ST. WENN.
HALS.
St. Wenn is situate in the hundred of Pider, and hath upon the north St. Breock, east Withiell, south Roach, west St. Colomb Major; but whether named from its tutelar guardian and patron, Sanctus Wina, or Wena, the Bishop of Winchester, anno Dom. 660, translated to London anno Dom. 666, who died 670; or from Anwena or Unwena, Bishop of Dorchester, anno Dom. 786, I know not.
This place is that San Vene, or Wena, taxed in the Domesday Book, and the only church or district in all that book in Cornwall to which was added the pronoun Saint, of which I have spoken elsewhere. In the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester into the value of Cornish Benefices, Ecclesia de Sanct. Wenne in decanatu de Pidre 1294, was rated at vil. xiiis. iiiid. Vicar’ ejusdem xiiis. iiiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, £16. 6s. 8d. The patronage was formerly in the Prior of Bodman, who endowed it; afterwards, when that Priory was dissolved, in the Crown; from whence it passed to Prideaux of Netherton, by him sold to Rashleigh, now in possession thereof. The incumbent Bedford; the rectory in Rashleigh; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, for one year, £126. 4s.
About the year 1663, the tower and bells of this parish church were struck down with thunder and lightning, and broken to pieces in a stormy night, and a great part of the roof of the church broken in.
(Here is another deficiency in the manuscript.)
And in particular those lands to the Lord Botreaux, by whose heir it passed in marriage to Hungerford, from Hungerford to Hastings, from Hastings to Edgecomb, from Edgcomb to Parkinge, from Parkinge to Vivian of Truan, from Vivian to Hals (the writer hereof), now in possession thereof.
Of this family was Michael de Tregury, a man of great learning, made first governor or professor of the University founded at Caen in Normandy by King Henry V. He was afterwards by him made Archbishop of Dublin, where, after twenty-two years’ residence, he died, 1471, and lies buried in St. Patrick’s Church there, with this bold epitaph:
Præsul Metropolis Michael hic Dublinensis
Marmore tumbatus, pro me Christum flagitetis.
i. e. Michael, the Metropolitan Bishop of Dublin, lyes under this marble tomb, for whome Christ shall earnestly intreate or desire.[15]
Lan-cor-la, in this parish, was formerly parcel of the manor of Ryalton, the Prior of Bodman’s lands, who endowed this church upon part of the said manor’s lands, with a considerable glebe, at least eighty statute acres of ground.
This little barton of Lancorla was anciently the voke lands of a considerable manor, now all dismembered, held,
by the Records of the Exchequer and Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, page 46, by the tenure of knight’s service.
It is now by lease in the possession and dwelling of the writer hereof, from Sir Jonathan Trelawny, Bart. Sir John Seyntaubyn, Bart. and Sir George Cary, of Clovelly, knight, as heirs to Jenkin of Trekeninge, to whom it came by purchase from Botreauxes and Parkinge’s heirs and assigns.
This manor of old contained fifteen Cornish acres of land, before dismembered tempore Edward I. that is to say, 638 statute acres, and was privileged with the jurisdiction of a Court Baron or Leet, and had a steward or bailiff pertaining thereto as dependant on Ryalton aforesaid.
Checkenock, now Killignock (S. T.) in this parish, was another district taxed in the Domesday Book 1087, from whence was denominated an old family of gentlemen surnamed de Killignock, where they flourished in good fame for many generations, till the time of Henry VIII. when the only daughter and heir of Thomas Killignock was married to Richard Nanskevall, alias Typpet, of St. Colomb, which marriage brought these lands into his possession, where for three or four descents his posterity flourished in genteel degree, till the latter end of the reign of King Charles II. when Matthew Typpet, Gent. that married Ringwood, of Braddock, having encumbered his estate with much debts, sold this place and the manor of Borlace Varth to Mr. Joseph Hawkey, his attorney-at-law, to pay costs in defence of actions brought against him by his creditors; and his other lands to Bligh, Vivian, and Hals, the writer of these lines, and left his son and heir a beggar. The arms of Typpet, —— three tippets, as I remember.
Tre-with-an, in this parish, i. e. the Tree Town, or Town of Trees, tempore Henry IV. was the land of Stephen de Trewithan, who held in this place and elsewhere, by the tenure of knight service, 25 Edward III. £20 per annum in lands of Barkley’s manor of Tremore (Survey of Cornwall, p. 52), from whose posterity, tempore Queen
Mary, it passed by sale to Renphry, whose son sold it, tempore James I. to Parkings, whose great-grandson Francis Parkings is now in possession thereof. The arms of Parkings are, in a field —— three pigeons ——.
In this parish stands Damelsa Castle, a treble entrenchment of earth on a high mounted bank or hill, on the south side of, and contiguous with, Damelsa House and lands. Probably it was erected before the Norman Conquest, to resist the incursions of the Danes, since those three rampiers consist of rude stones and earth after the British manner, as a hedge, not a wall. (See Castle an Dinas, in St. Colomb). For after the Conquest aforesaid, castles in England were generally built of lime and stones after the manner of the French. Probably it was demolished tempore King Stephen or King Henry II. when, many hundreds of those castles by their decree were pulled down in this island, as our chronologers all tell us.
In this parish, at Treganatha, i. e. the Spinster’s Town or dwelling, is held annually a fair or mart on St. Mark’s day, April 25, and another on August 1.
TONKIN.
St. Wenn is in the hundred of Pider, and hath to the west St. Colomb Major and St. Ennodor, to the north St. Breock, to the east Withiell, to the south St. Roche. This parish takes its name from St. Wenna, its female patroness.
This is a vicarage, valued in the King’s Book £16. 6s. 8d. The patronage in Philip Rashleigh, Esq. the incumbent Mr. John Bedford.
In an. 1291, 20 Edward I. the rectory here was valued (Tax. Ben.) at vil. xiiis. iiijd. being appropriated to the Abbey of Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire; and the vicarage at xiiis. iiijd.
The manor of Borlase, id est, the green summit or rising [as Bar Glas or Las (C.)] This lordship was given by King William II. surnamed Rufus, to —— Lord of the
Castle of Palfer in Normandy, ever since which his posterity have flourished here and at Treluddero, &c. in great esteem, by the name of Borlace (V. Upton de re militari). [N. B. This is a singular, perhaps a single, instance of a Norman or Saxon family assuming a Cornish name. Indeed I suspect it not to be true; and what is more certain, that species of apples which in Cornwall we call a Borlase, and more commonly a Treluddera, pippin, appears plainly to have taken its name from this family and that place, and serves as a good opening for explaining all those other names of apples which are merely Cornish in themselves like this. Whitaker.]
THE EDITOR.
It seems that Great Skewish, in this parish, belonged to a family of that name, one of whom was an author at a period so early as the reign of Henry the Sixth, when he compiled an abridgment of the Chronicles and the Wars of Troy; but in all probability the work has never been printed, since it is not noticed by Warton; nor is the author’s name to be found in the catalogues of our public libraries.
But the glory of this parish is Michael Tregury, Archbishop of Dublin.
Six or seven years ago, my attention having been drawn to this individual, who may justly be considered an honour to Cornwall, I applied to the Very Reverend J. R. Dawson, Dean of St. Patrick’s, through his brother the Right Honourable George Robert Dawson, when the Dean most kindly and liberally supplied me with a drawing of Archbishop Tregury’s tomb, as it is restored by the celebrated Doctor Swift, and furnished me with all the particulars known of my distinguished countryman.
I procured a wood engraving to be made of the drawing, and sent it, with whatever I could collect of Tregury, to the Gentleman’s Magazine, a reprint of which will here be inserted:
SEPULCHRAL EFFIGY OF ARCHBISHOP TREGURY, IN THE CATHEDRAL OF DUBLIN.
Mr. Urban, Tredrea, Cornwall, March 2, 1831.
You will much gratify me, and, I may venture to add, many other correspondents, by inserting in your most excellent repository, which has now survived one century with a spirit and vigour that give promise for its continuing through another, some particulars of an individual sprung from this county, who must have been a man of talent and of learning sufficient for adding lustre to any origin; but who is now almost entirely forgotten, his family having long since become extinct, and the records of the University, of the Church, of the Diocese, and of the Province over which he presided, having in great measure perished in the devastations of the civil war, and especially of those aggravated by religious dissensions.
Mr. Lysons, in his History of Cornwall, states, that in the parish of St. Wenn is situated Tregury, Tregurra, or Tregurtha, the seat of a family so called, of whom was Michael de Tregury, Archbishop of Dublin, who died in 1471. The last heir male of the elder branch of this family died in the reign of Henry the Fifth, leaving three daughters coheirs, who sold this barton to the family of Botreaux, from whom it passed successively, by inheritance or sale, through the families of Hungerford, Hastings, Edgcumbe, Parkins, and Vivian, to Mr. William Hals, who wrote the Parochial History of Cornwall, and resided here in the latter part of his life. The estate, now called Tregotha, is the property of Thomas Rawlings, Esq.
This brief notice of the Archbishop scarcely made any impression on my mind beyond a mere recollection of the circumstance, when a Cornish gentleman informed me that he had observed a monument to this Prelate in the Cathedral at Dublin. I then took the liberty of applying, through Mr. Dawson, Member for the County of Londonderry, to his brother the Dean of St. Patrick’s, who not only gave me every information and reference that is known to exist, but also a drawing of the monument, of which I have sent a wood engraving.—Since this was engraved, I
have seen a tracing from an old drawing in the possession of Sir William Betham, Ulster King at Arms, which shows that the sides of the original altar-tomb were adorned with trefoil-headed arches rising from short pillars.
It appears that few records are extant of the Prelates and Dignitaries of Dublin prior to the Reformation, in places where they might most reasonably have been expected to be found; and the monument itself would have perished but for the care and attention of the celebrated Doctor Jonathan Swift, who, with the Chapter, exactly a hundred years ago, rescued it from a dilapidated chapel, and carried the monument to its present situation in the Cathedral.
Michael Tregury attained his reputation for learning at the University of Oxford. He was Junior Proctor in the year 1434, under which Anthony Wood gives the following notice of him in his “Fasti.” He “was now Fellow of Exeter College, and about these times Principal of several Halls successively that stood near to the said College. But the King, having a special respect for him (being now accounted the utmost ornament of the University), made him Prefect or Governor of [the College at] Caen in Normandy, lately erected by King Henry the Fifth of England; which office he performing with singular applause, became at length, through divers preferments (of which the Deanery of St. Michael of Pencryche[16] was one) Archbishop of Dublin in Ireland.”
The foundation of the College or University of Caen, is again mentioned by Wood in his Annals, under 1417. In consequence, he says, of discontents regarding preferment and tithes, “the corruptness of provisions, and especially the wars between England and France, many dispersed themselves to other places. And because Normandy, Angiers, Poyctou,
Aquitaine, Bretagne, Gascoigne, and other places that were subject to the Crown of England, could not for that reason exercise their Scholastical Arts at Paris publicly and without murmurings, they receded to Caen in Normandy,[17] and studied there, which place Henry the Fifth, of England, made an University, causing one Michael Tregorie, an Oxford Doctor, sometime Fellow of Exeter College, to be governor and reader there, to the end that the doctrine of the University of Oxford might dilate itself and take root in those parts.”
The following memoir is extracted from Ware’s History of Ireland, vol. I. p. 359:
“Before the close of the same year (1449), Michael Tregury, a native of Cornwall, and Doctor of Divinity of the University of Oxford, was consecrated Archbishop of this See. He was a man of such great eminence for learning and wisdom, that in the year 1418, King Henry the Fifth invited him over to Caen in Normandy, to take upon him the government of a College, which that Monarch had then founded in the said city; to whom he joined, out of the Mendicant Friars, learned professors in all sciences.[18] There he is said to have discharged the trust committed to him with great applause, both by his public prelections and writings. A catalogue of his works may be seen in Bale and Pits. At last, upon the death of Talbot in 1449, he was promoted to this See by a papal provision, and was the same year, on the 10th of February (English style), restored to the temporalities by King Henry the Sixth, whose Chaplain he was: [But was obliged to submit himself to the King’s favour, and renounce every clause in his Bull prejudicial to the Crown.[19]] He was called into the Privy Council immediately, and had twenty pounds per annum[20]
granted him by the King, pro sano consilio, for giving good counsel, as his predecessors, Archbishops of Dublin, who were of the Council, had; and in 1453 King Henry the Sixth, for securing an arrear of two years and a half, and the growing salary, granted him a custodium on the manor of Tassagard, and the town of Ballachise, parcel thereof, to continue during the time he should be Archbishop of Dublin.[21]
“In certain Annals ascribed to Dudley Firbisse, there is a mention made under the year 1453, that an Archbishop of Dublin was taken prisoner at sea. I must leave the passage to the credit of the Annalist, not having met any hint of it elsewhere. There is extant in the Black Book of the Archbishop of Dublin (p. 82), a copy of a Bull of Pope Pius the Second, dated the 23d of November 1462, and directed to the Bishop and Archdeaconry of Ossory, commanding them to pronounce excommunicated, Geofrey Harold, Thomas and Edmund his sons, Patrick Birne, Thady Sheriff, Thomas Becagh, Robert Burnell, and other laymen of the city and diocese of Dublin, for laying violent hands on this Prelate, and committing him to prison; and that they should keep them under excommunication until they went to Rome for absolution, with the testimonials of the Bishop and Archdeacon. The reason of this insult is no where mentioned, that I can find. He repaired the manor house of Tawlaght, and died there in a very advanced age, on the 21st of December 1471; having governed this See about twenty-two years. His remains were conveyed to Dublin, attended by the clergy and citizens, and buried in St. Patrick’s Church, near St. Stephen’s altar [as he had directed by his will], where heretofore might have been seen a specious monument, adorned
with his statue, of elegant workmanship, on which are inscribed the following verses, penned without the aid of the Muses:
‘Præsul Metropolis Michael hic Dubliniensis
Marmore tumbatus, pro me Christum flagitetis.’
And at the head of the statue,
‘Jesus est Salvator meus.’
“This monument was found under the rubbish in St Stephen’s Chapel; the cover of it was preserved by the care of the Rev. Dr. Jonathan Swift, Dean of St. Patrick’s, and the Chapter, who in the year 1730 fixed it up in the wall, on the left hand, as you enter the west gate, between the said gate and the place where heretofore the Consistory Court was held; and they have placed this inscription over it: ‘Vetus hoc Monumentum, è ruderibus Capellæ Divi Stephani nuper instauratæ erutum, Decanus et Capitulum hùc transferri curaverunt, A.D. 1730.’
“The will of this Prelate, dated the 10th of December 1471, is extant among the manuscripts in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin (B. 52), whereby he deviseth his two silver gilded saltsellers (salsaria) with their covers, to make cups for St. Patrick’s, to serve in divine offices. He also bequeathed his pair of organs to the said Church, to be used at the celebration of divine service in St. Mary’s Chapel. ‘I devise also (says he) that William Wyse, whose industry for this purpose I choose, shall in my stead visit with a decent oblation St. Michael’s Mount in Cornwall, which by vow I am bound to perform either by myself or proxy;’ and also orders him to give some largesses towards building the neighbouring churches near where his friends dwell.
“The registry[22] of the Dominican Abbey in Dublin gives an account, that above fifty persons went out of the
Diocese to Rome in 1451, to celebrate the jubilee then held under Pope Nicholas the fifth, and that this prelate gave them recommendatory certificates to the Pope; that seven of the number were pressed to death in the crowd, besides what died in their return. This squares with the relation given by Mathias Palmerius, in his additions to the Chronicle of Eusebius, ‘That there was so great a concourse of people from all parts of the Christian world at this jubilee, that at Hadrian’s Mole almost two hundred perished in the press, besides many who were drowned in the Tiber.’ They who returned sate in 1453, brought the melancholy news, that Constantinople was taken by the Turks, and the Emperor Constantine Palæologus slain. Our Archbishop was so afflicted at the account, that he ordered a fast to be kept strictly throughout his diocese for three days together, and granted indulgences of an hundred years to the observers of it; and he himself went before the clergy in procession to Christ Church cloathed in sackcloth and ashes.”
The works of Tregury are thus noticed by Pits, in his volume “De illustribus Angliæ Scriptoribus:”
“Multa scripsisse perhibetur, quæ Gallis inter quos vixit vel Hibernis apud quos obiit, magis quàm Anglis e quibus natus est, nota esse poterunt. Hos tamen paucos titulos sequentes invenio:
| Super Magistro Sententiarum | lib. iv. |
| De Origine illius Studii | lib. i. |
| Quæstiones Ordinarias | lib. i. |
| Contra Henricum Albrincensem | lib. i. |
Yours, &c. —— Davies Gilbert.
De Restitutione Temporalium Archiepiscopatus Dublinensis.
[Rymeri Fœdera, tom. xi. p. 260.]
Rex Cancellario nostro, vel ejus deputato, seu Custodi Magni Sigilli nostri in terrâ nostrâ Hiberniæ, qui nunc est vel qui pro tempore fuerit, salutem. Cum dominus Summus
Pontifex, nuper vacante ecclesiâ metropolitanâ Dublinensi, per mortem bonæ memoriæ Richardi ultimi Archiepiscopi ejusdem loci, dilectum Capellanum nostrum Magistrum Michaelem Tregorre, sacræ theologiæ professorem, in Archiepiscopum illius loci præfecerit et pastorem, sicut per literas bullatas ipsius domini Summi Pontificis nobis inde directis nobis constat, Nos, pro eo quòd idem Archiepiscopus omnibus et singulis verbis in dictis literis bullatis contentis nobis et Coronæ nostræ prejudicialibus coram nobis renunciavit, et gratiæ nostræ humiliter se submisit, volentes cum eo agere gratiòse, cepimus fidelitatem ipsius Archiepiscopi, et temporalia archiepiscopatûs illius, prout moris est, restituimus eidem; et ideo vobis mandamus quòd eidem Archiepiscopo, seu ejus in hac parte attornatis, deputatis, seu procuratoribus, temporalia prædicta infra terram prædictam, cum pertinentiis, per brevia nostra inde in cancellariâ nostrâ terræ nostræ prædictæ, tot et talia quot et qualia sibi in hac parte necessaria fuerint, seu quomodolibet opportuna, sub magno sigillo nostro ejusdem terræ debitè conficienda deliberari demandetis, habenda in formâ prædictâ, cum suis juribus et pertinentiis universis. Teste Rege apud Westmonasterium, decimo die Februarii.
Et mandatum est militibus, liberis hominibus, et omnibus aliis tenentibus de Archiepiscopatu prædicto infra terram nostram prædictam, quod eidem Michaeli tanquam Archiepiscopo et domino suo in omnibus quæ ad Archiepiscopatum prædictum pertinent, intendentes sint et respondentes, sicut prædictum est. In cujus, &c. Teste, ut supra.
Pro Archiepiscopo Dubliniæ.
[Rymeri Fœdera, vol. xi. p. 325.]
Rex omnibus ad quos, &c. salutem.
Sciatis quòd, cùm venerabilis in Christo pater Michael Dublinensis Archiepiscopus habere et percipere debeat viginti libras per annum, de nobis pro suo sano consilio utilitatem et politicum regimen terræ nostræ Hiberniæ concernente,
nobis impenso et impendendo tempore quo Archiepiscopus ibidem extiterit, prout ejus prædecessores, Archiepiscopi loci prædicti, ac de consilio nostro et progenitorum nostrorum Regum Angliæ existentes, habere solebant de nobis et progenitoribus nostris prædictis pro hujusmodi consilio suo,—dictoque nunc Archiepiscopo summa quinquaginta librarum, de dictis viginti libris annuis (videlicet, a quarto die Novembris, in anno regni nostri vicesimi-noni usque quartum diem Februarii in anno regni nostri tricesimi-primi, scilicet per duos annos integros et unum dimidium annum, per quod tempus ipse venerabilis pater Archiepiscopus Dublinensis extitit, et sanum suum consilium ad utilitatem terræ nostræ prædictæ impendit,) per nos debita jam existat,—volentes eundem Archiepiscopum tam de dictâ summâ quinquaginta librarum contentari, quàm de viginti libris annuis hujusmodi, pro tempore quo ipsum Archiepiscopum ibidem fore contigerit percipiendis et habendis, ipsum Archiepiscopum securiorem fieri et reddi, de gratiâ nostrâ speciali ac de mero motu et certâ scientiâ nostris, commissimus eidem nunc Archiepiscopo custodium manerii sive dominii de Tassagard cum pertinentiis, necnon villæ de Ballachize, parcellæ manerii prædicti, cum pertinentiis, in manu nostrâ certis de causis existentium, habendum et tenendum eidem Archiepiscopo, unà cum proficiis, commoditatibus, curiis, juribus, emolumentis, et pertinentiis suis quibuscunque, per totum tempus quo ipsum Archiepiscopum Dublinensem fore contigerit, reddendo inde nobis per annum, pro custodiâ prædictâ, durante tempore illo, ad Scaccarium nostrum in Hiberniâ, tales et tantas denariorum summas, de qualibus et quantis nobis pro custodiâ manerii et villæ prædictorum cum pertinentiis modo responsum existet; et ulteriùs volumus et præfato Archiepiscopo concedimus quòd ipse centum solidos annuatim de denariorum summis, quæ per ipsum Archiepiscopum de custodiâ prædictâ deberi contigerint, in manibus suis propriis habeat et retineat, quòdque ipse dictam summam quinquaginta librarum inde sic levaverit, perciperit, et in manibus suis retinuerit.
Et insuper quòd ipse Archiepiscopus annuatim, durante toto termino prædicto, quo ipse Archiepiscopus ibidem et de consilio nostro fuerit, de hujusmodi denariis, de custodiâ prædictâ nobis per ipsum Archiepiscopum debendis et extunc proveniendis, in manibus suis propriis habeat et retineat viginti libras per annum, habendas, percipiendas, et retinendas in satisfactionem dictarum viginti librarum per annum, quas ipse Archiepiscopus pro consilio suo prædicto de nobis per tempus prædictum percipere debet, quamdiù ipse Archiepiscopus Dublinensis extiterit, pro sano suo consilio nobis impendendo; et ulteriùs concedimus præfato Archiepiscopo quòd ipse, in solutione dictarum denariorum summarum et custodiæ prædictæ, ad Scaccarium prædictum de omnibus hujusmodi summis, quas ipse Archiepiscopus, prætextâ harum literarum nostrarum patentium, habuerit, perciperit, aut retinuerit, de tempore in tempus, debitam habeat deductionem et allocationem; aliquo statuto, actu, ordinatione, sive restrictione in contrarium factis, editis, seu provisis, sive aliquâ aliâ re, materiâ, vel causâ non obstantibus. In cujus, &c. Teste Rege apud Westmonasterium, nono die Maii [1453].
Per Breve de Privato Sigillo.
St. Wenn measures 3,858 statute acres.
| £. | s. | d. | |
| Annual value of the Real Property as returned to Parliament in 1815 | 2963 | 0 | 0 |
| Poor Rate in 1831 | 228 | 5 | 0 |
| Population,— | |||
| in 1801, 358 | in 1811, 452 | in 1821, 589 | in 1831, 649 |
giving an increase of 81 per cent. in 30 years.
Present Incumbent, the Rev. R. P. Gilbert, instituted in 1810.
GEOLOGY, BY DOCTOR BOASE.
The rocks of this parish resemble those of the northern half of St. Columb Major.
[15] Mr. Hals has very inaccurately translated the last words of the second line. The Archbishop requests the readers of the Epitaph earnestly to entreat Christ for himself.
[16] The Deanery of Penkridge in Herefordshire was not, however, an early preferment of Tregury, it having been annexed to the see of Dublin as early as the reign of King John.
[17] “Jo. Rous, in lib. de Regibus, MS.”
[18] “Pits, de Script. 663.”
[19] See the act of restitution of his temporalities, at the close of this letter, p. 148.
[20] By Sir George Shuckburgh’s Tables, printed in the Philosophical Transactions for 1798, this sum would be equal to almost six and a half times as much as the same nominal sum at the commencement of the present century; that is, 130l. a year.
[21] See the letters patent hereafter, p. 149.
[22] Ware’s MSS.