Dolly Pentreath
Encyclopedia
Dolly Pentreath, or Dorothy Pentreath (baptised 1692, died December 1777) was probably the last fluent native speaker of the Cornish language
, prior to its revival in 1904 and the subsequent small number of children brought up as bilingual native speakers of revived Cornish.
She is often stated to have been the last monoglot speaker of the language, that is, the last person who spoke only Cornish and not English, but this is contradicted by her own account of herself, as recorded by Daines Barrington
.
in the Cornish language, which most local inhabitants (even the gentry
) then understood. She lived in the parish of Paul
, next to Mousehole
.
Perhaps due to poverty, Pentreath never married, but in 1729 she gave birth to a son, John Pentreath, who lived until 1778.
In 1768, Daines Barrington
searched Cornwall for speakers of the language and at Mousehole
found Pentreath, then a fish seller said to be aged about 82, who "could speak Cornish very fluently". In 1775, he published an account of her in the Society of Antiquaries
' journal Archaeologia, entitled On the Expiration of the Cornish Language. Barrington reported that "the hut in which she lived was in a narrow lane", and that in two rather better cottages just opposite it he had found two other women, some ten or twelve years younger than Pentreath, who could not speak Cornish readily, but who understood it. Five years later, Pentreath was said to be in her 87th year and was "poor and maintained mostly by the parish, and partly by fortune telling and gabbling Cornish".
In the last years of her life, Pentreath became a local celebrity for her knowledge of Cornish. About 1777, she was painted by the youthful John Opie
(1761–1807), and in 1781 an engraving of her after Robert Scaddan was published.
In 1797 a Mousehole fisherman told Richard Polwhele
(1760–1838) that William Bodinar "used to talk with her for hours together in Cornish; that their conversation was understood by scarcely any one of the place; that both Dolly and himself could talk in English"'
Pentreath has passed into legend for cursing at people in a long stream of fierce Cornish whenever she became angry. Her death is seen as marking the death of Cornish as a community language. According to legend, her last words were "Me ne vidn cewsel Sawznek!" ("I don't want to speak English!") but it is more likely that this was her customary response to being addressed in English.
There are many tales about her. She was said often to curse people, including calling them "kronnekyn hager du", an "ugly black toad", and was even said to have been a witch. Numerous other stories have been attached to her, their accuracy unknown. She was at one time thought to have been identical with a Dorothy Jeffrey or Jeffery whose burial is recorded in the Paul parish register but this has been doubted (however the Oxford DNB (2004) does accept the identification).
by Louis Lucien Bonaparte
, a nephew of Napoleon
, and by the Vicar of Paul of the time. It read:
Contradicting the monument, in 1882 Dr Frederick Jago of Plymouth received a letter from Bernard Victor, of Mousehole, who wrote "She died Decr. 26, 1777, at the age of 102. At her funeral the undertaker was George Badcock. He being my grandfather, that is the reason I am so well informed ; and there were eight chosen fishermen bearers to take her to her last resting place. There was not anything erected on the old lady's grave as a tablet to her memory. I know quite well the grave where her remains are deposited." In a later letter he went on to say that it was no surprise that Bonaparte and Garret had mistaken both the date and the place of the grave. "Dolly's actual resting place is 47 feet south-east, a point easterly from Prince L. L. Bonaparte's monument to her. It is not to be said that the monument is in its right place, because it was put there by the order of Prince L. L. Bonaparte, or by the Rev. John Garrett — the one a Frenchman and the other an Irishman!" However, the erroneous idea that Pentreath had lived to be 102 is believed to originate in a Cornish language epitaph which had been written by December 1789 and published in 1806 by a man named Tomson.
No burial of Dorothy Pentreath is recorded, but it has been argued that this appears in the parish register
under the name of Dolly Jeffery, which is suggested to be the surname of her son's father. This theory is accepted by the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
In 1887, the monument was moved to the site of her unmarked grave, and a skeleton was disinterred which was believed to be hers.
Pêr-Jakez Helias
, the Breton
writer, has dedicated a poem to Dolly Pentreath.
After her death, Barrington received a letter, written in Cornish and accompanied by an English translation, from a fisherman in Mousehole
named William Bodinar (or Bodener) stating that he knew of five people who could speak Cornish in that village alone. Barrington also speaks of a John Nancarrow from Marazion
who was a native speaker and survived into the 1790s.
There is one known traditional Cornish speaker, John Mann, who as a child in Boswednack, Zennor, always conversed in Cornish with other children, and was alive at the age of 80 in 1914. He was the last known of a number of traditional Cornish speakers of the 19th Century including Jacob Care of St Ives (d. 1892); Elizabeth Vingoe of Higher Boswarva, Madron (d. 1903 and who taught at least some Cornish to her son); John Davey
junior (d. 1891) and senior, of Boswednack; Anne Berryman (1766-1854), also of Boswednack. Matthias Wallis of St. Buryan certified in 1859 that his grandmother, Ann Wallis, who had died around 1844, had spoken Cornish well. He also stated that a Jane Barnicoate, who had died circa 1857, could speak Cornish too.
Cornish language
Cornish is a Brythonic Celtic language and a recognised minority language of the United Kingdom. Along with Welsh and Breton, it is directly descended from the ancient British language spoken throughout much of Britain before the English language came to dominate...
, prior to its revival in 1904 and the subsequent small number of children brought up as bilingual native speakers of revived Cornish.
She is often stated to have been the last monoglot speaker of the language, that is, the last person who spoke only Cornish and not English, but this is contradicted by her own account of herself, as recorded by Daines Barrington
Daines Barrington
Daines Barrington, FRS was an English lawyer, antiquary and naturalist.Barrington was the fourth son of the first Viscount Barrington. He was educated for the profession of the law, and after filling various posts, was appointed a Welsh judge in 1757 and afterwards second justice of Chester...
.
Life
Baptised 16 May 1692, Pentreath was probably the second of the six children of Nicholas Pentreath, a fisherman, by his second wife, Jone Pentreath. She later claimed that she could not speak a word of English until the age of twenty. Whether or not this is correct, Cornish was her first language. In old age, she remembered that as a child she had sold fish at PenzancePenzance
Penzance is a town, civil parish, and port in Cornwall, England, in the United Kingdom. It is the most westerly major town in Cornwall and is approximately 75 miles west of Plymouth and 300 miles west-southwest of London...
in the Cornish language, which most local inhabitants (even the gentry
Gentry
Gentry denotes "well-born and well-bred people" of high social class, especially in the past....
) then understood. She lived in the parish of Paul
Paul, Cornwall
Paul is a civil parish and village in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated two miles south of Penzance and one mile south of Newlyn.The village of Paul is represented on Penzance Town Council...
, next to Mousehole
Mousehole
Mousehole is a village and fishing port in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated approximately 2½ miles south of Penzance on the shore of Mount's Bay.The village is in the civil parish of Penzance...
.
Perhaps due to poverty, Pentreath never married, but in 1729 she gave birth to a son, John Pentreath, who lived until 1778.
In 1768, Daines Barrington
Daines Barrington
Daines Barrington, FRS was an English lawyer, antiquary and naturalist.Barrington was the fourth son of the first Viscount Barrington. He was educated for the profession of the law, and after filling various posts, was appointed a Welsh judge in 1757 and afterwards second justice of Chester...
searched Cornwall for speakers of the language and at Mousehole
Mousehole
Mousehole is a village and fishing port in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated approximately 2½ miles south of Penzance on the shore of Mount's Bay.The village is in the civil parish of Penzance...
found Pentreath, then a fish seller said to be aged about 82, who "could speak Cornish very fluently". In 1775, he published an account of her in the Society of Antiquaries
Society of Antiquaries of London
The Society of Antiquaries of London is a learned society "charged by its Royal Charter of 1751 with 'the encouragement, advancement and furtherance of the study and knowledge of the antiquities and history of this and other countries'." It is based at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London , and is...
' journal Archaeologia, entitled On the Expiration of the Cornish Language. Barrington reported that "the hut in which she lived was in a narrow lane", and that in two rather better cottages just opposite it he had found two other women, some ten or twelve years younger than Pentreath, who could not speak Cornish readily, but who understood it. Five years later, Pentreath was said to be in her 87th year and was "poor and maintained mostly by the parish, and partly by fortune telling and gabbling Cornish".
In the last years of her life, Pentreath became a local celebrity for her knowledge of Cornish. About 1777, she was painted by the youthful John Opie
John Opie
John Opie was an English historical and portrait painter. He painted many great men and women of his day, most notably in the artistic and literary professions.-Life and work:...
(1761–1807), and in 1781 an engraving of her after Robert Scaddan was published.
In 1797 a Mousehole fisherman told Richard Polwhele
Richard Polwhele
Richard Polwhele was a Cornish clergyman, poet and topographer.-Biography:Born at Truro, Cornwall, Polwhele met literary luminaries Catharine Macaulay and Hannah More at an early age. He was educated at Truro Grammar School, where he precociously published The Fate of Llewellyn...
(1760–1838) that William Bodinar "used to talk with her for hours together in Cornish; that their conversation was understood by scarcely any one of the place; that both Dolly and himself could talk in English"'
Pentreath has passed into legend for cursing at people in a long stream of fierce Cornish whenever she became angry. Her death is seen as marking the death of Cornish as a community language. According to legend, her last words were "Me ne vidn cewsel Sawznek!" ("I don't want to speak English!") but it is more likely that this was her customary response to being addressed in English.
There are many tales about her. She was said often to curse people, including calling them "kronnekyn hager du", an "ugly black toad", and was even said to have been a witch. Numerous other stories have been attached to her, their accuracy unknown. She was at one time thought to have been identical with a Dorothy Jeffrey or Jeffery whose burial is recorded in the Paul parish register but this has been doubted (however the Oxford DNB (2004) does accept the identification).
Monument
Pentreath was buried at Paul, where in 1860 a monument in her honour was set into the churchyard wall of the church of St Paul AurelianPaul Aurelian
Paul Aurelian is a 6th century Welsh saint, who became one of the seven founder saints of Brittany....
by Louis Lucien Bonaparte
Louis Lucien Bonaparte
Louis Lucien Bonaparte was the third son of Napoleon's second surviving brother, Lucien Bonaparte. He was born at Thorngrove, mansion in Grimley, Worcestershire, England, where his family were temporarily interned after having been captured by the British en route to America A philologist and...
, a nephew of Napoleon
Napoleon I of France
Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...
, and by the Vicar of Paul of the time. It read:
Contradicting the monument, in 1882 Dr Frederick Jago of Plymouth received a letter from Bernard Victor, of Mousehole, who wrote "She died Decr. 26, 1777, at the age of 102. At her funeral the undertaker was George Badcock. He being my grandfather, that is the reason I am so well informed ; and there were eight chosen fishermen bearers to take her to her last resting place. There was not anything erected on the old lady's grave as a tablet to her memory. I know quite well the grave where her remains are deposited." In a later letter he went on to say that it was no surprise that Bonaparte and Garret had mistaken both the date and the place of the grave. "Dolly's actual resting place is 47 feet south-east, a point easterly from Prince L. L. Bonaparte's monument to her. It is not to be said that the monument is in its right place, because it was put there by the order of Prince L. L. Bonaparte, or by the Rev. John Garrett — the one a Frenchman and the other an Irishman!" However, the erroneous idea that Pentreath had lived to be 102 is believed to originate in a Cornish language epitaph which had been written by December 1789 and published in 1806 by a man named Tomson.
No burial of Dorothy Pentreath is recorded, but it has been argued that this appears in the parish register
Parish register
A parish register is a handwritten volume, normally kept in a parish church or deposited within a county record office or alternative archive repository, in which details of baptisms, marriages and burials are recorded.-History:...
under the name of Dolly Jeffery, which is suggested to be the surname of her son's father. This theory is accepted by the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
In 1887, the monument was moved to the site of her unmarked grave, and a skeleton was disinterred which was believed to be hers.
Pêr-Jakez Helias
Pêr-Jakez Helias
Pêr-Jakez Helias, baptised Pierre-Jacques Hélias, nom de plume Pierre-Jakez Hélias was a Breton stage actor, journalist, author, poet, and writer for radio who worked in the French and Breton languages....
, the Breton
Breton people
The Bretons are an ethnic group located in the region of Brittany in France. They trace much of their heritage to groups of Brythonic speakers who emigrated from southwestern Great Britain in waves from the 3rd to 6th century into the Armorican peninsula, subsequently named Brittany after them.The...
writer, has dedicated a poem to Dolly Pentreath.
Last Cornish speaker?
As with many other "last native speakers", there is controversy over Pentreath’s status. Her correct claim to notability is not as the last speaker of the language, but rather as its last fluent native speaker.After her death, Barrington received a letter, written in Cornish and accompanied by an English translation, from a fisherman in Mousehole
Mousehole
Mousehole is a village and fishing port in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated approximately 2½ miles south of Penzance on the shore of Mount's Bay.The village is in the civil parish of Penzance...
named William Bodinar (or Bodener) stating that he knew of five people who could speak Cornish in that village alone. Barrington also speaks of a John Nancarrow from Marazion
Marazion
Marazion is a civil parish and town in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated on the shore of Mount's Bay, two miles east of Penzance and one mile east of Long Rock.St Michael's Mount is half-a-mile offshore from Marazion...
who was a native speaker and survived into the 1790s.
There is one known traditional Cornish speaker, John Mann, who as a child in Boswednack, Zennor, always conversed in Cornish with other children, and was alive at the age of 80 in 1914. He was the last known of a number of traditional Cornish speakers of the 19th Century including Jacob Care of St Ives (d. 1892); Elizabeth Vingoe of Higher Boswarva, Madron (d. 1903 and who taught at least some Cornish to her son); John Davey
John Davey (Cornish speaker)
John Davey or Davy was a Cornish farmer who was one of the last people with some traditional knowledge of the Cornish language. Jenner states that he level of his ability in the language is unclear, but was probably restricted to a few words and phrases...
junior (d. 1891) and senior, of Boswednack; Anne Berryman (1766-1854), also of Boswednack. Matthias Wallis of St. Buryan certified in 1859 that his grandmother, Ann Wallis, who had died around 1844, had spoken Cornish well. He also stated that a Jane Barnicoate, who had died circa 1857, could speak Cornish too.
See also
- Chesten MarchantChesten MarchantChesten Marchant or Cheston Marchant, who died in 1676 at Gwithian, Cornwall is believed to have been the last monoglot Cornish speaker, as opposed to other speakers such as Dolly Pentreath who could also speak English.-References:...
, sometimes considered the last monoglot Cornish speaker - John DaveyJohn Davey (Cornish speaker)John Davey or Davy was a Cornish farmer who was one of the last people with some traditional knowledge of the Cornish language. Jenner states that he level of his ability in the language is unclear, but was probably restricted to a few words and phrases...
, one of the last people with traditional knowledge of Cornish - Ned MaddrellNed MaddrellEdward "Ned" Maddrell was a fisherman from the Isle of Man who was the last surviving native speaker of the Manx language.Following the death of Mrs. Sage Kinvig Edward "Ned" Maddrell (1877 – December 27, 1974) was a fisherman from the Isle of Man who was the last surviving native speaker of the...
, often considered the last native speaker of the Manx languageManx languageManx , also known as Manx Gaelic, and as the Manks language, is a Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family, historically spoken by the Manx people. Only a small minority of the Island's population is fluent in the language, but a larger minority has some knowledge of it...
, another Celtic language