possible that in the hermit of Colemanshegg, mentioned in a Roll of 1258, we have a reference to one of Ogrin’s successors.[101] Of this latter personage we know nothing save that Richard hermit of Colemanshegg received 50s. yearly to find a chaplain to celebrate divine service for the soul of Catherine the King’s daughter.

But for this mention of Richard of Colemanshegg the earliest notice of a Cornish hermit after the Norman Conquest would have been that contained in the Assize Roll of the 30th year of Edward I (1301-1302) in which it is recorded that _Thomas de Penmargh noctanter intravit domum Andreae Paugan heremitae infra capellam Divi Justi et eum occidit. Johannes filius Andreae heremitae primus invenitor_. The entry is under the heading of the hundred of Penwith. Penmargh is doubtless Penmarth in Wendron. Pagan, of which Paugan may be a variant, is not uncommon as a personal name in early records. We are not told why Thomas of Penmargh killed Andrew, or how long it was before John discovered the dead body of his father, but it looks as if Andrew had been seen alive the day before his death and found dead by his son the day after. Where was the hermitage? It is described as below the chapel of St. Just, but St. Just was not a chapel (_capella_). It was a church (_ecclesia_), and the terms are never used indiscriminately. If it be allowable to render the passage “below a chapel of St. Just,” that is, below a chapel in the parish of St. Just, the record is very significant.

For one of the most interesting spots in that parish is Chapel Carn Brea, upon the summit of which stood until 1816 a chapel of which a sketch was made by Dr. Borlase, who described it as being approached from the south side by a large flight of steps and as being twenty feet in height, and the roof arched with stone well wrought. Hals tells us it was about ten feet wide and fourteen feet long, with a window in the east end. Both writers speak of an immense heap of stones lying around it, suggesting a large vault or hermitage underneath. The chapel was pulled down in 1816 to build a barn elsewhere. When, in 1879, Mr. W. C. Borlase made an examination of the confused mass of stones which remained, and still remain, he failed to discover any trace of a hermit’s cell, and concluded that the greater portion of the debris had done service as a covering for the prehistoric chambered grave which was found at a lower level. While it is not unlikely that the tumulus suggested, at a very early period, the site for the chapel to the first Christian solitary who found his way to that remote spot, the amount of stone there at the present time is too great to warrant the conclusion, unless the tumulus was of a type and size which has no rival in the county.

Some building doubtless existed besides the chapel, the size of which was obviously too small for public worship.

The most striking feature of Chapel Carn Brea is the commanding view which it affords not only of the Channel but of the whole of Penwith and of a large portion of the Lizard. No better spot could be chosen for a beacon.

Within a couple of hundred yards is the ancient mule track from Marazion to the Land’s End. After reading Miss Clay’s chapter on hermits as light-keepers, it seems impossible to doubt that the hermit of Chapel Carn Brea was one of those who in the day of small things performed that function, and whose simple signal was to the seafarer no less than to the traveller over the lonely moor a bright beacon of God. Andrew Paugan was probably only one of a long line of hermits who dwelt on the hill. A curious extract is found in Dr. Borlase’s collections which, as one of the latest specimens of Cornish literature, has a value all its own and, as the witness of a tradition extant in the latter half of the seventeenth century, is useful for the present purpose. I am indebted to Mr. Henry Jenner for a transcript and translation of it.

“The Accusation of the Hermit (who liv’d in Chapel Karn Bray in
Buryan) address’d to ye Duchess.

Rag an Arlothus woolaes Kernow
Dreth ’guz kibmias beniggas.

Why ra cavas dre eu an gwas Harry ma Poddrack broas.

Kensa, wit a hagar-awal iggeva gweel do derevoll war ren ny Keniffer
termen dre ra ny moas durt Pedden an woolaes do Sillan. Nessa, wit
an skavoll Crack-an-codna iggava setha war en cres a’n awles ewhall
(cries tutton Harry an Lader) heb drog veeth. Tregga, wit an gurroll
iggeva gwell gen askern skooth Davas, etc.”

To the Countess of the Dominion of Cornwall.

By your sacred leave.

You shall find by him that this fellow Harry is a great witch.

First, from the stormy weather he does work to raise upon us every
time that we do go from the end of the Land to Silly. Second, from
the break-neck stool which he can (or does) sit upon in the middle
of the high cliff (call’d The Chair of Harry the Thief), without any
hurt. Thirdly, from a ship he does make with the bone of a shoulder
of mutton.

Mr. Jenner is inclined to think that the “seat of Harry the thief” (Tutton Harry an Lader) refers to a piece of cliff at Tol Pedn Penwith called “Chair Ladder.” The whole passage as it stands detached from the context (which has been lost) is little more than so much gibberish. Possibly it may have been so intended, for the romance, of which it is a fragment, was written by Mr. Boson for his children. But this consideration, assuming it to be well founded, would not rob the allusions of their evidential value. Quite the contrary. Every romance requires some element of fact or vraisemblance to recommend it to the popular imagination. Not more than half a mile from Chapel Carn Brea, at the foot of the hill, is Crows-an-Wra, the Witch’s Cross, which may have suggested the character personified by Harry the Wizard of the break-neck stool. Some vague memories of the hermit who served the little chapel, tended the beacon and directed the travellers across the desolate moor doubtless still survived. Andrew Paugan was only one of the occupants of the cell, one who like many others in various parts of England spent his life in solitude, enduring privation and hardship and cultivating piety by prayer, meditation and active philanthropy. He was probably a widower when he gave himself to the career which Thomas of Penmargh, in the stillness of night, for some unknown reason brought to an untimely end.

The next mention of Cornish hermits is found in the _Inquisitio post-mortem_ of Edmund, Earl of Cornwall.[102] Following the inventory of honours, lands and services held by him at the time of his death there is a list of the charges upon his estates and among them the entry: “alms to St. Philip of Restormel, hermit, and St. Robert of Penlyn, hermit.” The earldom and its possessions reverted to the King on Earl Edmund’s death, and we are therefore not surprised to find an entry in the Close Roll of the following year, 1301, which reads as follows: “To the sheriff of Cornwall. Order to deliver to brother Robert of Penlyn, hermit, the island surrounded (_inclusam_) by the water of Fawe with a rent of 56s. 2d. from certain tenants of the manor of Penkneth, to be held by him for life as he held them before the death of Edmund, Earl of Cornwall, by reason of whose death the sheriff took them into the King’s hands; on the same terms as the earl granted them, together with the houses built on the island, to Robert by his charter which the King has inspected.”[103]

All attempts to identify the island have hitherto failed. The manors of Penlyn or Pelyn and Penkneth or Pennight are in the parish of Lanlivery, of which the river Fowey is, roughly speaking, the eastern boundary, but no island is now to be discovered in its course. The site of the hermitage of Restormel is also uncertain. It may have been that of the chapel of the Holy Trinity in the park, sometimes called the King’s free chapel, to which frequent reference is made in the Rolls, and from which, according to an inventory made in 1338, a bell weighing 100 lbs. had been removed to the chapel within the castle walls of Restormel. There is nothing to lead us to suppose that St. Philip and St. Robert had successors. It is not improbable that royal chaplains were substituted for them.

In 1339 the Patent Roll records the King’s protection granted to Roger Godman, hermit of the chapel of St. Mary by Liskeard (Liskerith), collecting about the realm the alms whereon he depends for subsistence.[104] It is probable that the chapel of St. Mary was the same as the King’s free chapel of St. Mary in the park of Liskeard to which Edward II appointed Roger de Aqua his chaplain in 1316.[105] It must be distinguished from that of the Hospital of St. Mary Magdalen. The former appears to have become a chantry, for, in 1378, a royal grant was made to Richard Lagge, chaplain, that he might celebrate service in it, and in the same year the bishop issued a licence to him in which it is stated that he is to celebrate for the welfare of the King.[106] The chantry was suppressed by Edward VI, and the “Chapel of our Laydye” granted to Thomas Pomray in 1549.[107] It is interesting to compare the fortunes of this chapel with that of the Holy Trinity in the park of Restormel. Both of them appear to have been served originally by hermits, to have been converted into royal chapels and to have shared the same fate.

A little more than half a century later, in 1403, the following entry occurs in Bishop Stafford’s register: “One Cecilia Moys, desiring to lead the contemplative life of an anchorite[108] in a certain house in the cemetery of Marhamchurch, the bishop on the 4th of May, 1403, commissioned Philip, abbot of Hartland, and Walter Dollebeare, vicar of Southill, to place her there under proper protection, assigning her till Christmas as a time of probation.”

Churchyards were regarded as places specially suitable for the dwellings of anchorites as being dead to the world. It was, moreover, an obvious advantage to the parish priest that they should be near the church for the purpose of Communion. A second entry in the same bishop’s register probably refers to the same anchorite, though the name is given as that of Lucy Moys, anchorite of Marhamchurch.

She receives on the 10th of October, 1405, a licence to choose her confessor. Another entry in the same register records a bequest of 40s. by Richard Tyttesburry, canon of Exeter, to the anchorite of Marhamchurch. His will was made on the 24th of February, 1405, and proved on the 7th of June, 1409.[109]

At St. Teath there was a hermit, name unknown, who in 1408, under the will of Sir William Bonevylle, received 20s. to pray for the soul of the testator: “al heremyte de Stetth pour prier pour moy.” In the Lambeth manuscript the bequest is recorded “a lermytage de Stath,” suggesting, but by no means proving, a permanent hermitage in the parish.[110]

Seven years later, in 1415: “Margaret an anchorite dwelling near Bodmin, having asked permission to migrate to the monastery of St. Bridget by Schene and to join the order settled there, is licensed by the bishop accordingly.” To her or to her predecessor Richard Tyttesburry, whose name has been already mentioned, bequeathed in 1405 the sum of 40s.[111]

It has been generally supposed that Roche Rock, a natural and rugged monolith some 300 feet in height, situated in the parish which bears its name, was formerly the seat of a hermitage, and there is much to favour the supposition. Norden (1584) describes it as “a verie high, steepe and craggie rock, upon the top whereof is placed a cell or hermitage, the walls whereof are partly wroughte, and that with great labour out of the obdurate rock.” In the illustration, which he gives, the building is complete with roof, windows and door. A detailed account is supplied by Davies Gilbert (1838), from which it appears that in his day the roof and upper chamber (as shown in Norden’s plate) had already disappeared, the beam holes of the chamber being the only evidence that such a chamber had existed. The dimensions of what is supposed to have been the chapel are given by him: the length 20 feet, the breadth 12 feet and the height 10 feet.

There are apparently only two purposes for which a building, at such an elevation and in so desolate and remote a spot, could serve—that of a beacon house or of a hermitage. The former is the less probable explanation because of more suitable sites in the neighbourhood. The lack of documentary evidence in support of the latter hypothesis is not surprising and will carry little weight with those who reflect that it is only, as it were, by accident that we have any evidence at all respecting the other hermitages in the county. Comparing the cell on Roche Rock with other similar cells in various parts of England it may be inferred that the building was at one and the same time used by its occupants for both purposes.

The foregoing survey discloses no such secrets as might have been expected. It leaves the story of Cornwall’s conversion where we found it. The key of the position remains undiscovered—the key wherewith to open and unroll the unwritten record of the struggles of those first fateful days when the Christian faith gained a foothold in the land. We are thrown back upon the witness of an age so late as to render the witness of doubtful value. If we refer to it, it is with diffidence, having little or no hope that, as evidence, it will receive the consideration it deserves. Yet in spite of all that may be urged against any particular legend, we must not forget that hagiographer and monk, chronicler and poet, cross and cell, holy well and church, all proclaim the same story and tell the same tale when they represent the heralds of the good tidings as wandering in deserts and in mountains and in dens and caves of the earth. The account of St. Sampson’s visit and the legend of St. Petrock are but types of the rest.

It would doubtless help towards the solution of the problem if something more definite could be known of the quarter whence the earliest of those heralds came. Was it from Gaul, from Lerins, from the East or from Rome? We know that St. Hilary of Poitiers, in the middle of the fourth century, dedicated his treatise _De Synodis_ to the bishops of the British provinces, that St. German of Auxerre accompanied by St. Lupus of Troyes came over to Britain in 429 to assist in extirpating the Pelagian heresy. Does this point to some closer and deeper connection than that of mere propinquity between the Churches of Gaul and of Britain?

The intercourse between Rome and Britain, the Roman soldiers and merchants who during the occupation were brought into daily contact with the Britons could not fail to effect some change in the religious attitude of the latter. It is not, however, this slow, silent, indirect influence which excites our interest. It is rather of that direct attack upon paganism which so far succeeded as to impress a definite character and to make it possible to speak of Celtic Christianity as a distinct type that we wish to hear.

We allow that the same truths when accepted by different races produce different effects and find expression in different ways. An orthodox Russian Churchman and an English Churchman profess the same creeds, accept the same Scriptures, and are in all essentials of one heart and of one soul; yet it will be some time before the latter can be got to feel at home in the public worship of the former. Race, temperament and tradition reveal themselves in external modes of worship. This is true, but it is not sufficient to account for the rôle of isolation assumed by the British Church and by the daughter Church of Brittany. Some external influence appears to have been at work at a very early period, monastic in character, which was unfavourable to the cultivation of close relations with the rest of Western Christianity. It could hardly have been either of Roman or of Gaulish origin. Had it been Roman it would have constituted a bond of union instead of being, as it was, a barrier against which Augustine could not prevail; had it been Gaulish it would probably have been attempered by intercourse with the source of its inspiration. Possibly it came from the Mediterranean or from the East by way of Marseilles.

-----

Footnote 95:

_Hermits and Anchorites of England_, Methuen & Co.

Footnote 96:

Nancherrow and Carnyorth, two neighbouring hamlets in St.
Just-in-Penwith, denote respectively the _valley of the stag_ and _the
hill of the roebuck_.

Footnote 97:

Leland, _Collectanea_, i, 75.

Footnote 98:

Loth, _Les Noms des Saints bretons_, p. 48.

Footnote 99:

_Parochial History of Cornwall_, Supplement, pp. 102, 110.

Footnote 100:

The name of Neot’s predecessor, like that of Veronica, may have been
suggested to Asser by the reputed miracle; but, if so, it would not
invalidate the truth of the narrative so far as it relates to the
successive founders of the church.

Footnote 101:

Colemanshegg is probably Kelmonseg (1308)=Kilmonseg (1332)=Kilmonsek
(1427)=Kyllymansak (1442)=Calamansack (hodie), in Constantine parish,
which in the eleventh century was embraced in the forest of Morrois.

Footnote 102:

Inq. p.m., 28 Edw. I, 44 (4).

Footnote 103:

_Calendar of Close Rolls_, 20 May, 1301, p. 488.

Footnote 104:

Pat. R., 13 Edw. III, 1339.

Footnote 105:

_Ibid._, 9 Edw. II, 1316.

Footnote 106:

_Ibid._, 1 Rich. II, 1378, and _Reg. Brantyngham_, p. 387.

Footnote 107:

Pat. R., 3 Edw. VI, 1549.

Footnote 108:

Hermit (Gr. Eremites, L. Heremita), one who lives in the desert;
Anchorite (Gr. Anachoretes, L. Anchorita), one withdrawn from the
world; Monk (Gr. Monachos, L. Monachus), one who dwells alone. The
difference between a hermit and an anchorite was that the former was
free to move from place to place, the latter was confined. The monk
who had at first been a solitary soon became a member of an ordered
and celibate community.

It is curious to notice that the impulse which created the hermit
produced the monastery, and that, at a later date, the monastery
incidentally produced the hermit.

Footnote 109:

_Register Stafford_, pp. 25, 251, 294.

Footnote 110:

_Ibid._, p. 391.

Footnote 111:

_Ibid._, pp. 25, 294.

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X

ST. MICHAEL’S MOUNT

It is of little consequence to consider when and by whom the suggestion was first put forward, but it was one which captivated all who were anxious to endow their native county with a unique distinction. The suggestion was that St. Michael’s Mount was identical with the island of Ictis, mentioned by Diodorus Siculus about the beginning of the first century before the Christian era.

Assuming the truth of this hypothesis, for which, indeed, many cogent arguments could be urged, historical writers were enabled to make a better start in the case of Cornwall than in the case of any other English county.

It is therefore somewhat disquieting to find a distinguished geologist staking a great reputation upon a counter-theory which, though promulged so recently as the year 1905, has at the present moment the support of the majority of those who are competent to form a judgment of its scientific value. Mr. Clement Reid, F.R.S., basing his arguments upon the evidence of geology and physical geography, has been able to show[112] that, nineteen hundred years ago, the Isle of Wight was, at high water, an island and, at low water, a peninsula answering exactly to the description of the island of Ictis given by Diodorus, whereas St. Michael’s Mount was at that time “an isolated rock rising out of a swampy wood.” On the other hand, however, it is only fair to say that Prof. Oman, who has doubtless examined and weighed, with his accustomed acumen, Mr. Reid’s reasoning and conclusions, remains unconvinced. The Rev. H. R. Coulthard has broached a new theory, which has perhaps not yet received the attention it deserves; it is that Ictis was the entire peninsula of Western Penwith. As against this, there is the evidence of Pliny who, on the authority of Timæus, states that the island of Mictis, apparently only another form of Ictis, was distant six days’ sail along the British coast, a statement which is as fatal to the claims of Penwith as to those of the Mount itself.

The question can hardly be said to be finally decided, but the prevailing opinion is in favour of the Isle of Wight.

The Mount has had several names. In the life of St. Cadoc[113] it is called Dinsul, which probably means the citadel of the sun.

St. Cadoc is said to have visited his aunt St. Keyne there, and to have miraculously provided the Mount with a supply of water.

By the Cornish it was called Careg Cowse, or Karrek-luz-en-Kuz, which William of Worcester correctly translates “Hoar Rock in the Wood.” It would be interesting to discover earlier evidence of this name. Its survival in the fifteenth century[114]—in spite of the monastic and military occupation of the Mount for many centuries—is very remarkable and seems to carry us back to the time when Mr. Reid’s description was exactly realised.

At some period, very difficult to determine, the Mount became known as Mons Tumba.[115] A charter in the Otterton custumal recording the reconstitution of St. Michael’s priory, in the reigns of Henry I, and Stephen, enjoins that the Cornish monks shall receive the blessing of their abbot at Monte Tumba unless, perchance, it shall please him to come into Cornwall and bless them there; from which it may be inferred that the religious house in Monte Tumba was at that time identified with Mont St. Michel in Normandy, although the latter was then, at an earlier date and long afterwards, commonly described as St. Michael in Periculo Maris.[116] When dealing with the medley of notes collected by William of Worcester it will be necessary to bear this in mind.

The Mount was associated with St. Michael before the Norman Conquest, in all probability before the Saxon invasion of Cornwall.

As Professor Loth has pointed out,[117] the name-saints (_hagio-onomastique_) of ancient Brittany are entirely national. “With the exceptions of some apostles, of St. Michael, St. Matthew, of St. Peter who has given his name to Ploubezre, it is useless to seek for them in Gaul and the Roman Church: they are all of them insular (British or Irish) or native Breton.” The same may be said of Cornwall with very few exceptions. The position assigned to St. Michael was everywhere unique. At some time subsequent to the Babylonish captivity St. Michael came to be had in special veneration of the Jews. From apostolic times in the East and from the fifth century, at least, in the West, he was received into the devotional system of the Christian Church. Nothing could have been more sane or scriptural than the honour paid to St. Michael. As the Prince of God’s people and the Captain of the heavenly hosts[118] (_militiae celestis signifer_) he, who had prevailed against the Spirit of evil, might well be expected to lend his aid when the wrestling was against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places. And what spot so worthy to be the site of an earthly fane for one whose warring is in the regions above man’s head, as the lonely mountain’s top. There is a sense of security felt by those who live on, or surrounded by, hills even now when so many ages have run since they were remotely responsible for it. The proper seat of the Archangel was clearly on the hill-top. They “found him an house” accordingly on the Cornish Mount, on Rowtor, on Rame Head, on Penkevil, on Caerhayes and on the western Carn Brea. Whether the cult of St. Michael superseded some earlier pagan cult in Cornwall it is impossible to say. Until some evidence is forthcoming it can serve no useful purpose to dilate upon the possible identity of Michael, Elias and Helios, or upon the possibility of one whose most notable achievement was the destruction of sun worship on Mount Carmel, being himself its personification to after ages.

That there was a religious community at the Mount bearing the name of St. Michael before the Norman Conquest hardly admits of doubt. All the saints, with three exceptions, found there by William of Worcester, in the Calendar, were Celtic and insular.

The late Professor Freeman and Mr. Horace Round have, however, expressed a contrary opinion based upon the doubtful authenticity of two charters, certain particulars of which, connected chiefly with their attestation, are admittedly and obviously inaccurate.

The first of these charters[119] purports to be a grant made by Edward the Confessor, “King of the English, to Michael the Archangel for the use of the brethren serving God in that place, of St. Michael near the Sea, of the whole of the lands of Vennefire and of the port called Ruminella with its mills and fisheries.” This charter bears the signatures of Edward the King, Robert archbishop of Rouen, Herbert bishop of Lisieux, Robert bishop of Coutances, Ralph, Vinfred, Nigell the sheriff, Anschitill, Choschet and Turstin. The second charter[120] claims to be a grant by Robert Count of Mortain to the monks of St. Michael in Periculo Maris (Normandy), of St. Michael’s Mount in Cornwall with half a hide of land and a market on Thursdays; and three (Cornish) acres of land in Amaneth, namely Trevelaboth, Lismanoch, Trequaners and Carmailoc, the signatories being King William (the Conqueror), Queen Matilda, Count Robert, William Rufus the King’s son, Henry the Boy (prince), Robert Count of Mortain, Matilda (his) countess, their son William, William Fitz Osborn, Roger de Montgomery, Tossetin the sheriff, Warin and Turulf.

To the grant there are added, 1—a confirmation of it by Livric (Leofric), bishop of Exeter, bearing date 1085; and 2—a postscript signed by the bishop, exempting by command of Pope Gregory, the church of St. Michael in Cornwall from episcopal control and conveying a remission of one-third of their penance to those who should enrich, endow or visit the said church.

With regard to Edward’s charter, it has been pointed out by more than one writer that Edward probably did not assume the title of King of the English until after the death of Hardicanute in 1042, and that Robert, archbishop of Rouen, died in 1037. It is not stated whence Dugdale obtained his copy of the charter, but a footnote by Oliver informs us that the MSS. of the _abbey_ of St. Michael are preserved in the public library at Avranches; and it is noteworthy that the charter in his _Monasticon_ is labelled Carta Edwardi regis Anglorum pro _abbatia_ Sancti Michaelis, and that the three episcopal signatories are _Norman_ ecclesiastics. It is therefore possible that during his sojourn in Normandy Edward who:

... loved the holy company
Of people of religion,
Who loved only all that was good;
Especially a monk who led
A high and heavenly life

may have been induced to promise or to give Cornish lands to the Norman St. Michael and that his friends may have styled him Rex Anglorum, knowing that only when he became de facto King of the English could any benefit accrue to the abbey. But it seems more probable that a gift of lands was made by him to the Cornish St. Michael after Hardicanute’s death and that after the Norman Conquest when the two religious houses were united by the cession of the Cornish priory to the Norman abbey the deed which may have borne the signature of Robert, archbishop of Canterbury, was altered so as to bear that of Robert, archbishop of Rouen. In that case the grant would have been made between 1050 and 1066. There were undoubtedly bold and fruitless attempts made on the part of the Norman abbots to enrich the Norman at the expense of the Cornish house, just as at a later period there were bold and successful attempts made to enrich the latter by borrowing the legends and traditions of the former.

The substantial genuineness of Edward’s charter will be regarded as probable when it is remembered that no ultimate advantage can be shown to have accrued from it to either house. A spurious document would hardly have been preserved in the face of facts witnessing to its failure. Neither Domesday Book nor the _Inquisitio Geldi_ makes mention of any possessions in Meneage belonging to St. Michael.

The suggestion offered in Chapter VI, viz. that the Meneage was at an early period monks’ land both in name and in fact, may possibly account for the entire series of transactions. Grants to religious houses and for religious purposes have not infrequently been a trifling recompense made to Paul for the spoiling of Peter. It was notably so in the reign of King Henry VIII. If in the early part of the eleventh century the Meneage represented alienated, that is, usurped monastic land, no one would have been more disposed than King Edward to make restoration or to honour St. Michael by granting it to the Mount. It is not unlikely that the grant remained inoperative owing to the difficulty of making terms with the layfolk in possession.

In the appendix[121] to volume iv. of his _Norman Conquest_, Mr. Freeman, after referring to the doubtful authenticity of Edward the Confessor’s charter, goes on: “doubtful as this charter is, the spuriousness of that which accompanies it (the charter of Robert Count of Mortain) is still more manifest.” He then recites the fact that whereas the latter charter is dated 1085, it bears the signatures of Queen Matilda, who died in 1083, and of Bishop Leofric, who died in 1072; also the exemption from ecclesiastical jurisdiction granted by Leofric at the instance of Pope Gregory, who did not become Pope until after Leofric’s death—altogether a most formidable indictment—and he proceeds to quote from the Exeter Domesday, with a view of establishing the real date of the foundation of St. Michael, the following passage (which will also be found below labelled A.):

“Sanctus Michahel habet i. mansionem quae vocatur Treiwal quam tenuit Brismarus eâ die qua Rex E. fuit vivus et mortuus.... De hac mansione abstulit Comes de Moritonio i. de praedictis ii. hidis quae erat de dominicatu beati Michahelis.”

“This,” he says, “is the only mention of the house I can find, and it would seem to imply a foundation between 1066 and 1085. Brismar was a man of large property in all the three shires. He is not unlikely to have been the founder of the Cornish Saint Michael, and if so he must have founded it, or at least have given the estate, after Edward’s death.” “It seems plain ... that whoever was the founder of the Cornish house it was not Earl Robert.” And he concludes, “a note in the _Monasticon_ (vii. 989) speaks of another tradition as naming Robert’s son William as the person who gave the Cornish house to the Norman one. Here we most likely have the clue to the mistake.”

When therefore Mr. Round is found endorsing Mr. Freeman’s opinion[122] that “Treiwal was given to St. Michael between the death of Edward the Confessor and the making of the great Survey,” and suggesting that Earl Brian (who could have had no footing in England before the Conquest) may have been the founder, it may seem presumption to express an opinion clean contrary to both. But let Domesday Book tell its own story. There are three references in the Exeter Book and two in the Exchequer Book which bear upon the subject. They are given below and labelled A, B, C, D, E for convenience of reference—those portions only being omitted which do not concern the present discussion. The extensions are for the use of those who are not familiar with the abbreviated Latin text.

A. Exeter Domesday, fol. 208b. (Ed. 1816, p. 189).

TERRA SANCTI MICHAHELIS DE CORNUGALLIA. Sanctus Michahel habet unam mansionem quae vocatur Treiwal quam tenuit Brismarus eâ die qua rex Edwardus fuit vivus et mortuus. In ea sunt ii hidae terrae quae nonquam reddiderunt gildam. Has possunt arare viii carrucae. Ibi habet Sanctus Michahel i carrucam.... De hac mansione abstulit comes de Moritonio i de praedictis ii hidis quae erat de dominicatu beati Michahelis.

B. _Ibid._, fol. 508 (Ed. 1816, p. 471).

Sanctus Michael habet i mansionem quae vocatur Treiwal de qua abstulit comes de Moritonio i hidam, quae erat in dominicatu Sancti die qua rex Edwardus fuit vivus et mortuus.

C. _Ibid._, fol. 258b (Ed. 1816, p. 138).

Comes habet i mansionem quae vocatur Treuthal quam tenuit Brismarus sacerdos eâ die qua rex Edwardus fuit vivus et mortuus. In ea est i hida terrae et reddit gildum (sic) Sancto Michaele (sic). Hanc abstulit comes Sancto. Bluhidus Brito tenet eam de comite.

D. Exchequer Domesday, page ii, column 2.

Terra Sancti Michaelis. Ecclesia Sancti Michaelis tenet Treiwal. Brismar tenebat tempore Regis Edwardi. Ibi sunt ii hidae quae nunquam geldaverunt.... De his ii hidis abstulit comes Moritoniensis i hidam.

E. _Ibid._, columns 1 and 2, 125 a and b.

Idem (Blohiu) tenet Trevthal. Brismar tenebat tempore Regis Edwardi.... Hanc terram abstulit comes aecclesiae Sancti Michaelis.

* * * * *

The very title which introduces extract A is suggestive. The land of St. Michael “of Cornwall” implies another St. Michael just as “St. Ives in Cornwall” implies a St. Ives elsewhere. And it is this St. Michael of Cornwall and no other who “has one manor which is called Treiwal which Brismar held at the time of Edward the Confessor’s death. There are two hides of land which have never paid geld. From this manor the Earl of Mortain has taken away one of the aforesaid two hides which was of Blessed Michael’s demesne.” If St. Michael of Cornwall did not exist before the Conquest it is difficult to understand how he could have had lands in demesne in the time of the Confessor. But it may be objected there is here no mention of the saint holding lands in the time of the Confessor. Accepting the correction for what it is worth, which is probably infinitesimal, because the whole tenor of the Domesday assessment—both as regards its ruling principle and its literary flavour—is found in the reiteration of the contrast or comparison of the land values as determined in the days of King Edward and at the time of the Survey, admitting the correction, let the reader refer to extract B. This reads, “St. Michael has one manor, which is called Treiwal, from which the Count of Mortain has taken away one hide which was in the demesne of the saint on the day upon which King Edward was alive and dead.” St. Michael (of Cornwall) was, therefore, quite as truly alive at the decease of the Confessor as Edward was dead. In the light of what has been said consider extract C. This is important, because it tells us that Brismar was a priest and a very different person from the magnate described by Mr. Freeman who held lands in three shires.