He saw no more the dwelling of his father.”
Aneurin represents Caradoc as having fallen in this battle.
It is possible that Caradon may take its name from him, and that it may have been Dun Caradock.
Caradoc and his true wife Tegau were laid hold of by the Anglo-Norman romancers. They could not understand his nickname, and rendered it “Brise-Bras,” and supposed that his arm was wasted away, whereas the Celtic title implies that it was brawny. To explain the wasted arm they invented a story. They told of an enchanter who made a serpent attach itself to the arm of Caradoc, from whose wasting tooth he could never be relieved until she whom he loved best should consent to undergo the torture in his stead. The faithful Tegau, on hearing this, was not to be deterred from giving him this proof of her devotion. As, however, the serpent was in the act of springing from the wasted arm of the knight to the lily-white neck of the lady, her brother Cado, Earl of Cornwall, struck off its head with his sword, and thus dispelled the enchantment.[8]
If Tegau was actually the sister of Cado, then we may flatter ourselves that Cornwall presented the two noblest and purest types of womanhood at the Arthurian period—Tegau and Enid, the wife of Geraint.
Two miles out of Callington is the parish church—Southill—one of the many instances of an ecclesiastical settlement at a respectable distance from the secular caer or tribal centre, that each might live its own life and have its own independent organisation.
Southill was founded by S. Samson. As we have already seen, he had landed on the north Cornish coast and made his way to Petherwin, where he had visited his first cousin Padarn. On his way, he passed through the district of Trecor, now Trigg, deriving its name from three notable caers or camps,—Helborough, Warbstow, and Launceston. As Samson was in this district, he found the people performing idolatrous rites about a tall upright stone, and this with the sanction of their chief, who was called Gwythian. Samson did not throw down the menhîr; he contented himself with cutting a cross upon it.
I wonder whether this is the stone that still stands at Southill, on which is cut the cross of Constantine. It is an inscribed stone to one Connetoc, and is of the period of S. Samson.
Whilst tarrying in Cornwall, Samson heard that his old master, Dubricius, was very infirm and failing, and he hastened to South Wales to revisit him. The old man, who was dying, committed to his charge a favourite disciple named Morinus. Samson did not particularly relish the charge, for he did not believe the young man was sincere. However, he took Morinus back with him, but soon after, the disciple became insane and died. The monks, regarding this as possession, removed his body and buried it outside their cemetery. Samson was, however, very uneasy, because the deacon had been entrusted to him with such solemnity by Dubricius, whom he loved and reverenced with all his heart, and he prayed incessantly for the poor fellow who had died mad, till one night he dreamed that Dubricius appeared to him and assured him that Morinus was admitted to the company of the blessed. With a glad heart Samson ordered the body to be at once exhumed and laid in consecrated ground.
One night in midwinter a thief got into the church, and stole thence a cross adorned with gems and gold and all the money he could lay his hands on, and ran away with the spoil wrapped in a bundle. He made for the moors and ventured over a bog, trusting that the frozen surface would bear him. But his weight broke through the thin ice, and he sank to his waist. Afraid of going under altogether, he threw away his burden, and did that which everyone who has wits will do in a bog—spread out his arms on the crust.