We’re now down to the last three surnames, each of which could boast over 1,000 households in the Cornwall of 1861. Like Harry and Harris or Stephens and Stevens, Richard and Rickard share the same root, being merely alternative pronunciations (one from Parisian Old French and the other from Picardy.) In medieval Cornwall and England these two names, introduced by the Normans, look to have been interchangeable. So, whether you’re a Richards or a Rickard depends heavily on luck and the pronunciation/spelling of the name at the time it solidified into a hereditary surname (which in west Cornwall quite was sometimes late – in the 1500s.)
The pattern of this surname in the 1500s tells us that it was relatively late in its adoption as a hereditary surname, most common in west and mid Cornwall and with a patchier presence in the east, where surnames had been embraced up to two centuries previously.
I’ve tended to treat Richards and Rickard as separate surnames although there’s no real logic to that decision, based as it was merely on a feeling that people generally tend to regard them these days as different. In fact, if we lump the two together this gives us over 1,200 Richards and Rickard households in 1861 and pushes the combined surname (just) into second spot in this top 20. For some reason, whereas Richard was fast gaining its <s> ending in the 1600s, Rickard never did.
Cornish studies resources 
Are you sure Richards is a Cornish surname? i’ve noticed when traced the surname usually ends up being from upcountry if you go back enough, quite often somerset.
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As the first map above indicates the name Richard/Rickard was heavily concentrated on the Cornish-speaking parts of Cornwall in the early 1500s when surnames were becoming hereditary in mid and west Cornwall. I’d be very surprised if many of those Cornish-speakers had come from Somerset, a tricky thing to prove before the 1540s in any case. It’s possible that there was some migration of Richards families into east Cornwall both in the later medieval period and later and no doubt even more from Devon, but this can be viewed as part of the expected short-distance migratory churn.
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Cornish surnames from somerset do seem improbable I agree, however there would appear to be some Richards’s from somerset moving down because they’re some Richards in my tree that have been traced to Somerset and moved to Wendron
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My Richards appear to have moved into the Lizard Head/Perranunthnoe/Marazion/St. Hilary region in the prior to 1500s from Wales from the Sir Thomas Richardson line.
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