The Story of an Ancient Parish: Breage with Germoe / With Some Account of Its Armigers, Worthies and Unworthies, Smugglers and Wreckers, Its Traditions and Superstitions

by H. R. Coulthard

The first definite tradition bearing upon the history of the Parish is the arrival of St. Breaca with St. Germoe, somewhere about 500. It is said that they landed at the mouth of the Hayle River in company with between seven and eight hundred Irish Saints, both men and women, who are supposed to have come from the Province of Munster. From the legends that have come down to us with regard to them we gather that they were not altogether wanted by the Cornish. However, this was a minor consideration to such a large band of enthusiastic Irish men and women; they made a forcible landing and drove back the Cornish Chief Teudor and his men who opposed their landing. The legends describe Teudor as a cruel heathen, in which surely there must be some mistake, as Teudor is a Christian name, being only Cornish for Theodore. The legends go on to tell us that one of this great company of Saints, a woman called Cruenna was killed at Crowan in trying to take forcible possession of the land of one who was already a Christian, for the purpose of building a church upon it. It seems very much as if these Irish men and women, with the true impulsiveness, of their race, set out to Cornwall to convert the inhabitants, without first taking the trouble to find out whether or no they were Christians. We see instances of the same spirit at work to-day, Methodist Missionaries in Rome to convert Roman Catholics, and Roman Catholic Missionaries in England to convert Christians who are not Roman Catholics.

It may be helpful, in considering this matter, to take a glance at the condition of the people of the country whence these Missionaries came at the time with which we are dealing. St. Patrick, who owed his knowledge of Christianity to St. Ninian, a Briton, first brought Christianity to Ireland not more than a hundred years before the arrival of the seven hundred and seventy seven Saints in the Hayle River, whilst, as we have seen, Cornwall had been under Christian influences for several centuries. A candid view of Christianity in Ireland at this time can only lead to the conclusion that it was more than half Pagan. The tonsure of the Priests, or mode of cutting their hair, was exactly the same as that of the Druid[9] Priests. It was not till the year 804 that Monks and Clergy in Ireland were exempt from bearing arms,[9] that is three hundred years after the coming of these Saints to Cornwall. Women[9] were not exempt from fighting in the ranks till 500. In 672 a battle was fought between the rival Monasteries of Clonmacnois and Durrow. In 816 four hundred Monks and Nuns[9] were slain in a pitched battle between two rival Monasteries. In 700 the Irish Clergy[9] attended their Synods sword in hand, and fought with those who differed from them on doctrinal points, leaving the ground strewn with corpses. The Irish, no doubt with the wild unreasoning enthusiasm so characteristic of the race, flung themselves into the new movement, and the Monasteries were soon filled with Monks and Nuns with but a vague realisation of what Christianity was; many no doubt would quickly weary of the new life of rule, and yearn for one of greater variety; hence possibly the swarming off to other lands in search of spiritual adventures.

The theory has been suggested that our army of Irish Saints were fugitives, worsted in battle, escaping from their enemies, as Ireland at this period was devastated with petty tribal wars. This theory, to say the least, seems most plausible.

Vague traditions have come down to us of incidents in the lives of the Saints of this period which reveal something of the moral atmosphere in which they lived and moved and had their being. At the end of Germoe Lane there used to be a cairn of great stones, which an ignorant local administration has long since cleared away. The legend of these stones was that St. Keverne possessed a beautiful eucharistic chalice and paten. St. Just the holy visited his friend and stole these sacred vessels. St. Keverne discovered the loss and pelted the flying St. Just with the great stones that fell at the end of Germoe Lane. The same story appears in the life of St. Patrick where the annalist reveals his bias in the words: "O wonderful deed! O the theft of a treasure of holy things, the plunder of the most holy places of the world!" Straws show the way in which the wind blows, and this fable and the comments of the Irish annalist reveal the view of his age on the question of theft.

Of course, we fully admit that the Irish Monasteries did become for a time the home of the learning of the age such as it was. We do not forget their great foundations in Germany and Northern Italy, and their exquisite skill in the work of illumination as in the books of Durrow and Kells; what we contend is that the Irish Saints in coming to Cornwall were coming to a land which possessed a Christianity older and purer than their own. That the Irish Saints were sincere according to their lights we do not doubt, and being true to the light they possessed they are worthy of being held in honour.

It has been suggested as a solution for the reason of the Invasion of the Irish Saints, that at the close of the fifth and the beginning of the sixth century Cornwall was only partially christianized, that Pagans and Christians were living side by side in amity, and that the Irish Saints came to devote themselves to the conversion of the Pagans. Whether this solution of the difficulty be true or no, at any rate it is opposed to all that we can gather from the testimony of ancient writers and hagiographers, and, if we accept it, we must reject their testimony as utterly false and worthless.

Of course, a distinction must be made between the Hibernian Saints and the many Saints who came over from Brittany and settled in Cornwall. The people of Brittany were one in language and character with the Cornish to a far greater extent than the Irish; and, like the Cornish, the people of Brittany had been under Christian influences several centuries before the Irish had.

Amongst the Saints who came from Ireland with Breaca and Germoe was Gwithian, said to have been killed in the fighting with Teudor or Theodore: Cruenna, killed at Crowan; Wendron, who made his settlement at Wendron; Moran, who settled at Madron; Ia, who settled at St. Ives; St. Levan, said to have been Breaca's brother, settled at St. Levan; the names of others also have come down to us whom we need not mention. Germoe is supposed to have been of royal descent, which means that he was related to the petty king or chief of his sept or tribe. Breaca is said in the vague traditions that have come down to us, originally to have pursued the calling of a midwife; Leland, the great antiquary of the reign of Henry VIII. when he visited Cornwall, saw many legendary lives of the Cornish Saints, from which he made extracts. Most of these lives were destroyed with much else that was beautiful and valuable at the time of the Reformation.

The last book of the lives of our local Saints was in the library of Sir William Howard of Naworth Castle in Cumberland, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It was carried thither by a Cornish Roman Priest, who took refuge with him and acted as his Chaplain. This valuable volume has been long lost sight of.[10]