TAMARTON.

HALS.

Tamarton vicarage, alias North Tamarton, is situate in the hundred of Stratton, and hath upon the north, part of Whitson; south, part of Devon and Boyton; east, the Tamar river, from whence it hath its denomination Tamarton, that is to say, the town situate upon the Tamar river; which river on the Devonshire side gives also name to Tamarton Decenna, or hundred there, as also to Tamarton vicarage parish, and Tamarton chapel, situate on the banks of that famous river; as also Stoke Damarell vicarage and parish. For Stoke Tamar-oll parish; that is to say, Stoke chapel or college in Cornish British, in Devon; and for the etymology of the word Tamar, see my Cornish Vocabulary, and Liber I. Chap. III.

This is the ταμαρα ποταμος, the Tamara Potamos, mentioned by Ptolomy the Greek geographer 1500 years past; that is to say Tamar fluvius, flumen, amnis fluentum, the Tamar river, in the province of the Cornavy, for Cornubia, or Danmonij.

In the Domesday Book 1087, this district was then taxed under the name and jurisdiction of Hornacott, i. e. iron cot or house, so called from Hornacott free chapel then extant there, and for aught I hear yet standing. The present church of Tamarton is either of late erection or endowment, since it is not mentioned in either of the inquisitions as to its value of First Fruits, unless it passed as a daughter church to some other, or was wholly impropriated. The parish rated to the four shillings per pound Land Tax, for one year 1696, at £48. 16s. 4d. The manor of Tamarton was formerly the lands of Walesbury, by whose heir it passed to Trevillian of Somerset, now in possession thereof, as I am informed.

Upon the bastard King Athelstan’s victory over the Cornish Britons, Anno Dom. 930; and dismembering from that regniculum the district of Devon, and confining their dominion only to the west side of the river Tamar, the Saxon poets triumphed in verse, one of which hath those words of this division.

Hinc Anglos, illic cernit Tamara Britannos, i. e. on this side Tamar beholds the English, on the other the Britons.

TONKIN.

Tamarton is in the hundred of Stratton, and has to the west St. Mary Wike, to the north Whitstone, to the east part of Devonshire and the river Tamar, to the south Boyton.

As for the name, it took it from the old Roman Tamara [which however did not stand here, but at Saltash, a long way below. W.]; as that did from the river Tamar, turned into the English termination, to signify a town on the river Tamar.

It is not valued in the King’s Book, but in the Taxatio Benefic. anno 1291, 20 Edward I. this church, by the name of Capella de Tamerton, is valued at 46s. 8d. and was formerly appropriated to ——.

It is now a rectory, being endowed by the endeavours of the present incumbent Mr. John Bennet; who, and his successors for ever, are to pay a fee-farm rent to the crown of £6. 13s. 4d. out of the sheaf; the patronage being alternately in Henry Rolle of Stephenton, and Richard Coffin of Portledge, both in Devon, esquires. [The sheaf then appears to have belonged to the Crown, and had been set by the Crown, at £6. 13s. 4d. to its lessees the patrons. The chapel was therefore inserted as a mere curacy in the last Valor, but has been now endowed by the lessees giving up their lease to it, and so improving their own patronage. W.]

THE MANOR OF TAMARTON.

This, in the extent of Cornish acres, 12 Edward I. (Carew, fol. 48), is valued in eight. In 3 Henry IV. (id. fol. 40 b.) Halvethas Malivery held half of a knight’s fee here.

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Lysons gives the descents of property in this parish. He says the manor of North Tamarton was given by Roger de Valletort to Richard Earl of Cornwall, and that Roger Earl of Cornwall gave it to Gervase de Harningate. It was afterwards in the Carminows. In 1620 it belonged to Tristram Arscott, esq. and afterwards to the Rolles, of whom it was purchased by the late Sir John Call of Whiteford.

The manor of Hornacot or Horningcote belonged at an early period to a family of that name; in 1620 it was possessed by Sir Charles Howard, in right of his wife, the daughter of Sir John Fitz of Fitzford near Tavistock, and was afterwards in the Courtenays; and finally passed from them by purchase to the late Mr. George Browne of Bodmin.

Ogbere, called by Norden Ugbere, was in his time the seat of William Lovice, and had been the residence of Leonard Lovice, probably the father or grandfather of William, and is stated, by a monumental inscription still extant in the church, to have been Receiver-general of the Duchy Revenues for Queen Elizabeth.

Vacye, in remote times the seat of a family bearing the same name, is now the residence of George Call, esq. younger son of the late Sir John Call.

This parish contains besides the church town three small villages called Alvacot, Headon, and Venton.

Tamarton measures 4788 statute acres.

£.s.d.
Annual value of the Real Property as returned to Parliament in 18152,11500
Poor Rate in 1831330130
Population,—
in 1801,
403		in 1811,
420		in 1821,
479		in 1831,
517

giving an increase of 28 per cent. in 30 years.

Present incumbent, the Rev. C. P. Coffin, instituted in 1813.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The geological structure of this parish is the same as that of Boyton.