The Parochial History of Cornwall/Volume 1/St Breock
ST. BREOCK.
HALS.
St. Breock is situate in the hundred of Pyder, and hath upon the north St. Issy; east, Wadebridge on the Alan river; south, St. Wenn and Withiel; west, St. Columb Major.
The name is derived from St. Breock or Briock, the patron of this church, of one in the island of Guernsey, and perhaps of Breage near Helston.
This St. Breock was a native of Ireland, born at Cork about the fifth century. A man famous in his day, for the most strenuous support of the orthodox faith in opposition to Arianism, the heresy at that time distracting the Latin Church. He was bishop of a diocese in Armorica, now called Britany, where the place of his residence is at this day distinguished by his name.
This parish does not appear in the Bishop of Lincoln's valuation; but in that of Wolsey it is rated at 41l. 10s. 6d.
In the Domesday survey this parish was rated under the district of Pelton or Penpow, now Powton.
This Powton was the voke lands of a manor given to the See of our Cornish Bishop; afterwards to the Bishop of Kirton, and then to Exeter; finally to the Priory of St. Petroc at Bodmin. After the dissolution of monasteries, this barton, together with the extensive manor to which it belonged, passed through a great variety of hands by sale, so that Mr. Hals says the manor had sixteen lords of different families in about sixty-two years; a mutability not to be instanced in any other lands in Cornwall, except Fentongellon in St. Michael Penkivell, which also contained a religious house, but in 26 Henry VIII. was converted to secular purposes.
This manor of Pelton has always possessed a court leet, where writs might be entertained without any limit of amount; but, the lord of the manor having suffered from various escapes of persons confined for debt, the prison, and with it the judicial functions of the court, have been discontinued. Sir William Morice, the secretary of state and friend of General Monk, acquired this manor by purchase. His second daughter, Barbara Morice, married Sir John Molesworth of Pencarrow and brought this property into that family, where it still remains.
Hurston in this parish, which I take to be from the Saxon, and to mean wood town, is still situated in a wood, and formerly belonged to the Carmynews of Fentongellon.
Tredinick gave name and origin to an ancient family of gentlemen. Christopher Tredinick was sheriff of Cornwall in 22 Henry VIII.; he gave for his arms, In a field Or, on a bend Sable three bucks' heads caboshed Argent. His family and name are now, I take it, both extinct. In the time of Charles II. this property came by purchase to Lord Robartes.
[Mr. Hals adds a fanciful derivation of this name; but since "doon" and "din" are well known to signify a place tenable either by nature or art, and "ick" is unquestionably water, Tre-din-ick will be either the fortified town, or the hill town, near a river.]
Trevorder, meaning the further town, or the one most distant; also Trevorder Bickin, the far-off beacon-town, belonged to the Carmynews of Fentongellon, having come to them by the heiress of Trenowith, as Trenowith had acquired it by the heiress of Tregago. It passed by sale from the Carmynews to Vyell, and has subsequently split between six coheiresses, who married Prideaux, Vyvyan, Dennis, Grensill, Rinden, and Smith.
TONKIN.
Mr. Tonkin has not any thing worth inserting that differs from Mr. Hals, except perhaps his etymology of the name Dunveth, a place belonging once to Tredinick, and situated near the churchyard, and therefore named the hill of graves; beth being a grave in Welch and Cornish, and the labials b and v perpetually changing into each other.
THE EDITOR.
This parish measures 6875 statute acres.
Annual value of the Real Property, as £. s. d. returned to Parliament in 1815 . . 6910 The Poor Rate in 1831 776 14 in 1801. 962 in 1811, 998 in 1821, 1225 in 1831, 1430; being an increase of rather more than 50 per cent, in 30 years.
Present Vicar, the Rev. W. Molesworth, presented in 1816 by Sir W. Molesworth, Bart.
GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.
On the north and north-eastern parts of this parish, in the vicinity of the Camel, the land is fertile, resting on a rock which sometimes resembles a calcareous schist, but more commonly that kind of clay-slate which abounds in the calcareous series. This slate at Penquean splits into very thin leaves, and is then quarried as a roofing slate, but is softer and has less lustre, and is not so durable as that raised at Delabole near Camelford. The south and south-western parts of the parish consist of barren downs; the rock forming the substratum is, however, very similar in appearance to what occurs in the other division; but it contains more silex and is less laminated, does not easily cleave, and is less susceptible of decomposition than the former, and therefore produces only a meagre, arenaceous soil.