St Erth (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Carhangives; Carnhangibes; Carnabeggas

In the civil parish of St Erth.
In the historic county of Cornwall.
Modern Authority of Cornwall.
1974 county of Cornwall.
Medieval County of Cornwall.

OS Map Grid Reference: SW55773477
Latitude 50.16250° Longitude -5.42096°

St Erth has been described as a Timber Castle although is doubtful that it was such.

There are no visible remains.

Description

Spreadbury writes "Vanished castle of Richard FitzTurold." Lewis writes "In the churchyard, and in the village, are the remains of ancient crosses; and near the vicarage-house is a double circular intrenchment, called Carhangives, supposed to have been the site of a baronial castle." Leland writes "And not far from the bridge there was a castle, so it seems, or a manor house now completely demolished, which was called Carnhangibes. Some say that Dinham was lord of this place, and many knights and gentlemen owed suit to his court."

Comments

Lewis and Leland are, almost certainly, referring to the round at SW55773477 (PastScape No 424959) recorded as "A spread outer slope 1.0m. high survives on the W. and S. and faint traces are discernible on the S.E. and E. Surveyed at 1/2500. There is no visible evidence that it was ever bivallate as Polwhele suggests and it was accepted as univallate by Thomas in 1851. Its non-defensive situation on a S.W. slope below the hilltop with its shape and size are typical of an I.A. round rather than a hill-fort (Field Investigators Comments–F1 NVQ 06-APR-65)"

Fitz Turold is recorded in Domesday as holding many manors in Cornwall, as a sub-tenant, but an association with St Erth has not been identified. There is is no suggestion, other than Spreadbury of him having a castle here. Association with the Dinham family not found. The main road used to run through the village across a ford and C14 bridge but there is no suggestion that this was ever anything other than a village. The round does not seem to have had any medieval use and the is no obvious site for the medieval manor house, although PastScape records a couple of chapel sites with a kilometre.

Sources of information, references and further reading

Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 424959.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 29320.

Books
- Spreadbury, I. D., 1984, Castles in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly (Redruth)
  Lewis, Samuel (ed), 1848, A topographical Dictionary of England online transcription
  Lysons, D. and S., 1814, Magna Britannia Vol. 3 Cornwall p. 94 online transcription
  Polwhele, R., 1803, History of Cornwall (London) Vol. 1 p. 112 online copy
Antiquarian (Histories and accounts from late medieval and early modern writers)
- Chandler, John, 1993, John Leland's Itinerary: travels in Tudor England (Sutton Publishing) p. 70
  Toulmin-Smith, Lucy (ed), 1907, The itinerary of John Leland in or about the years 1535-1543 (London: Bell and Sons) Vol. 1 p. 192 online copy

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The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

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