names wrested away by neighbourhood, as are other things by like accidents in the eastern parts of the county; other names have been encroached upon by fantastical or vainglorious builders calling their houses after their own names, and others upon vain toys; but these are not many. Moreover, concerning the loss of our speech, and the names of families, I must here (but tenderly though) blame the incuriosity of some of our gentry; who, forsaking the etymologies of their own speech, have studied out new derivations of their names, endeavouring to make themselves as it were descended from French or Norman originals, in adopting or adapting their names thereunto; whereas, their own names in the Cornish are more honourable, genuine, and true; from the Conquest, forsooth, those would have their descent, (no illustrious thing in itself) whereas the ancestry of many of them have been here long before. How finely many have cozened themselves thereby, might be shewn, if it would not be offensively taken, by taking up of coat armour as from French originals. The art of heraldry hath been drawn out to us in French terms and trickings, mostly begun when our kings had most to do in those parts, and so from thence it hath continued ever since; and our Cornish gentry, finding the English so much addicted thereunto, have followed in that tract the same mode, and would fain have themselves understood such, when they were much better before than those French or Latin terms could make them, in which many of the English may be blamed as well as we; for the herald’s art hath many mysteries in it under their French and Latin terms, and many mistakes may be thereby to us and others who are not well acquainted with them, but in those that concern our own tongue, it is evident many have wronged themselves, and more may do so if not well heeded.
The grounds of two mistakes are very obvious. 1st. Upon the Tre or Ter. 2dly. Upon the Ross or Rose. Tre or Ter in Cornish commonly signifies a town, or rather place, and it has always an adjunct with it. Tri is the number. 3. Those men willingly mistake one for another; and so in French heraldry terms, they use to fancy and contrive those with any such three things as may be like or cohere with, or may be adapted to any thing or things in their surnames; whether very handsome or not, is not much stood upon. Another usual mistake is upon Ross,
which, as they seem to fancy, should be a rose; but Ross in Cornish is a vale or valley. Now for this their French-Latin tutors, when they go into the field of Mars, put them in their coat armour prettily to smell out a rose or flower (a fading honour instead of a durable one); so any three such things, agreeable perhaps a little to their names, are taken up and retained from abroad, when their own at home have a much bttter scent and more lasting.
Some, however, amongst us, have kept themselves better to the antiquities of their Cornish names in their coat armour, as that honourable family Godolphin,[39] in keeping still displayed abroad his white eagle, from the Cornish Gothulgon. Richard, king of the Romans, Emperor elect, supplied his Cornish border with silver (perhaps tin) plates, deducing them from the antient earls of Cornwall, as borne by them before the Norman Conquest, and, in honour to them and himself, still bearing the same afterwards. Chiverton, whose name in Cornish is a house on a green place or hill, he beareth a coat thereunto accordant, a castle with a green field under it; which may be well thought on as to the name in[40] Cornish, though, in the heraldry it had been more complete. V. a castle A. as I apprehend; Scaberius, which is sweepers or sweeping, A. 3 broom besoms V.; Gavergan, a goat; Keverel, a he-goat, or he-goats; that creature taking most delight, as it is observed, in the cliffs thereabout. These are better significations taken from home, than the other that are foreign; and yet the assumption of a coat from any particular act of a man’s own, is better than such as have reference barely to names, without some special signification therewith.
I had thoughts formerly, and made preparation to give many more instances, where many amongst us have been mistaken in those two particulars; but since it is a hard thing to convince men of old errors, and a harder to make a question against any concerning their gentelicions and the old forms thereof, though intended more for their honour, I shall forbear the further prosecution thereof; but in this, however, I shall do them right, that they, i. e. their ancestors, in this way thus trodden, have walked
generally as antiently as any other gentry of this nation, and to my seeming, it had been better if they had stood still super vias antiquas avorum suorum, since most of those ancient families who have strayed abroad as aforesaid, have yet some of them, and many more had, lands and places of their own names in their possession long enjoyed; and a nearer passage it had been to their journey’s end, viz. their honour, if they had not adventured abroad: a testimony whereof we have in that great contention which happened in the time of King Edward III. between Carminow of this county (a family to which most of the ancient gentry here have relation) and a great person[41] of the nation, for bearing of one and the same coat armour, Azure, a bend Or. After many heats about it, a reference was made of it by the king to the most eminent Knights of that time, of which John of Gaunt, King of Castille, was one, before whom Carminow proved his right by the continual bearing thereof, and that before the Conquest, which was not disapproved nor disallowed, but applauded: yet, because the other contendant was a baron of the realm, Carminow was adjudged to bear the same coat still, but a file in chief for distinction sake. The decision was no way dishonourable, and the remembrance of the contention continued to the glory of his posterity, to which his motto in Cornish seems to have an allusion —in English, “A Straw for Whifflers or Dissemblers;” or as some have said to be, “A Fig Cala Rag Whetlow;” but we may take the same better, I think, from the very name of Carminow being in Cornish a rock immoveable, as a sign of his resolution, from thence, or formerly taken up.
Having gone through this passage, which I know not how it may be taken by my countrymen, let me make this observation, that since the gentry here have thought fit, or endeavoured by mistake, to forsake the antiquity of their Cornish names, and thereby their greatest interest, might perhaps prognosticate that their language, which was their ancient glory, should in revenge forsake them, as now it hath almost done; and I shall proceed to assign some other causes of the decay thereof.
XI. The vicinity, or near neighbourhood with Devon. I may say that vicinity only with the Devonians, we having none else, which next to the corruption of tongues by
time and superstition to saints, hath most devoured the names of places, especially on the borders of Cornwall with Devon; and there is the worst language commonly spoken, and spoken rudely too, which corrupts not only their own country tongue but ours also, in the places that are nearest to them, and those infect others nearest to them. The names of the places are thereby also much altered in the Cornish, which antiently they had generally, and the particulars that do yet appear, do stand as marks only to shew that what were formerly had are now much eaten away, on the borders especially. ’Tis observed also elsewhere in this county furthest west, where the Cornish hath been most spoken, that the English thereabouts is much better than the same is in Devon, or the places bordering on them, by being most remote from thence from whence the corruption proceeds.
XII. Our gentry, and others, antiently kept themselves in their matches unmixt, commonly at home in their own country, both sons and daughters desiring much to do so, whereby they preserved their names here, and races the better; and when their names changed, it hath been observed to be to the places of their abode, sometimes willingly, sometimes by accident. So it hath continued the Cornish names to the places, and consequently the tongue. But indeed of late our gentry have frequently sought out foreign marriages in other counties, whereby, though it may be confessed they have brought in much wealth, and have goodly inheritances abroad, yet their offsprings have been dissipated, and their affection less intire to the county, the country-men, and country speech; yet it is to be observed, that not many of them have been very prosperous or of long continuance in other counties, where they cannot muster up very many of our names of gentry, Prideaux, Trevilian, Tregonwell, Penruddock, and a few others excepted, which shews that our Cornish are like those trees that thrive best and live longest in their own peculiar soil and air, which yet is fruitful and durable to those that come in amongst us. Not only gentry, which are very many, that have great inheritance by their matches here with Cornish families, but many others also, which seldom leave this country when they have been planted here.