PADSTOW.
HALS.
The manuscript relating to Padstow is lost.
TONKIN.
Padstow, in the hundred of Pider, is bounded to the west by St. Merrin, to the north and east by the sea, its own harbour, and the river Alan, to the south by Little Petherick.
Leland (Itinerary, vol. ii. fol. 75), speaking of the town here saith, “this town is ancient, bearing the name of Lodenek in Cornish, and in English after the true and old writings Adelstowe, Latin, Athelstani locus, and the town there taketh King Adelstane for the chief giver of privileges unto it.” In Tax. Benef. 20 Edw. I. it is also called Eccles’ de Aldestowe, and valued—the rectory in 106s. 8d. and the vicar in 13s. 4d. being appropriated to the priory of Bodmin. Notwithstanding which I take it that it has its name from the famous St. Petrock, an abbreviation of Petrockstow, St. Petroc’s Place, to whom this church is by all allowed to be dedicated, and who most probably was born here; as more certain it is that he was buried in St. Petroc’s church in Bodmin, as you may see there.
But Fuller (Worthies in Wales, p. 13), from Bale calls Petrok, a Welsh-Irish-Cornish man, as having his birth in Wales, his breeding in Ireland (according to the custom of that age), from whence after twenty years’ studying he came into Cornwall, and fixed himself at Petrok’s-stowe, now corruptly Padstowe, from a small oratory so called from him; that he wrote a book of Solitary Life, whereto he was much addicted, and flourished anno 560; but Collier from Harpsfield, whose authority I prefer, makes him to go from Cornwall into Ireland, so that as I said before we may claim the honour of his birth.
This church is a vicarage, valued at £11. 3s. The