The Celtic Christianity of Cornwall: Divers Sketches and StudiesTaylor, Thomas
History
The Celtic Christianity of Cornwall: Divers Sketches and Studies
Taylor, Thomas
Cornwall (England : County) -- Church history
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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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