The Cornish people are one of the oldest indigenous peoples of the British Isles and are separately shown, as "Cornish Celtic", on a map of the Ethnography of Europe, compiled by the Edinburgh Institute of Geography and published by Bartholomew in 1937. One of Britain's leading archaeologists, Professor Colin Renfrew, convincingly argues that Celtic languages were spoken in Britain as long ago as the Neolithic period (4500-2000 BC). Therefore, we might conclude that Celtic people have been resident in Britain for a period exceeding 4000 years. Previously, it had been thought that Celtic peoples spread into Britain c800 BC but, even in this case, their history of occupation in Britain predates that of the English by some 1,300 years. The Cornish people, by definitive name, are identified in the Ravenna Cosmography of c700 AD, itself compiled from Roman sources some 300 years earlier, by the place name Durocornovio, "fortress of the Cornovii, i.e. people of Cerniu (Kernow)". This has been identified as Tintagel, which was a major seat of Celtic royalty during post-Roman centuries and possibly before. By way of contrast, the English peoples - a group with Germanic/Teutonic roots - were not present in the British Isles until the 5th century AD and had no known contact with Cornwall until the 8th century. . During this period, Cornwall under its true Celtic name Cerniu (now Kernow) was, as acknowledged by leading historians, a kingdom; the remnant of a larger south-western kingdom known as Dumnonia. Remains of a king list survive, with rulers such as Gurvor, Tudwal, Cynvor,Gerent I, Constantine and Gerent II, known and confirmed. In 878, the Annales Cambriae recorded the death by drowning of Dungarth (Doniert), rex Cerniu ("King of Cornwall"). The last known Cornish King was Huwal in the early-mid 10th century. During the 9th and 10th centuries there were incursions into Cornwall by the Saxons and King Athelstan achieved a victory, which succeeded an earlier success at Hingston Down in the previous century, at St Buryan in 9?? At the time of the Norman Conquest, the last of the Cornish royal family, Cadoc, became the first of the Earl of Cornwall who was succeeded by the Count of Mortain, who was the half brother of William I.. The Conqueror himself was quick to recognise the Celtic distinctiveness of Cornwall and appointed Bretons, whose language and people were descended from the Early Cornish, to positions within the Earldom. The Exeter, or Little, Domesday Book showed the power exerted by the Normans. It was,in effect a land utilisation survey, designed to determine the taxes which landowners in Cornwall should pay. It should be noted that neither before or after this time that Cornwall in Wessex. In 1337, the Earldom was succeeded by a Duchy, which has survived until the present day. The proper description of Cornwall is not the County of Cornwall, illegally set up in 1889, but the Duchy of Cornwall. The Mappa Mundi shows Cornwall as one of the four distinct nations of Britain, while HenryVIII, in listing his realms, cited England and Cornwall separately. Many Court and official documents of the Medieval and Tudor periods state: "in Anglia et Cornubia" ("in England and in Cornwall"). The 14th century Duchy Charters or Charters of Creation, still completely valid in modern law, firmly state that no "sheriff, bailiff or minister" of the Crown (and thereby Westminster) "shall enter therein (i.e. Cornwall) to execute their writs or summons of or attachments to the Crown, save in the case of the default of the Duke". This, in association with the Charter of Pardon 1508, mentioned below, creates particular consequences for the present Crown, Westminster Government and, indeed the Anglican church, in respect of their presence and actions in Cornwall over the last five centuries. Christianity, which spread from Ireland and Wales and was brought by missionaries from Ireland and Wales, whose names were recorded in the Lives of the Saints, was widespread in Cornwall long before the arrival of St. Augustine in Kent. The Cornish religion was a branch of the early Celtic Church which resisted the demands of Catholicism until about the 10th century. Catholicism in Cornwall adapted to the custom of the period by adopting many of the practices of the Celtic Church, thus ensuring a relatively smooth transition. The first concerted attempt to impose English culture and language upon the Celtic Cornish occurred in 1549 when, at the demand of the previous king, Henry VIII, Catholicism was to be replaced by the Protestantism of the Anglican church. |
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The Cornish people resisted strongly, protesting particularly at the imposition of the English language that few of them spoke or understood (most were monoglot Cornish speakers) in church services. Their uprising in defence of their religion and language is reviewed by some as part of the Prayer Book Rebellion and was the third time in 50 years that the Cornish had marched upon England in anger. The English response was shameful, bringing in foreign mercenaries and becoming the first state to use them in a civil dispute. These arquebusiers from Germany and Italy killed a thousand Cornish fighters, then murdered 900 unarmed Cornishmen at Clyst St Mary, 1300 Cornishmen were slaughtered at Sampford Courtnay and 300 Cornish patriots died at Fenny Bridges. The King being a mere child at the time, further orders were issued by the Lord Protector, the Earl of Somerset, and Archbishop Thomas Cranmer for the genocide of the Cornish people. Under Sir Anthony Kingston, English and mercenary forces moved into Cornwall and, in all, brought the slaughter up to 11% of its population before the butchery was stopped. With families deprived of their menfolk and livelihoods, the true figure of deaths caused by this barbaric crime accounted for 20% of the Cornish population. Proposals to translate the Prayer Book into Cornish were also suppressed. Those that had led the ethnic slaughter on England's behalf were richly rewarded. The Cornish Holocaust has, for years been omitted or glossed over by English "history" books but is now coming to light more publicly. It is remarkable that the Cornish language survived until the late 19th century, albeit in small pockets in the Land's End and Lizard peninsulas. By this time, scholars such as Henry Jenner were researching the old language and begun the revival which flourishes today, despite its exclusion from the curricula of Cornish schools. Nevertheless, it has been described as the world's fastest growing language with the number of current speakers and students running into four figures. The language features on the Arms of Cornwall Council, onen hag oll, "one and all"; and those on Penwith District Council, kensa ha dewertha, "first and last". Various towns and villages in West Cornwall now display bilingual name signs: St Ives, Porthia; Mousehole, Porth Enys; Penzance, Pensans; Helston, Hellys; Lelant, Lananta, to name but a few, plus, of course, on the various Tamar crossings: Cornwall, Kernow. Even so, the curriculum unlawfully imposed on Cornish schools by Westminster refuses to instruct Cornish children in their own native language and, in fact, goes so far as to teach them that they are "English". The current education system in Cornwall is but one facet of the programme of ethnic cleansing by stealth being waged upon the Cornish people by England. The Cornish language, like the Welsh, Breton and the Cumbric language (Cumbria) which died out in the 14th century, is a direct descendant of the Celtic tongue known as Brythonic, which was formerly spoken throughout mainland Britain before developing into distinct regional or national languages from the late 6th century AD. A remarkable distinctiveness has existed for over 800 years: Cornwall's legal right to its own Parliament. The right was confirmed and strengthened by the Charter of Pardon 1508, which added to its rights that of veto over acts, statutes, laws, etc., passed by the Westminster government. These rights were granted in perpetuity and cannot be lawfully rescinded. Cornwall's right to its own sovereign Parliament, and the powers it processes under the Charter of Pardon were confirmed as valid in British law by the then Lord Chancellor, Lord Elwyn Jones in 1977. The ramifications of this irrevocable Charter, in association with the Duchy Charters of Creation mentioned above, in respect of the Westminster government's (and its agents,) presence and actions are huge. In British law - a law that has been continually ignored and breached by England - no officer or agent of the Crown (this would include both Westminster and the Anglican Church) can legally set foot upon Cornish soil without the express and joint permissions of the Duke of Cornwall and Cornwall's Stannary Parliament. It can be immediately seen that such agencies as the Church of England, the Crown Prosecution Service, H.M. Customs and excise and H.M. Inspector of Taxes operate within Cornwall illegally. The imposition of such further agencies as English heritage, English Estates, English Nature etc., also have no legal right to operate within the borders of the Duchy. To put this situation right after centuries of abuse and contempt for the law would create chaos, immediately explaining why the Westminster government continues to ignore and even deny the existence of such laws. However, it is a situation that Westminster is entirely responsible for and has brought upon itself through its colonialist attitude. The imposition of English heritage to oversee Cornish sites and monuments has outraged a significant proportion of Cornwall's people who resent the rewriting of history to claim, as the heritage of the English, monuments built by their own forebears long before the English settled in Britain. |
It is noticeable that, in publications issued by English Heritage, all references to the native Cornish people of today or the past as Celtic is deliberately omitted, to be replaced by obscure terms such as "Iron Age" or "Romano-British". As Cornwall was virtually unaffected by the Roman occupation of Britain, the latter term, when applied to the Cornish natives of the time, is singularly inapt. Further powerful evidence of Cornwall's national distinctiveness and legal position were cited in the notable Duchy of Cornwall v the Crown case of 1855, when it was confirmed by the Attorney General to the Duchy, Sir George Harrison, that Cornwall was, in law, a Palatine State , extra-territorial to the English Crown and whose quasi-sovereign is the Duke of Cornwall; that during the Kingdom, Earldom and Duchy, Cornwall had always been treated as distinct from England; and that its eastern boundary confirmed that set up in 931 AD, that is, the east bank of the Tamar river; all of which was accepted as the legal position by the Court. It is to be noted that all arbitrary adjustments to that boundary by the Boundary Commission and others, and its position as shown by the Ordnance Survey, are unlawful. |
