which they had newly received for building a monastery or a church.
"When there were ten days of Lent still remaining there came a messenger to call him to the king, and he, that the religious work might not be intermitted, on account of the king's affairs, entreated his priest, Cynebil, who was also his brother, to complete the work that had been so piously begun. Cynebil readily complied, and when the time of fasting and prayer was over he there built the monastery, which is now called Lastingham."[1]
The name Petrock is really Peterkin, the Celtic diminutive of Peter, and it is probable that Peter Tavy is another of his foundations, as well as certain other churches now regarded as dedicated to the great apostle.
The Saxons, who were saturated with Latin ideas, when they obtained supremacy, rededicated the churches to saints of the Roman calendar, if they were able to obtain from Italy some scraps of bone that it was pretended had belonged to one of the saints of the Latin calendar. But there is no evidence that the British Christians did other than call their churches after the names of the founders.
Lydford church is of fifteenth-century Perpendicular, but in the chancel is an earlier piscina, and the font is possibly pre-Norman. The chancel screen is gone, but the rood staircase remains.
In the churchyard is the often-quoted epitaph of George Routleigh:—
"Here lies in horizontal position
the outside case of
George Routleigh, watch-maker,
- ↑ Hist. Eccl; iii. c. 23.
