Zennar is situated in the hundred of Penwith, and hath upon the north
the Irish sea, north-east Tywidneck, south Maddarne. For the name, if
it be compounded of Sen-nar, it signifies Holy Pool or Lake;
otherwise, if it be a corruption of Se-nar or Seynar, English Cornish,
it signifies the sea lake, or creek of the sea; and the church is
situated in a valley near the sea, with a rivulet of water flowing by
it.
At the time of the Norman Conquest, this district was taxed under the
jurisdiction of Trenwith, or of Alvorton. When the first inquisition
into the value of Cornish Benefices was made, this church was not
endowed, if extant; however, in Wolsey’s Inquisition (1521), it was
rated by the name of Zennor or Sennor £5. 5_s._ The patronage in the
Bishop of Exeter. This parish was rated to the four shillings in the
pound Land Tax in 1696, for one year, at £86. 10_s._
This church, I take it, was endowed by the Prior of St. Michael’s
Mount, and was formerly wholly impropriate. This parish is
comparatively scattered all over with stones and rocks of great
bigness; yet amongst those are found very many fertile plots of ground
for corn, grass, and barley, as also many tin lodes, tending to the
great profit of the farmers and tinners thereof.
In this parish are the ruins of an old free chapel called Chapel Jane,
that is the narrow chapel.