The Parochial History of Cornwall/Volume 1/Blisland
BLISLAND.
HALS.
Blisland is situate in the hundred of Trig-minor, id est, sea-shore the less; so called minor, to distinguish it from Trig-major, which encompasseth a larger tract of land on the sea-shore of the Irish Channel, viz. that now divided into Strator and Lesnewith; and hath upon the east, Temple; west, Helland; north, Brewer and St. Udye; south, Cardinham. The modern name Blisland is a corruption of Bliss-lan, id est, happy, rejoicing, gladsome temple or church, which is testified by the Bishop of Lincoln and Winchester's inquisition into the value of benefices, in order to the Pope's annats 1294, Ecclesia de Bliss-lan in Decanatu de Trigminorshire, vil. In Wolsey's Inquisition and Valor Beneficiorum, £13. 10s. The patronage lately in Sprye, Parker, Reynolds, in right of the manor of Blis-land, now Molesworth; the incumbent Hicks. This parish was rated to the four shillings in the pound land tax 1696, £104. At the time of the Norman Conquest I judge it was taxed under Udy or Pengally.
This manor of Blisland was heretofore invested with the jurisdiction of life and limb within its precincts (the lords whereof doubtless built or endowed the present church); and within memory of the last age, the inhabitants will tell you, that a person was executed, in the gallows-field there, for robbing this parish church of its silver cup and pattens belonging to the altar (vide Mitchell). This manor of Blisland, tempore Hen. VII. was the lands of ........, who forfeited the same by attainder of treason in Flammock's rebellion, whereby it fell to the crown; from whence it was conveyed to the Stanhopes, and from them to Parker, and from Parker to Reynolds, from Reynolds to Sprye, from Sprye to Molesworth.
In this parish somewhere liveth Trese, Gent. The name Tres, or Treas, is Cornish British, and signifies in that language "the third," and was a name taken up in memory of the third son or person of the family from whence he was descended, and is derived from the same Japhetical origin as τριτος, tertius, "the third," as the Latin word tres. Treas is also "the third" in the Scots and Irish tongues.
This parish hath in it loads and streams of tin.
TONKIN.
The etymology of this parish is plain, being wholly Saxon, bless and land, as contrasted with the moors and craggy hills around it. Norden says that the sheriff's writ runneth not within this parish.
THE EDITOR.
Number of statute acres 6025.
| The annual value of the Real Property as returned to Parliament in 1815 | £. 3,643 |
s. 0 |
d. 0 |
| Poor Rate in 1831 | 328 | 5 | 0 |
| Population, | in 1801, 437 |
in 1811, 487 |
in 1821, 637 |
in 1831, 644. |
Increase on an hundred in 30 years 47.4, or more than 47 per cent.
It is worthy of remark, that Mr. Pye, the present incumbent, has been in possession of the living fifty-three years; and that his predecessor, Mr. Hicks, held it during sixty-two years; so that one change of rectors has alone taken place in the long period of an hundred and fifteen years; a case of successive longevity almost unparalleled and the more extraordinary in comparison with the inheritance of family estates, when it is recollected that each of those gentlemen must at the least have completed the twenty-fourth year of his age before he received induction to the benefice.
GEOLOGY.
Doctor Boase remarks the eastern half of this parish is situate on granite, which is of the same kind, and belongs to the same insulated group, as that extending into the parishes of Advent and of Alternun. The western half consists of alternate layers of schistone and of compact rocks, some of which approach near to greenstone. These rocks are, however, more fully exposed in the adjacent parish of St. Breward, or Simonward, under which head they will be described.