Is situate in the hundred of East, and hath upon the north, Pillaton;
south, Salt-Ash, and part of St. Stephen’s; east, Landulph; west,
Landrake. For the first name, it signifies “Flemings’ Parish;” for
blo, bleau, pleu, in Cornish, is of that signification (viz. a
parish); for the second name, it signifies “Flemings,” making amends,
or supplying defects (see Verstegan on the word Bote), and seems from
the name to be a church founded or endowed by some gentlemen of that
name, in order for the commutation of penance for sins committed, and
to pray for the founder’s soul, his ancestors, and relatives; by which
expedients most religious houses and churches heretofore were built.
Originally these Flemings came from Stoke Fleming in Devon, so called,
for that once a nobleman of Flanders resided there, and was lord
thereof: one of whose posterity, tempore Richard I. in this place,
held by the tenure of knight’s service seven knights’ fees, by the
name of Stephen Flandrensis (Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 48), who
probably was the founder of this church, still bearing his name. His
son Richard Flandrensis was sheriff of Cornwall three years, from the
third to the sixth year of King John’s reign. Finally, the estate,
name, and blood of those Flemings, tempore Henry IV. ended in a
daughter and heir, which was married to John Coplestone, of
Coplestone, in the county of Devon.
This district of Bote-Fleming, at the time of the Norman Conquest, was
rated under the name of Pillaton, still contiguous therewith. But at
the time of the inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester
into the value of benefices in Cornwall 1294, in order to the Pope’s
annats, Ecclesia de Bote-fflemmen in Decanatu de Est Wellshire, was
rated iii_s._ iiii_d._ In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, £16. 15_s._; and
the parish rated to the 4_s._ per pound Land Tax 1696, £103. 14_s._
Mutten-ham, id est, the Mutton dwelling or habitation, alias
Mott-an-ham, the meeting or court dwelling, in the year 1689 was the
dwelling of my kind friend John Waddon, Esq. (a justice of peace and
deputy-governor of Pendennis Castle for King James, under John Earl of
Bath); in which house and place his lordship first treated with the
Prince of Orange’s Commissioners, in order to render into his
possession the castles of Pendennis and Plymouth, which soon after was
performed, on condition of the Earl’s holding his former dominion as
governor of those places under him; whereupon he caused the Prince’s
declarations to be first proclaimed or published in those garrisons
amongst the soldiers; who received and heard the same with great joy,
shouts, and acclamations, to the utter destruction of King James’s
jurisdiction and power in Cornwall and Devon, and establishing that
prince’s.
At this time were dispersed those rhymes, said to be made by father
Peters:
“Henricus Octavus
Sold the land that God gave us;
But Jacobus Secundus
Shall refund us.”
The dispersion of which two papers, made all possessors of church
lands and impropriators, together with all rectors and vicars of
churches in Cornwall (except Mr. Beauford of Lantegles, and Mr.
Polwhele of Newland,) to renounce their allegiance to King James, and
to take an oath of fealty to the Prince of Orange, after his accession
to the crown of England.