Towednack ( kw, Tewydnek) is a
churchtown and
civil parish
In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
in
Cornwall
Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a Historic counties of England, historic county and Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people ...
, England, United Kingdom. The parish is bounded by those of
Zennor in the west,
Gulval
Gulval ( kw, Lannystli) is a village in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. Although historically a parish in its own right, Gulval was incorporated into the parishes of Ludgvan, Madron and Penzance in 1934, and is now considered to be a suburb ...
in the south,
Ludgvan
Ludgvan ( ; kw, Lujuan) is a civil parish and village in Cornwall, England, UK, northeast of Penzance. Ludgvan village is split between Churchtown, on the hill, and Lower Quarter to the east, adjoining Crowlas. For the purposes of local g ...
in the west and south, and
St Ives and the
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...
in the north and east. The church is about two miles (3 km) from St Ives and six miles (10 km) from
Penzance
Penzance ( ; kw, Pennsans) is a town, civil parish and port in the Penwith district of Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is the most westerly major town in Cornwall and is about west-southwest of Plymouth and west-southwest of London. Situ ...
.
Towednack lies within the
Cornwall Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). Almost a third of Cornwall has AONB designation, with the same status and protection as a National Park.
History
Towednack gold hoard
In December 1931 a
hoard
A hoard or "wealth deposit" is an archaeological term for a collection of valuable objects or artifacts, sometimes purposely buried in the ground, in which case it is sometimes also known as a cache. This would usually be with the intention of ...
of gold ornaments was found in the parish. A sunken lane, known locally as Badger's Lane, leads down from Lady Downs onto the road to
Amalveor
Amalveor ( kw, Amal Veur, meaning "great Amal"; 'Amal' appears to be the name of a river) is a hamlet in West Penwith, Cornwall, England, United Kingdom at . The hamlet is south-west of St Ives. It is in the civil parish of Towednack.
A pair ...
. Here at SW4794 3759, concealed in an ancient stone
hedge
A hedge or hedgerow is a line of closely spaced shrubs and sometimes trees, planted and trained to form a barrier or to mark the boundary of an area, such as between neighbouring properties. Hedges that are used to separate a road from adjoi ...
, was found a collection of beautiful gold objects, including two twisted neckrings, four armrings and two lengths of unfinished gold rod. One necklet consists of a single twisted strand of gold, and the other consists of three strands loosely twisted together. The gold is very fine, and probably came from Ireland. These ornaments date from the late
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...
and they now reside in the
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
. A replica of the hoard can be seen at the
Penlee House Museum in Penzance. In 2007 there were calls in the local Cornish press for the gold hoard to be returned to Cornwall from the British Museum.
Parish church
The church is dedicated to St Tewennocus and did not become parochial until 1902. It was built in the 13th century and has a plain tower. A south aisle was added in the 15th century. The font is of granite, 1720, and stands on a base which is an inverted Norman font. Towednack church is claimed to be the last church in which services were conducted in the
Cornish language
Cornish (Standard Written Form: or ) , is a Southwestern Brittonic language of the Celtic language family. It is a revived language, having become extinct as a living community language in Cornwall at the end of the 18th century. However, ...
(in 1678), though the claim is also made for Ludgvan. The parish saint disguised under the name 'Tewennocus' is almost certainly
St Winwalo (pet-form: Winnoc), also commemorated at
Gunwalloe
Gunwalloe ( kw, Pluw Wynnwalow) is a coastal civil parish in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is situated on the Lizard Peninsula south of Helston and partly contains The Loe, the largest natural freshwater lake in Cornwall. The parish p ...
and
Landewednack, as well as
Landevennec, Brittany: the place-name being derived from Old Cornish "te-Winnoc" (thy St Winnoc
inwalo, now represented as
Late Cornish Te Wydnek. The aisle, chancel and nave was restored under the direction of
Mr Sedding in 1870 and in 1880 the tower and its roof restored. The cost of the 1880 building work was paid for by money from the weekly
offertory
The offertory (from Medieval Latin ''offertorium'' and Late Latin ''offerre'') is the part of a Eucharistic service when the bread and wine for use in the service are ceremonially placed on the altar.
A collection of alms (offerings) from the c ...
. ''
The Cornishman'' newspaper described the parish thus,
The parish is poor; the people are only a few hundreds; many (probably most) of them are Dissenters who never enter a Church; and the Church itself is small; and yet the offertory has been the means of doing more than Church-rates ever did. When the two broken bells are re-cast (will any rich man do this for poor Towednack?) this parish will process the most thoroughly restored Church in West Cornwall.
One of the bells has the inscription ″Baragwanath″ (wheat bread), a name which was still common in this part of Cornwall at the time of the visit of the
Penzance Natural History and Antiquarian Society, in September 1882. They noted, ″a true chancel-arch″, which was described as the church's ″peculiar and rare feature″. Also seen was the
benchends and their medallion-portraits of the 1633 bearded and hatted
churchwarden
A churchwarden is a lay official in a parish or congregation of the Anglican Communion or Catholic Church, usually working as a part-time volunteer. In the Anglican tradition, holders of these positions are ''ex officio'' members of the parish b ...
s. Their inscriptions are ″James Trewhela, warden″ and ″Master Matthew Trenwith, warden″.
Further restoration work was carried out in 1884 with the replacement of the wooden floor of the nave, which was destroyed by
dry rot. The new floor was cement, covered with a wooden platform between the benches and red tiles replaced the ″rough″ slate floor of the aisle.
Until 1902 Towednack was a
chapelry
A chapelry was a subdivision of an ecclesiastical parish in England and parts of Lowland Scotland up to the mid 19th century.
Status
It had a similar status to a township but was so named as it had a chapel of ease (chapel) which was the commu ...
of
Lelant;
right of sepulture was only obtained in 1532. The early incised cross on a stone in the porch and the altar slab suggest that the subordination to Lelant only began after the Norman Conquest. The stone in the porch forms a bench; the cross shaft has crosses at both ends. Over the porch is a typical
sundial
A sundial is a horological device that tells the time of day (referred to as civil time in modern usage) when direct sunlight shines by the apparent position of the Sun in the sky. In the narrowest sense of the word, it consists of a f ...
of a wide class of Cornish church dials from 1720. The inscription reads ″''Bright Sol and Luna Time and Tide doth hold. Chronodix Humbrale''″.
There was a Cornish cross at Tredorwin; it was found in use as a building stone in a cottage at Coldharbour in 1880. It is now in the churchyard (''illustrated right'').
The
Gorsedh Kernow
Gorsedh Kernow (Cornish Gorsedd) is a non-political Cornish organisation, based in Cornwall, United Kingdom, which exists to maintain the national Celtic spirit of Cornwall. It is based on the Welsh-based Gorsedd, which was founded by Iolo Mo ...
was held in the parish in 1933, and the church was the first to hold a service, in Cornish, in modern times.
Mining
In the early part of the 19th-century Towednack was one of the richest tin-producing districts in west Cornwall. Mines included Wheal Reeth, Wheal Margaret, Reeth Consols and Georgia, and Conquer Downs.
Notable people
*
John Quick (1852–1932) – Australian lawyer, politician and judge.
Local government
For the purposes of local government Towednack is a civil parish electing a parish council every four years. The principal local authority in this area is
Cornwall Council
Cornwall Council ( kw, Konsel Kernow) is the unitary authority for Cornwall in the United Kingdom, not including the Isles of Scilly, which has its own unitary council. The council, and its predecessor Cornwall County Council, has a tradition ...
.
Folklore
A story told by the Rev.
W. S. Lach-Szyrma
The Reverend Wladislaw Somerville Lach-Szyrma, M.A., F.R.H.S. (25 December 1841 – 25 June 1915) was a British curate, historian and science fiction writer. He is credited as one of the first science fiction writers to use the word "Martian" ...
, to a group of
antiquarians
An antiquarian or antiquary () is an aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artifacts, archaeological and historic sit ...
from the
Penzance Natural History and Antiquarian Society, was the legend of the tower:
* ''... the tower was never completed as during the night the 'Evil One' would knock down what the men had built the previous day. This went on for some time until the men gave up and the tower remains as it is today (1882).'' Similar legends also refer to nearby
Lelant church and
Brent Tor on Dartmoor.
[Anon. (1883) "An Account of the Annual Excursion, 22 Sep 1882". ''Transactions of the Natural History and Antiquarian Society of Penzance''; p. 202.]
Popular media
In 1975 the church was the scene for the marriage and burial services in ''
Poldark
''Poldark'' is a series of historical novels by Winston Graham, published from 1945 to 1953 and continued from 1973 to 2002. The first novel, '' Ross Poldark'', was named for the protagonist of the series. The novel series was adapted twice ...
'', a
BBC series based on the novels of
Winston Graham.
It was also used as a location in the 1979 BBC series
''Penmarric''.
References
External links
Church of St TowennacCornwall Record Office Online Catalogue for Towednack
{{St Ives CP navigation box
Bronze Age sites in Cornwall
Civil parishes in Cornwall
Gold objects
Hamlets in Cornwall