To my Cousin (C. R.) marrying my Lady (A.)

Since the time of King Arthur: gentry identity and the commonalty of Cornwall c .1300-c .1420

“…118 A profusion of local practices further reinforced this picture, with a specific Cornish husbandman way of riding, many parcels of land in the peninsula divided into Cornish acres, and coarse grains grown on these, used to brew a distinctive 'thycke' ale 'lyke wash as pygges had wrestled dryn'. 119 The circulation of stories of sunken kingdoms, of Tristan, Iseult and King Mark, rendered this distinctiveness even more manifest. 120 The Cornish were not a monolithic entity, however, for the division between the gentry and the peasantry stood out as a chasm, as it did in every shire.…”