I commend to you a pleasant walk in a lonely part of the Devon/Cornwall boundary area; the nearest village has the 'Celtic' name of Kelly, the squire being Mr Kelly of Kelly. After the hamlet of Kelly, the Path will bring you to Bradstone Church. No; I can't tell you its Dedication, because that information was lost at the Reformation (indications offered today, like Nonne or Matthias, are guesses by the Georgians or Victorians). But Nicholas Orme, in his invaluable 1998 book about English Church Dedications, records, from the Kelly Archives, that in 1469 there was a 'store' of S Christopher.
Hence the relevance of all this to today's Holy Mass, in which the propers include, nestling under the kindly wing of S James, a commemoratio of ... Yes!! ... S Christopher! God bless the institution of commemorationes!
Whether S Christopher was the titular, or simply had a subsidiary cult in Bradstone Church, is not clear ... but ... set your fears at rest ... we shall return to this important matter.
Continue further along the camino and you will eventually come to a high, sturdy and well-built bridge, called Greystone Bridge, carrying the traveller across into Cornwall. It was constructed by the Abbot of Tavistock, after the saintly and learned Bishop Lacey of Exeter had granted, in 1439, an indulgence of 40 days for those assisting the work (BTW, Bishops of Exeter continued granting indulgences even after Henry Tudor's schism). My Lord Abbot was a man of consequence and wealth in these parts; his Abbey possessed the only printing press in the South West of England. Naturally, it was destroyed after the Reformation (less than two decades after the Abbey had gleefully secured from the Pope exemption from diocesan jurisdiction!).
The abbey's assets were soon to be looted by a man called Russell, one of the perpetrators of the 1549 Western Genocide. You will not be surprised to know that his descendant was one of the Traitors of 1688, for which treason he was rewarded with the titles "Duke of Bedford and Marquis of Tavistock".
Before this beneficent bridge was built ... how did you get, undrowned and dry-footed, across the great River Tamar which divides Devon from Cornwall?
Back to S Christopher.
He was a popular Saint in medieval England. In many churches his likeness faced you from a church's North wall as you entered by the South door; a big powerful bloke carrying the infant Christ on his shoulder across a great river (the artist very commonly had thoughtfully included the fish).
My theory is that S Christopher was either the Parish Patron, or the Patron of an important guild, composed of ... the Watermen!
I bet they viewed the construction of that fine bridge in the decades after 1439 with a more than Luddite disapproval!
I know the area because Bradstone was one of the seven churches I helped with after I retired from teaching. The church was, formally, closed, but we were allowed to say Mass in it on one Sunday in the year.
If I could grant you an indulgence for walking this camino and offering praise today to S Christopher of Bradstone, I would do so! And for more than a mere forty days!
7 comments:
Saint Christopher pray for us all! Thank you Father for reminding us of his commemoration.
I just looked on Google Maps. It is a splendid bridge! Noted for future holiday reference.
Having distant relatives who are descended from Squire Kelly of Kelly and who moved from Kelly to Red Cliff, I am moved to ask if you know where Red Cliff was (or is). The Red Cliff Kelly descendants sailed to New England in 1635.
Dear Fr Hunwicke,
A 'camino' along the Devon/Cornwall border is a good idea.
On a more serious note, I would be interested to hear your thoughts on the origins of the hamlet of Doddycross which is not too far from that border. I have often passed the road signs for both Doddycross and Merrymeet and I have elaborate musings on the subject of who "Doddy" was/is and why he got cross in the first place. I think there be ancients 'goings-on' round those parts.
Having let my curiosity get the better of me, I last year drove from the main road (A38) to dear old Doddycross only to find the narrow country lanes went on forever, which sent me into a sort of 'haze'. On arrival at Doddycross I found there was no 'there' there, just a few houses (I did take photos though), all nice and scenic and pleasant but still perhaps concealing the true horror of Doddy's original 'rage'. No church, no village hall, just the vague whiff of some ancient demonic stuff. I asked a chap doing his garden, "Is this the place where Doddy got cross?" and he answered, "I suppose so" without so much as a pause.
(In my imaginings, which could be true, Doddy is both a giant sea creature, a bit like a giant walrus, currently hanging around just off the coast of Plymouth, or sometimes he is also very small, maybe mole-like and still getting annoyed in the Doddycross/Merrymeet area. I fear that the reality is this: he is both at the same time. It is also possible that he dines regularly at Nando's in Plymouth).
Could you look into all this for me? There's a good chap. I somehow feel I've been "Tavistocked".
All the best,
Patrick Walsh
Doddy is doubtless cognate with dod, tot, toot, twt in placenames (Doddington, Tooting, Mythe Tute) and dodman (the snail).
See 'The Old Straight Track' by Alfred Watkins (1925) concerning ley lines, an hypothesis sadly discredited by its adoption and distortion by New Age fantasists.
Watkins believed that Neolithic trackways were set out by the Dodman, a surveyor, recognisable by his sighting staves (cf. the Long Man of Wilmington). The snail bears such staves on his head, earning him the folk-name of dodman.
P J Walsh: "Just a few houses" is what usually defines a hamlet, at least in these parts (the kingdom of Dumnonia). And many "crosses" are just that: rural crossroads, quite often with no houses at all.
What is Kelly spelled in Classic Irish? Or Latin?
Kevin is, as I am happy to know, Coimgenus or Caoimhín / older Caoimhghín / even older Cóemgein ... wait, I think I might be able to look it up ...
The Irish surname may be from either Ó Ceallaigh or Ó Cadhla, or yet again from a toponym.
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