“It may here be worthy of remark, that, as the miners impute the discovery of tin to St Perran, so they ascribe its reduction from the ore, in a large way, to an imaginary person, St Chiwidden; but chi-wadden is white house, and must, therefore, mean a smelting or blowing house, where the black ore of tin is converted into a white metal.
“A white cross on a black ground was formerly the banner of St Perran, and the standard of Cornwall; probably with some allusion to the black ore and the white metal of tin.”—Gilbert.
A college, dedicated to St Perran, once stood in the parish of St Kevern, (Dugdale’s “Monasticon,” vol. vi., p. 1449.) This probably had some connexion with Perran Uthnoe. The shrine of St Perran was in that parish, which is said to have contained his head, and other relics.
Lysons quotes a deed in the registry of Exeter, shewing the great resort of pilgrims hither in 1485.
In the will of Sir John Arundell, 1433, occurs this bequest:—“Item, lego ad usum parochie S’c’i’ Pyerani in Zabulo, ad clandendum capud S. Pierani honorificè et meliori modo quo sciunt xls.”—Collectanea Topogr. et Geneal., vol. iii p. 392.
For a full examination of the question, Did the Phœnicians trade with Britain for tin? the following works should be consulted:—“History of Maritime and Inland Discovery,” by W. D. Cooley; “Historical Survey of the Astronomy of the Ancients,” by Sir George Cornewall Lewis; “Commerce and Navigation of the Ancients,” by W. Vincent, D.D.; “Phœnicia,” by John Kenrick, M.A.; “The Cassiterides: an Inquiry into the Commercial Operations of the Phœnicians in Western Europe, with particular Reference to the British Tin Trade,” by George Smith, LL.D., F.A.S.
(C.)
ST NEOT.
The following account of this celebrated saint, as given by Mr Davies Gilbert, will not be without interest:—
“Multitudes flocked to him from all parts. He founded a monastery, and repaired to Rome for a confirmation, and for blessing at the hands of the Pope; these were readily obtained. He returned to his monastery, where frequent visits were made to him by King Alfred, on which occasions he admonished and instructed the great founder of English liberty; and finally quitted this mortal life on the 31st of July, about the year 883, in the odour of sanctity so unequivocal that travellers all over Cornwall were solaced by its fragrance. Nor did the exertions of our saint terminate with his existence on earth; he frequently appeared to King Alfred, and sometimes led his armies in the field. But, if the tales of these times are deserving of any confidence, the nation is really and truly indebted to St Neot for one of the greatest blessings ever bestowed on it. To his advice, and even to his personal assistance as a teacher, we owe the foundation by Alfred of the University at Oxford.
“The relics of St Neot remained at his monastery in Cornwall till about the year 974, when Earl Alric, and his wife Ethelfleda, having founded a religious house at Eynesbury, in Huntingdonshire, and being at a loss for some patron saint, adopted the expedient of stealing the body of St Neot; which was accordingly done, and the town retains his name, thus feloniously obtained, up to this time. The monastery in Cornwall continued feebly to exist, after this disaster, through the Saxon times; but, having lost its palladium, it felt the ruiner’s hand; and, almost immediately after the Norman Conquest, it was finally suppressed. Yet the memory of the local saint is still cherished by the inhabitants of the parish and of the neighbourhood—endeared, perhaps, by the tradition of his diminutive stature, reduced, in their imagination, to fifteen inches of height; and to these feelings we, in all probability, owe the preservation of the painted glass, the great decoration of this church, and one of the principal works of art to be seen in Cornwall.”—Gilbert’s Hist Corn., vol. iii. p. 262.