It may be remarked that lofty and elevated situations throughout Europe are dedicated to St. Michael, probably on account of the Archangel being uniformly painted with wings, and therefore tacitly imagined to have habits similar to birds; and perhaps the dedication of the largest of our domestic fowls to the celebration of his festival, may owe its origin to a similar analogy.
Saint Kenna is believed to have imparted the same identical virtue to the chair which overhangs the tower, as she
bestowed on the celebrated well near Liskeard, and since no one obtains a seat in this chair without much resolution and steadiness of head, one may be inclined to anticipate the supposed effect with greater certainty from the achievement of sitting in St. Michael’s chair, than from drinking water from St. Kenna’s well. The time of St. Kenna’s visitation is not accurately known. She is supposed to be the same St. Keyna, daughter of a prince of Brecknockshire, who lived a recluse life for many years near a town situated midway between Bristol and Bath, since called Cainsbarn, after her name, where she founded a monastery in the beginning of the sixth century, and cleaned the neighbourhood from snakes and vipers by converting them all into Cornua Ammonis, which have abounded there ever since, in testimony of her sanctity and of the fervour of her prayers.
The supposed ancient site of St. Michael’s Mount, its being the hoary monk in a wood surrounded by forests, is deduced from arguments very similar to those which prove the miraculous power of St. Kenna in converting serpents into stones.
Trees have been found buried under the sand and silt in the Mount’s Bay, as they are frequently found in every similar inlet of the sea on the southern coast of England. And the tradition, if a term so respectable may be applied to such vague conjectures, applies equally to Mount St. Michael; or they may have been derived from a common origin. See Le Grand Dictionaire Historique, par M. Moreri, Paris edition of 1188, with the Supplement of 1735. In the 5th folio volume of the Dictionary, p. 193, and in the 2d. folio volume of the Supplement, p. 261, will be found these passages:
“Saint Michel ou Mont Saint Michel, en Latin Mons Sancti Michaelis in periculo Maris. Bourg de France en Normandie, avec une Abbaie celebre et un chateau. Sa situation est assez particuliere, sur un rocher qui s’etend au milieu d’une grand greve, que la mer couvre de son reflux.
On dit qu’ Augustin, evêque d’Avranches, qui vivait au commencement du huitieme siecle, y suit des chanoines apres une apparition de l’Archange Seint Michel.
“Ce mont s’appelloit le Mont de Tombe à cause de sa figure. On pretend qu’une foret occupoit autrefois sont le terrain depuis le mont jusques aux Paroisses de Tanis et d’Ardevon; que la mer a detruit cette foret, et qu’elle en a pris la place; et c’est de la, dit on, que le Mont Saint Michel est surnomme, ‘Au peril de la mer,’ Mons in periculo Maris.”
The first authentic document relative to St. Michael’s Mount is the charter of Saint Edward the Confessor, the original of which remained among the archives of Mount St. Michael.
In the recent edition of Dugdale’s Monasticon Anglicanum, vol. vii. p. 988: