Is situate in the hundred of Pedyr, and hath upon the north the Irish
sea; on the west, St. Cuthbert; south, Newland; east, St. Columb
Minor. As for this compound name, it is plain British; Cran-tock,
Cran-dock, id est, a place that heretofore bore or carried beech
trees. But others will have the name to be derived from its pretended
titular guardian, one St. Carantochus, a British disciple of St.
Colomb’s, of whom I must plead _non sum informatus_; otherwise than
that Carantodhius in old British, Scots, and Irish, is love,
affection, tenderness. Cran-teck is fair beech trees.
More sure I am that this district, at the time of the Domesday Roll,
was taxed under the name of Ryalton or Cargoll; and in the Inquisition
of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, into the value of
church livings in Cornwall, Ecclesia Sancti Carentini in Decanatu de
Pidre is thus rated, the vicar 40_s._ and the nine prebends, then
extant in this collegiate church, were thus taxed, viz. John de
Woolrington, 53_s._ 4_d._; John de Cattelyn, 30_s._; Nicholas Strange,
30_s._; John de Ingham, 40_s._; Ralph de Trethinick, 53_s._ 4_d._;
David de Monton, 40_s._; William de Patefond, 40_s._; John Lovell,
30_s._; John de Glasney, 6_s._ 8_d._; in all 19_l._ 3_s._ 4_d._ From
whence I gather this collegiate church had great revenues then
belonging to it, since it is higher rated to the Pope’s annats than
any other church then in Cornwall. However, before Richard II.’s time
it was wholly impropriated or appropriated to its founder and endower,
the Prior of St. Pedyr at Bodmin; the vicar subsisting only by a small
salary of 6_l._ and oblations and obventions; for which reason it is
not mentioned in Wolsey’s inquisition, or Valor Beneficiorum.
Which collegiate church being dissolved by the statute 26 Henry VIII.
and the revenues vested in the crown, the impropriator Mr. Buller is
patron and rector of the vicarage church now extant; the incumbent
Warne, who comparatively subsists upon his bounty; and the parish
rated to the 4_s._ per pound Land Tax, 1696, 73_l._ 16_s._
By reason of the great quantities of sea-sand blown up from the
Gannell creek by the wind (tempore Edward VI. as Holinshed saith), the
place where the college stood is now scarce discernible; only a
consecrated arched well of water bears the name of St. Ambrose’s Well,
contiguous therewith.
Speed and Dugdale, in their Monasticon Anglicanum, tell us that at its
dissolution, 26 Henry VIII. it consisted only of four prebends, whose
revenues were valued only at 89_l._ 15_s._ from whence it appears five
prebendary’s rents were dismembered from it before that time; and
since its suppression the lands of those four prebends have passed
from the crown to Louis, from Louis to Goldingham, from Goldingham to
Lutterell, now in possession thereof.
The vicarage church of Crantock is commonly called lan-guna, or
lan-gona, that is to say the hay temple or church; and is, suitable to
its name, situate in a large hay meadow of very rich land, containing
about three acres, where, by ancient custom the vicar’s cattle
depasture over the dead bodies interred therein.
Tre-ganell, or Tre-gonell, in this parish, that is to say, the canal
or channel town, situate upon a creek of the north sea, gave name and
original to an old family of gentlemen surnamed Tregonell or
Treganell, whose three daughters and heirs, tempore James I. were
married to Bauden, Pallamonter, and Penpoll, who gave for their arms,
in a field Argent, three Ogresses between two cottices in fess Sable,
as many Cornish daws Proper.
John Tregonell, or Treganell,――of his posterity (now transnominated to
Tregonwell), was a younger brother of this house, tempore Henry VII.
who had his first education in this college of Crantock at a cheap
rate, (as any may be had at Aberdeen or Glasgow in Scotland,) from
whence he went to Oxford, and proceeded so far in book-erudition as to
take his degree of Doctor of the Civil and Canon Law, and acquired
such perfection and fame therein, that he was chosen proctor for Henry
VIII. in that costly divorce betwixt him and Queen Catherine of Spain;
by whom he was also knighted, and for his labour and pains therein had
a pension of 40_l._ per annum settled upon him during his life; and
afterwards, upon the resignation of that annuity, and the payment of a
thousand pounds, he had by that king settled upon him and his heirs
the site and demesne of Midleton, a mitred abbey in Dorset, of great
value, which his posterity enjoy to this day, himself being buried in
Midleton church 1540. He had issue John, afterwards knighted, sheriff
of Dorset, 1 Philip and Mary; who married ――――, and had issue John
Tregonell, Esq. sheriff of Dorset 2 James I., who also married ――――,
and had issue John Tregonell, Esq. sheriff of that county 15 James I.,
when Francis Vyvyan, Esq. was sheriff of Cornwall.
Tre-ago, also Tre-agho, synonymous words, in this parish, that is to
say, the fishing spear or barbed iron for stabbing fish, used it seems
heretofore in the gannell or channell haven contiguous therewith, by
the owners of this little barton and manor, and from thence
denominated; tri-ago is in Latin-Cornish a threefold action, or acting
or making; tre-ago, the town of action. From this place was also
denominated its lord, of an ancient family of gentlemen surnamed De
Tre-ago, who at his own proper cost and charge built the south aile in
the now vicarage church of Crantock, and appropriated the same to his
family or heirs and assigns for ever, by charging those lands with the
repair and maintenance thereof (for ever) as at this day they do,
without being chargeable to the parish of Crantock. The sole daughter
and heir of those Treagos, as I am informed, was married to Mynors,
tempore Edward IV. who made it the seat of his family; as afterwards,
tempore Elizabeth, the issue male of Mynors failing, his only daughter
and heir was married to Tregian, and Tregian’s posterity, by ill
conduct, wasted this barton and manor of Treago, and sold the same for
the payment of bills of cost to John Cooke, Gent. attorney-at-law,
tempore James I.; and in like manner Thomas Cooke, Esq. within fifty
years after the death of his father or grandfather, sold this place
and most of his other lands to Hugh Boscawen of Tregothnan, Esq. now
in possession thereof, viz. temp. Charles II.
This place was heretofore privileged with the jurisdiction of a court
leet, and a strong prison for keeping prisoners for debt in durance,
though now I take it to be destitute of both. The arms of Mynors were,
Sable, an eagle displayed Or, on a chief Azure, bordered Argent, a
chevron between two crescents above and a rose beneath Or. This last
bearing on the chief, and marshalled within the escutcheon was, as
tradition saith, the coat armour of Treago; and such sort of
marshalling divers coats Nicholas Upton doth approve of, especially
where a man hath large possessions by his mother, and but a small
patrimony from his father; as perhaps the case was thus with Mynors.
In this parish is the port, haven, or creek, called the gonell or
ganell, that is to say the canal or channel of the Tremporth river,
leading into the sea, wherein much fish and fowl is caught; and many
times ships frequent this place for trade and safety, the sea here
winding up itself between the lands about a mile in the country. It
also, at full sea, affordeth entrance and anchorage for ships of the
greatest burthen, if conducted by a pilot that understands the course
of the ganell or channel; at the head of which, as a ligament
fastening the parishes of Lower St. Colomb and Crantock together, is a
county bridge, called Trem-porth; that is to say, the tying,
fastening, terrifying, or making afraid gate, cove, or entrance, so
aptly named perhaps from the rapid confluence of this channel or river
in winter season, before the bridge was built, where it meets the salt
waters, and the softness of the clay and sea-moore marsh there on
which the bridge is situate.
I find William Smith, Esq. of Crantock in Cornwall, (which I take to
be of this place,) was created a baronet by Charles I., 27 December
1642, patent 418. I suppose the son of that Smith of Exon, that
married one of the coheirs of Vyell of Trevorder. He had issue Sir
James Smith, Baronet, (but where they lived in this parish I know
not,) whose arms were, Sable, a fess and two barrulets, between three
martlets, Or.
The manors of Cargoll and Ryalton being given by our earls of Cornwall
before the Norman Conquest to the Bishop of Bodmin or Cornwall, or the
prior thereof; some of them were founders and endowers of this college
of Crantock out of the lands and revenues thereof.