Michael “of Cornwall” implies another St. Michael just as “St. Ives in
Cornwall” implies a St. Ives elsewhere. And it is this St. Michael of
Cornwall and no other who “has one manor which is called Treiwal which
Brismar held at the time of Edward the Confessor’s death. There are two
hides of land which have never paid geld. From this manor the Earl of
Mortain has taken away one of the aforesaid two hides which was of
Blessed Michael’s demesne.” If St. Michael of Cornwall did not exist
before the Conquest it is difficult to understand how he could have had
lands in demesne in the time of the Confessor. But it may be objected
there is here no mention of the saint holding lands in the time of the
Confessor. Accepting the correction for what it is worth, which is
probably infinitesimal, because the whole tenor of the Domesday
assessment—both as regards its ruling principle and its literary
flavour—is found in the reiteration of the contrast or comparison of the
land values as determined in the days of King Edward and at the time of
the Survey, admitting the correction, let the reader refer to extract B.
This reads, “St. Michael has one manor, which is called Treiwal, from
which the Count of Mortain has taken away one hide which was in the
demesne of the saint on the day upon which King Edward was alive and
dead.” St. Michael (of Cornwall) was, therefore, quite as truly alive at
the decease of the Confessor as Edward was dead. In the light of what
has been said consider extract C. This is important, because it tells us
that Brismar was a priest and a very different person from the magnate
described by Mr. Freeman who held lands in three shires.
Extract C also introduces us to Treuthal, which Brismar the priest held
at the Confessor’s death. “Therein is one hide and it renders geld to
St. Michael.” (The Domesday scribe, not the printer, is responsible for
“gildum” and “Michaele.”) “This the Count has taken away from the saint.
Bluhid Brito (Blohiu of Brittany) holds it of the Count.” No one who is
acquainted with the history of Treuthal, with its almost endless variety
of spellings, can doubt either where it was or what it was. It was the
patrimony and the place of residence in the parish of Ludgvan of the
Bloyou family, the descendants of Bluhid Brito (Ralph Bloyou was born
there[123] on the Feast of the Nativity of the B.V.M. 21 Edward I) until
1354, when Elizabeth, daughter and heir of Alan Bloyou, sold it to Sir
Nigel Loring.[124] It is still the name of a village and the name of a
manor. While Treiwal, by which name the Domesday compiler seeks to
distinguish St. Michael’s land from Blohiu’s, is almost, if not quite,
forgotten, the variant Truthwall survives. But to revert to Brismar.
Comparing A, B, and C, it is clear that one hide was taken away from
Treiwal, that it was of Blessed Michael’s demesne in the time of King
Edward, that Brismar the priest held it in the time of King Edward, that
the Count of Mortain took it away from St. Michael, that it,
nevertheless, paid geld to St. Michael at the time of the Survey, that
Blohiu held it of the Count at the time of the Survey, and that it was
called Treuthal to distinguish it from Treiwal, the name of the parent
manor. With these facts before us it is impossible to doubt that for
fiscal purposes Brismar the priest and St. Michael the archangel were
regarded as identical in the time of King Edward—in other words, Brismar
was the visible representative of the invisible archangel. This explains
why in extract D Brismar held Treuthal in the time of Edward, and why in
extract E Brismar held, in Edward’s time, that which “the Earl has taken
away from the church of St. Michael.”
There are two further considerations which may be adduced in support of
the contention that St. Michael of Cornwall was the name of a religious
community which was not, at the time of the Survey, identical with St.
Michael of Normandy. It will strike every careful reader of that part of
Domesday which relates to Cornwall that wherever a church or a saint is
mentioned the reference is to what we now call either a conventual or a
collegiate church.
St. Aliquis holds a manor which is called Quidvis, the church of St.
Aliquis holds a manor which is called Quidvis—these are only different
ways of saying that the manor of Quidvis belongs to the community of St.
Aliquis. When, therefore, we read that one hide of Treiwal was of the
demesne of St. Michael in the days of the Confessor, we know that the
land belonged to a body of religious.
The second consideration is this: It has been pointed out to me that the
phrase “nunquam geldaverunt” (have never paid geld) is also peculiar, in
Cornwall, to quasi-monastic lands. But St. Michael not only did not pay
geld, he received geld, and received it from that hide of land of which
he had been despoiled by the Count.
Excluding St. German, who fared badly, the Count usurping all his
demesne lands, and whose only dues had consisted of a cask of beer and
30d. paid to the church, there were ten such communities in Cornwall at
the time of the Survey. Of these only three, St. Michael, St. Petrock
and St. Stephen, ever became affiliated to the larger monastic bodies.
The rest remained what they then were, collegiate churches, served by a
body of secular canons, who in course of time disappeared, giving place
to a rector. St. Buryan was apparently the last of these communities to
be dissolved. To sum up the results. It will, I think, be admitted that
extract A is not the only mention of the house of St. Michael to be
found in Domesday, that it was not founded between 1066 and 1085, that
Brismar—the Brismar of St. Michael—was not a man of large property but a
priest representing St. Michael, that if he founded the house it was
before and not after the Conquest, and, finally, that for reasons
already stated, Earl Brian was not the founder. Moreover, it is hardly
likely that a body of ecclesiastics, either at Mont Michel or at St.
Michael’s Mount, would have cited Edward as the patron of the Cornish
house if there had been some earlier patron to cite. It would rather
seem that what Mr. Round says of Count Robert’s charter is not far from
the truth, viz. “the fact that the form of the charter as we have it is
probably not genuine does not of necessity invalidate its substance.”
In justice to Mr. Round it must be added that after reading the
arguments here put forward, he would, in support of his contention, read
the concluding words of extract B elliptically: “one hide which was in
(what became) the saint’s demesne on the day on which King Edward was
alive or dead (i.e. after the Confessor’s death).” It is clear that such
a method of interpreting Domesday Book can only be allowable when there
is overwhelming evidence in its favour. In this case the evidence does
not seem to warrant its application.
As we have seen, Count Robert by his charter gives to the Norman house,
St. Michael’s Mount with half a hide of land and a market on Thursdays
and lands in Amaneth. Comparing this statement with that of Domesday
Book, it will be observed that in the latter there is no mention of
lands in Amaneth and no mention of the market, although in Domesday
markets are frequently mentioned, while on the other hand there is
mention made of two hides of land, one of which, Treuthal, the Count has
taken from St. Michael to be held of him by Bloyou, the other being held
by St. Michael in demesne. The question which arises is: Did the Count
restore one half of the usurped lands or, assuming the charter to have
been made before Domesday Book (1086) was compiled, did he by a later
instrument add half a hide, thereby endowing St. Michael with a moiety
of the hide held in demesne? We know from the subsequent history of the
lands under discussion that the Bloyous remained in possession of
Truthall, which never had a market, and we know that a market was held
at Marazion or thereabouts within the Domesday manor of Treiwal. We
therefore conclude that the Count’s gift to the Norman abbey was a
further act of spoliation, which by connivance of the Conqueror he was
allowed to practise against the Cornish monks, and also that his charter
was executed subsequent to 1086. The presence of Queen Matilda’s name
among the witnesses is the only invalidating element in what we have
every reason to regard as an authentic document. Its confirmation by
Bishop Leofric, and also the bishop’s postscript, are probably both of
them forgeries. To give them the appearance of genuineness the Queen’s
name may have been added to the authentic document. Be that as it may,
the alleged date, 1085, supposed to have been supplied by the bishop, is
impossible, inasmuch as the fourteenth year of indiction with which it
is made to synchronise would be either 1070 or 1094.
In 1094 the Conqueror was dead, and in 1070 “Henricus puer” was in the
second year of his age. It must also be added that the date does not
occur in the charter, but is supplied from the cartulary.
The composite character of the postscript to which also Leofric’s
signature is appended is seen in the wild statement to which it bears
witness. In it we are informed that by command and counsel of Pope
Gregory and of the King, Queen and Nobles of England, the bishop grants
immunity from all episcopal control to the church of Blessed Michael the
Archangel of Cornwall, and a remission of one-third of their penance to
all who shall enrich, endow or visit it. Pope Gregory (Hildebrand) was
not elected till 1073, the year after Leofric’s death, and the
indulgence which the postscript contains and which constitutes its
_raison d’être_ was manifestly only an expedient to foster pilgrimages
to St. Michael’s Mount which, supposing the monastery to have been
founded after the Conquest, would have been too obvious to achieve its
object. Something more will be said under this head when dealing with
the testimony of William of Worcester.
When allowance has been made for clerical errors and for the
interpolations and additions to which attention has been drawn, there is
no sufficient reason to reject either the literal interpretation of
Domesday or the authenticity of Edward’s charter, or the substantial
accuracy of Count Robert’s. The date of the latter would probably be
1086, or a little later, probably in the last year of the Conqueror’s
reign. A third charter of the reign of William Rufus records the grant
to the Norman St. Michael, by Count Robert of Mortain and Almodis his
Countess of the manor of Ludgvan held by Richard Fitz Turold, also that
which Bloyou formerly held in Truthwall (Treiuhalo), and both the fairs
(_ferias_) of the Mount, the monks paying to the grantors the sum of
sixty pounds.
Now it is worthy of remark that neither of these manors ever became
permanently attached to either religious house. Though it is impossible
to speak with certainty, it looks as if the Count had wrested Ludgvan
from Richard, had claimed Truthwall on the death of Bloyou and had sold
them both to the Norman abbot, who afterwards found it impossible to
resist the claims of the rightful heirs.
The Cornish St. Michael had assuredly no cause to hold the Count in
grateful remembrance. From first to last he acted the part of a robber.
On this occasion one is inclined to suspect that the possessions of the
brethren serving God at the Mount were much more extensive before than
after the Norman Conquest. Assuming the Confessor’s charter to be
genuine it would almost appear that the Meneage district had, at a
remote period, become attached to a Celtic monastery at the Mount, and
that he was merely ratifying the title while perhaps limiting the extent
of its possessions.
There is yet another document of great importance. It is described in
the Otterton custumal[125] as the Erection (_Constructio_) of the Priory
of St. Michael in Cornwall. It is, in reality, a notification by
Bernard, abbot of the Norman house, that the church of Blessed Michael
of Cornwall, built by him in 1135, was consecrated in his presence by
Robert (Chichester), bishop of Exeter, that, with the advice of the said
Pontiff and of Count Raner, and with the approbation of the barons of
the province, he has got together thirteen brethren and has made
provision for them out of old endowments and current contributions, that
he has enacted that he who shall be selected by the parent house to be
prior of St. Michael’s Mount shall not fail to make a return to it of 16
marks yearly, that if he shall prove refractory he shall be degraded and
another prior appointed by the abbot with the abbey’s consent, and so
on. Moreover, the Cornish brethren are to receive the benediction of the
monastic order from the abbot _in Monte Tumba_ unless perchance it
please him to come to Cornwall and bless them there. At the end of the
instrument there is a list of the possessions of the Blessed Michael of
Cornwall, given to the archangel by Count Robert of Mortain, viz.
Tremaine, where there is sufficient land for two ploughs, Trahorabohc
for three, Listyahavehet for three, Treganeis for two, Carmahelech for
two.
The entire document is needlessly defiant and menacing. The Cornish
house is reduced to a mere appanage of the abbey and the prior to a mere
collector of 16 marks for its benefit. Every vestige of independence is
swept away, and that, too, in subversion of the primary principle of the
saintly founder of the order. One hardly expected to find evidence in
Cornwall in confirmation of Dante’s description given more than a
century later.
The walls, for abbey reared, turned into dens (of thieves),
The cowls to sacks, choked up with musty meal.
It is therefore satisfactory to note that the priory could only reckon
among its possessions the lands given by the Count of Mortain, the rest
of St. Michael’s lands having either been confiscated or alienated
between the date of the Domesday Survey (1086) and that of the document
(1135).
To identify the several grants of land a more or less careful
examination of the places mentioned in the charters becomes necessary.
Taking them in order of date, the Confessor by his charter gives to St.
Michael for the use of the brothers serving God the place known as St.
Michael, which is by the sea, with all that belongs to it, and he adds
the whole land of Vennefire, with its towns, vills and lands; also the
port of Ruminella, with its mills and fisheries. One of the witnesses is
Vinfred, or, as the name is commonly written, Winfred. We are therefore
justified in substituting “W” for “V” in Vennefire, and “s” for “f”
according to the Avranches cartulary. Vennefire becomes Wenneshire. A
glance at the Feudal Aids reminds us that the hundreds of Cornwall were
entered as Poudreschir (Powder), Pydrisire,[126] Pydar, Trigrishire,
etc. It is therefore safe to regard Vennefire as the equivalent of
Wenneshire. But the name of the hundred in Domesday Book is Wineton, a
correlative, in this case the equivalent of Wenneshire. Vennefire is
therefore the hundred of Kerrier. Ruminella is the diminutive or
feminine, not only in Latin but in Welsh,[127] of Rumin or Rumon. The
port of Ruminella thus becomes the port of Ruan Minor, i.e. Cadgwith.
One or more mills still exist in the valley and at no great distance
from the port. If, as we have already suggested, the Meneage district
was, like the hundred of Pydar, settled by Celtic monks, the Confessor’s
grant would mean little more than the confirmation to them of their
ancient patrimony, focussed at St. Michael’s Mount.
Edward can hardly be supposed to have had an intimate knowledge of the
locality or of its conditions. Under the influence of men like Robert of
Jumièges he may well have given more than he had at his disposal. The
futility of the attempt is the best proof of its having been made. It is
certain that at the time of his death the monks of St. Michael had no
considerable holding in Kerrier. Earl Harold had become overlord of the
manor of Wineton, seventeen thegns holding eleven hides of him, the rest
being held by him in demesne. After the Conquest Wineton fell to the
King, who gave the whole to Robert Count of Mortain, to be held of the
Count by sub-tenants. It may have been in some measure as an act of
reparation, but it was chiefly in order to augment the influence and
revenue of St. Michael of Normandy that he granted to that abbey St.
Michael’s Mount in Cornwall, with half a hide of land and three
(Cornish) acres of land in Amaneth, to wit Trevelaboth, Lismanoch,
Trequaners and Carmailoc. No conditions of tenure are specified except
freedom from the King’s jurisdiction in all matters but homicide. It is
not stated, for example, whether the lands shall be held of the Cornish
or of the Norman St. Michael. In some sense no doubt the community at
the Mount became henceforth an alien priory of Mont St. Michel, but
there does not seem to have been any definition of the relations between
the two houses until 1135.
The identification of the names Amaneth, Trevelaboth, Lismanoch,
Trequaners and Carmailoc is not free from difficulty. The word Amaneth
is probably for An-maneth, i.e. An-manech, the monastic (territory) and
equivalent to Meneage.[128] Manaccan the monk’s (church) (cf.
Plou-manach in Brittany, the monk’s parish) is situated in the northern
portion of what is still known as the Meneage district, which Leland
(1533-1552) calls the land of Meneke or Menegland.
The next name—Trevelaboth—presents no difficulty. There is a continuous
chain of evidence to show that it is identical with Traboe, a small
manor in the parish of St. Keverne. In order to equate the three
holdings which remain, viz. Lismanoch, Trequaners and Carmailoc, it will
be necessary to refer to a document in the Otterton custumal[129] in
which they appear as Tremain, Listyavehet, Treganeis and Carmaheleck.
Carmailoc is obviously Carmaheleck or Carvallack, a holding in St.
Martin’s parish which derives its name from the prehistoric earthwork in
that parish. If we suppose the “n” in Trequaners and Treganeis to be a
false reading for “u”—a pardonable blunder of constant occurrence—we
have the modern tenement of Tregevas or Tregevis also in St. Martin’s.
We are thus left with Lismanoch as the equivalent of Tremain (the modern
Tremayne) and Listyavehet. Tremain calls for no remark in this
connection: everyone knows where it is. Lismanoch, of which it appears
to have formed a portion, presents some difficulty, because in that form
the name is now unknown. As Lesmanaoc it occurs in a grant of King Edgar
in 967 to Wulfnod Rumancant. In that grant its boundaries are minutely
described, but unfortunately to little purpose owing to the fact that
many of the place-names in it are either purely descriptive or have
become so altered during the ten centuries which have elapsed since the
grant was made as to be incapable of recognition. One or two points are
clear. Lesmanaoc was of considerable extent. For some distance it lay
along the river which empties itself at Porthallow. It must have reached
well towards the south of St. Keverne parish if “Castell Merit” and
“Crouswrah” (two places mentioned in the charter) are, as seems
probable, the modern tenement of Kestlemerris and Crousa Downs. At the
time of Count Robert’s charter its area had evidently been contracted,
otherwise it could hardly have escaped mention in Domesday Book. The
portion which had been lost was probably the southern portion, for no
mention is made of any possessions south of Traboe in the grants of the
priory lands after its dissolution.
These considerations lend support to what is something more than a
conjecture of Mr. Henry Jenner, viz. that in the two tenements now known
as Lesneage we have the site of Lesmanaoc. Lesneage, as he points out,
may well be a contracted form of Lesmeneage, which in turn may be only
another form of Lesmanaoc, on the same principle as Treveneage in St.
Hilary can be shown by an unbroken series of documents to have been
derived from Trevanaek.
It is worthy of remark that within a short distance of Lesneage is Mill
Mehal or St. Michael’s Mill. If this be the true etymology then the name
Listyavehet becomes less formidable than it looks.
The final “t” is the only difficulty. If we may regard it as a false
reading for “l,” Listyavehet becomes Lis-ty-amehel, the “court of the
house of St. Michael,” Lesmanaoc being the “Monk’s Court,” and the
change of name easily accounted for by the transfer of the monks’
possessions in Menegland (monastic land) to the house at St. Michael’s
Mount.
The _Itinerary_ of William of Worcester deserves attention. It is a
curious assortment of undigested and ill-arranged odds and ends of
information compiled in the year 1478, that is to say about half a
century after the expulsion of the Benedictines from the Mount and the
introduction of the Bridgettines, only five years after the Mount was
seized by John de Vere, Earl of Oxford, and surrendered by him to the
King’s troops after a siege of twenty-three weeks. The _Itinerary_ is
properly speaking a note-book. For the most part William confines
himself to matters of topography, genealogy and hagiology.
Once and again he condescends to men of low estate, as, for example,
when he tells us that about the year 1476 one Thomas Clerk, of Ware,
left Ware on the Octave of St. John the Baptist and rode to the Mount
within ten days and then returned to Ware at the end of another ten
days, thereby covering, according to the route bill which is given,
something over thirty-two miles a day for twenty consecutive days.
William himself rode more leisurely. Leaving Norwich on the 16th of
August, 1478, travelling by way of Truro, he reached Marazion on the
16th of September. The next day he heard Mass at the Mount and in the
afternoon of the same day he began the return journey to Penryn. The
time spent by him in Cornwall was just over a week.
That he should have gathered as much material as he did is therefore a
matter for surprise. Towards this harvest St. Michael’s Mount
contributed its full share, which is scattered without any regard for
convenience or context throughout the work. After describing the
tributaries of the river Fal, and à propos of nothing whatever, he
inserts a (supposed) indulgence of Pope Gregory, said to have been
granted by him in 1070, although Hildebrand did not become Pope until
three years later. The indulgence is addressed to the church of Mount
St. Michael in Tumba in the County of Cornwall, and of it, all but the
opening words are a verbatim copy of the spurious postscript to the
Count of Mortain’s charter, of which mention has been already made. It
is followed by a notice added by the Community at the Mount stating that
the document, having been recently discovered in the old registers, is
placed on the church door and, being unknown to most men, they, the
ministers and servants of God, require and beg all who have the guidance
of souls to do all in their power to publish it in their churches so
that their subjects may be moved to greater devotion and may, by
pilgrimage, frequent that place and obtain the said gifts and
indulgences. William next mentions the apparition of St. Michael in
Mount Tumba, formerly called the “Hore-rok in the Wodd,” which happened
at a time when woodland and meadow and plough land lay between the said
Mount and the islands of Scilly, and there were 240 parish churches now
submerged.
He observes that the first apparition of St. Michael in Mount Gorgon in
the Kingdom of Apulia took place in A.D. 391; the second, in Tumba in
Cornwall, near the sea, about A.D. 710; the third, in the days of Pope
Gregory at a time of a great pestilence; the fourth being _in ierarchiis
nostrorum angelorum_. The next paragraph appears to be the fragment of a
description of Mont St. Michel and its foundation by St. Aubert, bishop
of Avranches.
Then follow various measurements. The length of the church of Mount St.
Michael is stated to be 30 “steppys,” its breadth 12 steppys; the length
of the chapel newly built is 40 feet, i.e. 20 steppys; its breadth about
10 steppys; from the church to the foot of the Mount, to the sea-water,
14 times 60 steppys; the distance by sea between Marazion and the foot
of the Mount is estimated at 1200 (feet), i.e. 700 steppys, in English
10 times 70 steppys. It is difficult to reconcile the last of these
measurements with the former and to connect the “step” with a modern
equivalent. The “step” was not a “pace,” for speaking of the dimensions
of Bodmin Church, William says in length it is 57 paces (_passus_) and
in breadth 30 steppys. It was apparently two feet (_pedes_), but whether
two modern feet of 12 inches we are unable to say. A little further on
William tells us that the island of St. Michael’s Mount is about a mile
in diameter and is distant from the mainland the length of a bow-shot.
It lies north of the island of Ushant in Brittany.