The hundreds of Cornwall (Cornish: Keverangow Kernow) were administrative divisions or Shires (hundreds) into which Cornwall, the present day administrative county of England, in the United Kingdom, was divided between c. 925 and 1894, when they were replaced with local government districts.
Some of the names of the hundreds ended with the suffix shire as in Pydarshire, East and West Wivelshire and Powdershire which were first recorded as names between 1184 and 1187.[1]
In the Cornish language the word keverang (pl. keverangow) is the equivalent for English "hundred" and the Welsh cantref. The word, in its plural form, appears in place names like Meankeverango (i.e. stone of the hundreds) in 1580 (now The Enys, north of Prussia Cove and marking the southern end of the boundary between the hundreds of Penwith and Kerrier), and Assa Govranckowe 1580, Kyver Ankou c. 1720, also on the Penwith – Kerrier border near Scorrier. It is also found in the singular form at Buscaverran, just south of Crowan churchtown and also on the Penwith-Kerrier border. The hundred of Trigg is mentioned by name during the 7th century, as "Pagus Tricurius", "land of three war hosts".[2]
- ^ Gover, J. E. B. (1946) Research paper at the Courtney Library, Royal Institution of Cornwall, Truro.
- ^ Craig Weatherhill, Article in Cornish World; March 2007