Cornwall, Connectivity and Identity in the Fourteenth Century, by S.J. Drake

Medieval Cornwall had a more distinct identity than any other English county, with the possible exception of Kent. In part, this came from geography: its peninsular form and remoteness. In part, it was historical, having been a separate kingdom until the late 800s. In part, it was something wished on Cornwall by literary authors: Geoffrey of Monmouth and his successors, the writers of romances. They depicted Cornwall as a separate duchy or kingdom of ancient Britain: the realm of Arthur, Tristan and Yseut. In part, the Cornish understood themselves to be different. This is particularly apparent in their cherishing so many unusual saints who were believed to have come to Cornwall from other ‘Celtic’ lands and to have established Christian sites independently of this process in England. There was even a legend that Cornwall had received its own Roman mission from Gregory the Great through St Germanus, although he lived over a century earlier.

At the same time, Cornwall was ruled by English kings from the time of King Alfred, and shared with other regions in the growth of royal government thereafter. As Dr Drake demonstrates, it had certain features of its own: its stannaries that regulated the production of tin, its own kind of acre and its Brittonic language although, by 1300, this was spoken only in its western half. It was an earldom converted in 1337 to be a duchy and an appanage for the monarch’s eldest son. The duchy comprised a collection of estates with certain rights over the whole of the county, but Cornwall was not a palatinate to the extent that was true of Cheshire, Durham or Lancashire. It had the normal set of sheriffs and other royal officers. It lay within the English legal system. It sent members to Parliament and, for religious purposes, it was part of the diocese of Exeter and the province of Canterbury. Its archdeaconry and parishes functioned in the usual ways. Only in its absence of great landlords other than the earl or duke was it less typical: an absence which also caused its religious houses to be fewer and more modest than elsewhere.

Dr Drake’s book sets out to explore this dichotomy: difference and similarity. It does not take the form of a comparative study of Cornwall with one or more other counties elsewhere in England, which would have involved an analysis of political, social and economic history in all respects. Rather it examines Cornwall’s connections with the rest of England: the extent to which its inhabitants were involved in English affairs beyond the River Tamar, and the ways in which other English were involved in Cornish affairs. This means that only the upper and more mobile parts of society receive attention. Socially the book is mainly about gentry and clergy, with some consideration of merchants, mariners and soldiers, as well as immigrants from Brittany and elsewhere. Chronologically it focuses on the fourteenth century, but often goes beyond as far as the early seventeenth in search of material especially about cultural matters. The same topics often reappear in successive chapters so that the reader does not always get the full range of evidence and conclusion in any one place. The index must be used to remedy this.

Within these limits, the scope of the book ranges widely. It falls into three parts. The first introduces the county, examines the structure of government, discusses how far there was a county community, and expounds what is known of Cornishness in such matters as personal names, saint cults, literature and recreations. On the basis of taxation lists, the author discounts the use of Cornish saints’ names as forenames, but other records show that such names were in use for both men and women, although in a minority of cases. The second part is a history of the earldom and duchy (from 1337) and those who held them. The earls and dukes were members of the royal family, apart from Piers Gaveston, who appears to have been a very negligent and uninvolved holder of his property. Part Three looks at the ways in which the Cornish were connected with the rest of England or vice versa. These include royal duties, military service, lord and tenant relationships, commerce, the legal system, the Church, and maritime matters (shipping and piracy). Some substantial appendices list the office-holders in the county alphabetically, the records of Cornish men-at-arms and archers chronologically, and the ports that sent ships to the royal fleet, all during the long fourteenth century.

The book concludes with some pages of reflections. Cornwall had features of its own, but was for most purposes an English shire. It was peripheral but its gentry, clergy, merchants and mariners travelled widely—the latter as far afield as Iceland, Spain and the Baltic. There were communities of Cornish in Oxford and more especially in London. Some people moved into Cornwall as royal office-holders establishing gentry families or as poorer immigrants. These conclusions form a convincing argument in a well-written and engaging book. It scores well on two points. Firstly, it is a sober account of Cornish distinctiveness and integration within England, without the passion that distorts the issue in more popular accounts. Secondly, it is a useful examination of how a county functioned as a community and related to the rest of England in its government, law and trade. This will be a valuable comparator for studies of counties elsewhere.