At the head of the lovely Vale of Lanherne is a district which has long been the centre for the old game of "hurling," and although football has largely taken its place, it is still sometimes played on Shrove Tuesday. The ball is smaller than that used for cricket, is light to handle, and has a coating of silver. The one now in use is inscribed with this couplet:
"St. Columb Major and Minor do your best,
In one of your parishes I must rest."
During the short reign of Edward VI. the ferment against the reformation doctrines came to a head in Cornwall. The people rose under Humfrey Arundel and marched to Exeter, only however to meet with a crushing defeat. Four thousand were slain, and their leaders taken and hanged at Tyburn. Martial law was then proclaimed, and Sir Anthony Kingston, Provost Marshal, was sent down into Cornwall. Among other stories told of him is that of his expeditious visit to St. Columb. Arrived at the little market town he promptly seized "Master Mayow" and directed that he should be hanged as a rebel. "Mistress Mayow, intending to plead for her husband's life, spent so long a time in prinking herself that by the time she reached the presence of the judge, her husband was dead."
In the neighbourhood of St. Columb are nine menhirs in a line, called the Nine Maidens, or in Cornish "Naw Voz"; also Castle-an-Dinas, a large triple entrenchment on a high tableland enclosing six acres of ground and two tumuli. Hither came the Royalist leaders in 1646 to discuss the question of surrender, and here King Arthur is supposed to have stayed when on pleasure bent. The waste land around is known as Goss Moors, and there he hunted not only the red deer but the wolf.
"The Green Book of St. Columb" is one of the historical treasures of the county. It is so called from the colour of its leather binding, and is a book of parish accounts dating from the reign of Elizabeth.[2] Curious to relate, the rectory-house is surrounded by a moat. The church, which is very large for Cornwall, contains some good brasses and bench-ends, the brass of Sir John Arundell and his two wives (1545) being probably the finest example in the county. This church has had hard usage. In 1676 a barrel of gunpowder which lay in the rood-loft was fired by some mischievous boys. Three of them were killed, and a great deal of other damage was done. Some few years later the tower was struck by lightning, and the people, made wiser by misfortune, were careful to erect a less lofty one, which, however, was itself struck a few years since.
Colan
Halfway between the two St. Columbs is the little church of Colan, which contains the interesting brass of ffrancis Bluet, 1572, and Elizabeth, his wife, with effigies of both and of their thirteen sons and nine daughters. Below it is a smaller brass containing these words:
"Behold thyselfe
by us; Suche one
Were we as thow: