The Parochial History of Cornwall, Volume 2 (of 4)
History
The Parochial History of Cornwall, Volume 2 (of 4)
Cornwall (England : County) -- History; Geology -- England -- Cornwall (County)
That it had at that time considerable revenues belonging to it I make
no question, since in the Domesday Book, 20 William I. 1087,
Lan-migell was then taxed, that is to say Michael’s church or Temple,
as aforesaid. But that which renders this place most famous is the
present church or chapel and tower, cemetery, and cells cut in the
rocks for hermetical monks of the order aforesaid; built and further
endowed by William Earl of Morton and Cornwall, yet extant and kept in
good repair, with pews; to whose father, Robert Earl of Morton, King
William the Conqueror had given the lands of many rebels in those
parts, and in particular this Mount, with its appurtenances,
(dedicated as aforesaid) and created him Earl of Cornwall, whose
successors held the same by tenure of Knight Service till temp.
Charles II. Of which sort of tenures there were lately extant, in the
hundred of Penwith, thirteen knight’s fees.――Carew’s Survey of
Cornwall, p. 39. And in other hundreds three hundred more in Cornwall.
Upon the tower of this church or chapel, for it is bigger than many
other Cornish parish churches, is that celebrated place called Kader
Migell, i. e. Michael’s Chair, viz. a kind of seat artificially made
or cut in the stones on the top of its tower, very dangerous in the
access and tremendous to behold.
Contrary to this description, Mr. Carew, in his Survey of Cornwall, p.
154, tells us that St. Michael’s Chair is a bad seat, in a craggy
place without the castle, dangerous for the access and therefore holy
for the adventure; so that I conceive he had this report by hearsay,
not ocular demonstration. In this chapel are yet to be seen the
tombstones of several persons there interred, in the rocks, (with a
small quantity of earth, though without the chapel there is a bank of
earth, brought there by art for burying the dead,) but the
inscriptions on those tombstones are so obliterated with dust and
time, that I had not leisure much to examine them. The roof and timber
of this temple is yet so firm and uniformly kept in repair, that no
decay, moth, or spider’s web are to be seen in the roof thereof, which
gives occasion to a conjecture that the same was all built of Irish
oak, which drives that poisonous creature the spider from it. Certes,
this fabrick is not only an evident proof of the great skill which
former ages, in William the Conqueror’s days, had in the art of
architecture, but that many other such of much later erection can
hardly equal the same, though it has stood firm above six hundred
years.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account