1610 Gazetteer of Penwith

[HeatherC]

Hello all

I have transcribed and uploaded the Penwith section of "Speculi Britanniæ pars: a topographical and historical description of Cornwall" by John Norden to my Morvah website.

John Norden was topographer and was the first Englishman who designed a complete series of county histories and geographies (a gazetteer). The first part of his Speculum Britanniae in 1593 was of Middlesex, then Hertfordshire in 1598. Three of his studies were printed long after his death, Essex, Northamptonshire, finished in 1610, but only published in 1720, Cornwall also finished in 1610, published in 1728.

He talks of places "muche anoyde by sea and sande", of St Ives being "a poore haven towne" and of Morvah, "a parishe standinge upon the Irishe sea, in a moste colde seat in winter: It longs to Madern."

You can find it here through my homepage freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~morvah/index.html

or the direct route -

The Gazetteer here freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~morvah/topographical_and_historical_description_of_cornwall.html

and the Map here
freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~morvah/penwith_map_c1590.html

Best regards
Heatherc

[donne]

Thank you, Heather, that's really interesting. I was struck by 'Camburne' described only as 'a churche standinge among the barrayne hills'. Quite a difference to the bustling industrial town it later became.

[myghaelangof]

Nice one Heather, thank you.
This is a very useful piece of history, naming various house owners, and principal mines.
It has helped answer something that has been bothering me in recent years And that is the parish names of Senner and Sennen! I keep wondering if these places are getting mixed up, maybe they are, but Nordens work clearly identifies the similarity in the place names. I guess Sener became Zennor at a later date to avoid this confusion, especially as 'n' and 'r' are very similar in the old hand.

[HeatherC]

Thank you....... There is more to come from the "general" section when I have transcribed it.

It took a while but with the information it gave I thought well worth it. Transcribing so many old parish registers over the years certainly came in use

A lot of double and treble checking went on, as not only were there only 24 letters in the alphabet, but there was also the none standardised spelling ie. parish, paryshe, parishe

No letter "j" so "i" used in it's place

Letter "V" written as a "v" at the beginning of a word, but as a "u" when it appeared within a word.

Letter "U" sometimes written as a "V"

I could go on but I am getting boring now

Have attached a sample alphabet of old hand writing for anyone who may find it of use (also to see if I can make the attachment facility work ).

Best regards
HeatherC

Attachments:

[tonymitch]

And there was me thinking the difference between Senner and Zennor was either because of non standardisation of Ye Olde English Keyboard or a typo as the 'S' is directly above the 'Z'.
;D
Seriously Heather....very well done. It's should be a great help in looking at old manuscripts, and thanks for the transcription of the Gazetteer.



Tony M