92 



THE CHURCH GOODS OF CORNWALL AT THE TIME OF THE 

 REFORMATION. 



Bt H. MICHBLL WHITLEY, F.G.8.,—I/ou. Secretary. 



Having had occasion to visit the Public Record office in the 

 spring of this year, my attention was drawn to the Inventories 

 of Church goods in Cornwall, taken under the various com- 

 missions issued during the reigns of Henry VIII*^ and Edward 

 VP'' ; and which on examination I found to contain much 

 interesting and valuable information. 



I therefore devoted what time I could conveniently spare to 

 collecting as complete a series of these lists as possible, with the 

 object of contributing a paper on the subject to our Society. 



It is almost needless to say that the work was both difficult 

 and tedious, and only those who have been so occupied can 

 judge of the time and attention requisite ; a day's search in 

 documents of the crabbed handwriting of the period, and 

 perhaps almost illegible from damp and age, sometimes resulting 

 in no new fact worth recording being discovered. 



The first of the Inventories of ornaments, plate, jewels, etc., 

 appears in the Chantry* Certificates relating to Cornwall, Nos. 

 15 and 9 taken respectively, in the 37th year of Henry VHP'' and 

 the 2nd year of Edward VI*''- 



These commissions were issued in order to ascertain the value 

 of the possessions, plate, and jewels of the dissolved colleges, 

 chantries, etc., what endowments, if any, should be left as 

 desirable for the convenience of the parishioners, and what por- 

 tion should be converted to the King's use ; the property of 

 these chantries having been assigned to the crown by the Act of 

 37 Henry VHP'' 



The names of the commissioners appointed on the commission 

 37th Henry VIII'''' (1545), mostly West countrymen, are 



* A place wliei'e masses were sung for the repose of the soula of the dead. 



