Tailors and bilingualism in 16th century Cornwall

The 80^th most common surname in Victorian Cornwall was Taylor, an ubiquitous name found across southern Britain. This was already the case in Cornwall in the early 1500s when it appeared from the far east along the Tamar to West Penwith. But in Cornwall Taylor had a competitor.

In the Cornish language the word for tailor was trehar or treher. We find Trehar, spelt eight different ways, in a number of parishes in mid and west Cornwall at this time. These indicate districts in which Cornish was spoken in the 1520s and 1540s. However, even in those areas the number of Trehars only just outnumbered that of Taylors.

Does this mean that mid and west Cornwall was effectively bilingual at this time? No, as we don’t know how many men known as Trehar had their name translated into English by the clerks, minor landlords and clergy who compiled the records. These men were more likely to be proficient in both languages. Furthermore, we have no idea how many of those only officially recorded as Taylor were known in their communities as Trehar, people such as John Taillor in Ruan Major in 1524, but recorded as John Trehar in 1543.

Whatever the case in the early 1500s, the number of Trehars had undergone a steep decline by 1641/42 as Cornish language occupational names succumbed to the advance of English.

Here’s another set of surnames taking us to Taylor/Tailor at number 80. You can check out the early maps of these here.

rank	surname	type	number of households
=71	Oates	personal name	163
=71	Snell	personal name/nickname	163
=71	Tippett	personal name	163
73	Truscott	place-name	162
74	Keast	nickname?	157
75	Woolcock	personal name?	156
=77	Hawken/in/s	multiple	155
=77	Jewell	personal name	155
=77	Veal/Vial	multiple	155
79	Goldsworthy	place-name?	154
80	Taylor	occupational name	153

Further details of most of these names can also be found in my The Surnames of Cornwall.

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