Although much good work has been done and useful results have been obtained in many fields of research both by individual Cornishmen and by societies like the Royal Institution of Cornwall, there is one department at least which has been somewhat neglected by those for whom it might have been expected to possess a special attractiveness.
The interest which of late years has been awakened in the Cornish language and in Celtic Christianity has not been the result of any revival in Cornwall itself. Mr. Whitley Stokes is an Irishman by birth and extraction, Professor Loth a Breton, Mr. Henry Jenner a Cornishman. In fact no Cornishman except the last-named has so far thrown himself wholeheartedly into the movement which has for its object the critical study of the language and religion of the Celtic-speaking nations. This is much to be regretted, because both of these subjects were assigned a place in the comprehensive scheme of Dr. Borlase, which, as conceived and elaborated by him, entitled him to rank among the leading European antiquaries of his own day. Although Dr. Borlase achieved little of permanent value in the way of exposition, he gathered much valuable material which, but for him, would have been lost, and by his sagacity and diligence succeeded in riveting the attention of his compatriots.
He was, like all the leading archæologists of his time, a resolute believer in the Druidical origin of the prehistoric remains of the county, a theory which he advocated with consummate skill and particularity. Since his death the theory has been found to be untenable without any serious injury, however, being done to his high reputation.
The brilliant essay of his great-great-grandson, the late Mr. William Copeland Borlase, on the Age of the Saints, first printed in 1878, has been one of the very few original works accomplished in the county having for its object the exposition of Celtic Christianity. In this work its writer attempted too much. Subsequent research has shown that many of his identifications of the Cornish saints are untrustworthy, and that his arbitrary delineation of the spheres of influence of the respective groups of Irish, Welsh and Breton saints is often fanciful and misleading.
Given leisure and the spirit of enquiry, the two subjects which ought to appeal most strongly to a Cornishman are the ancient religion and the ancient language of the county to which he belongs.
Both subjects are now well within his reach owing to the immense amount of material which has, within recent years, been made available by the publication of ancient records. The Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents of Haddan and Stubbs, the Episcopal Registers, edited by Hingeston-Randolph, the Parish Registers, edited by Phillimore and others, the publications of the Record Commissioners and of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, the Revue Celtique, the Ancient Cornish Drama, edited by Mr. Edwin Norris, the critical works of Mr. Whitley Stokes, of Professor Loth and Dom Gougaud, the Cornish Grammar of Mr. Jenner; these are a few of the many sources whence valuable information may be derived for the comparative study of these subjects. In this connection it may be observed that little satisfaction will be gained from facts and statements which are obtained at second hand. Facts must be sought out in the original documents and examined in their original settings.
The context is often more illuminating than the fact which it enshrines. Not documents only; the towns, villages, hamlets and homesteads, with their ancient names, address silent appeals to the hearts and understandings of those who live among them.
An interesting illustration is supplied by the three Cornish words, Eglos (Ecclesia), Escop (Episcopus) and Pleu (Plebs)—interesting because the final judgment must be held in suspense until a survey has been made of their ramifications. All three words are found in the place-names of this county. Eglos is found in Lanteglos, Egloskerry and in some other places; Escop is found in Trescobeas in Budock, formerly appendant to the bishop’s manor of Penryn, also in Mainen Escop (Bishop’s Rock), in the Isles of Scilly; Pleu is found in Plunent, the ancient name of Pelynt, in Pluvathack (Budock) and possibly in Bleu Bridge in Gulval. Names beginning or ending in Eglos are numerous in Cornwall; those having Pleu for the first syllable are very few in number. In Brittany very few place-names are composed of Eglos and Escop, whereas Pleu enters into many. Why does Pleu rather than Eglos lend itself so readily in Brittany to the exigencies of ecclesiastical nomenclature? Were it not that Lan (monastery) is equally distributed in the two countries, we should be tempted to say that in Cornwall a Celtic word (lan) was preferred to a Latin word (plebs) to describe the ecclesiastical unit. Some difference of condition or of association there must have been to account for it. That which most readily occurs is that Armorica was thoroughly Latinised before the insular Celts arrived there, whereas Cornwall was probably never brought into close contact with Roman civilisation as such except on and near the coast; in other words, that Plebs was in use in the former country before it became Christian and acquired afterwards a specific ecclesiastical signification, whereas in Cornwall it was introduced along with Christianity or after Christianity had taken root. Very few traces of Roman civilisation are to be found in this county. The Roman milestone at St. Hilary is almost unique. Roman coins, of which many have been found in the county, do not prove Roman settlement. It is certain, however, that Britain had become Christian, at least in name, before the Roman legions were withdrawn, and it is therefore probable that the words Eglos, Escop and Pleu had been received into the Cornish language before that time. And the true explanation of the persistence of Pleu in the place-names of Brittany seems to be that the insular Britons, who had acquired the word Plebs during the Roman occupation, converted it, for ecclesiastical purposes, into Pleu and took it with them when they emigrated to Armorica, where very soon it had to give place to the word Pares (from the French Paroisse), though not before it had taken root in the place-names. In Cornwall and Wales, on the other hand, Pleu remained in current use and is therefore seldom found in the place-names of those countries. Making allowance for changed conditions, the same explanation accounts for the persistence of the word Lan in the place-names of all three countries—it persisted in the place-names because it had fallen out of current use.
For reasons which will appear later, it is important to keep well in mind the relations which subsisted between Cornwall and Brittany from the time of the Dumnonian exodus, which began in the first half of the fifth century, until those relations were interrupted in the sixteenth century.
Leaving for future discussion the question of religion, there are points of contact between the two countries which deserve attention, not only because they are interesting in themselves, but because they can hardly fail to suggest others.