Mebyon Kernow and Cornish Nationalism: The Concise History [Illustrated] [Paperback]

Most people are aware of the great historical contribution of the Cousin Jacks - amongst the finest miners in the world without whose expertise the tin, copper and gold mining industries in USA and Australia would not have succeeded. These expert craftsmen came from Cornwall in the British Isles but were not English. They were Cornish! Their rich dialect was just one of the many basic differences between them and the other immigrants from Britain. Today Cornish people are still proud of their differences - their culture, their history and most of all their LANGUAGE.
It would be anachronistic to use the term Cornish Language in application to the Cousin Jacks/ Cornish miners who came to America in the C19th. They spoke a dialect full of Cornish-derived vocabulary and may well have known many Cornish words. However, the Cornish Language had already died at least a century earlier, buried with the old lady Dorothy Pentreath in 1777 - she is traditionally reputed as being the last native speaker. While the beautiful and rich Cornish Dialect (as opposed to the Cornish Language) has never really died, the Cornish Language, like Modern Hebrew, has been successfully resurrected. Today there are a few thousand Cornishmen and Cornish ladies who can actually speak the ancient language of their forefathers ( a lovely mysterious language akin to Welsh and Breton) and there are even monoglot toddlers brought up in Cornish-speaking families who have not yet learnt English.
It is no wonder that with this acute sense of cultural identity which is evident in Cornwall, the Cornish people feel a great sense of national pride. Perhaps a logical progression from reviving their language was to revive a sense of national identity. It is therefore not surprising to see that many Cornish people today for cultural and historical reasons would like to see Cornwall (or Kernow as they call their beautiful land) independent from the rest of Britain and an autonomous state analogous with the Republic of Ireland. The Cornish people's nationalism is not a nationalism like that of Nazi Germany, despising other races; it is rather a sense of national awareness of and pride in their own culture. While most Cornishmen adamantly insist (correctly so) that they are NOT English, in no way do they have any prejudice against the English; indeed English visitors are invariably made most welcome and are often the first to appreciate the unique distinctiveness that is apparent as soon as they cross the Tamar into Cornwall.
The Cornish form of nationalism wishes to see Cornwall as an independent state with a Cornish Assembly living, as ever, in harmony with her English neighbours and friends, not in adversity. It would like through political means to achieve something similar to the bloodless Velvet Revolution that separated the Czechs from the very similar Slovaks (yet culturally the Cornish and English are much more distinct). This book is a readable and analytical examination of the Cornish struggle for independence and in particular a careful historical account of the Cornish National Party and Mebyon Kernow (literally 'sons of Cornwall'). Voters of this party (like voters for the Welsh equivalent Plaid Cymru) should feel satisfied that they can bear no share of the responsibility for Tony Blair's immoral invasion of Iraq (and for the ensuing terrorist reprisals which this evil man has provoked). Cornish Nationalism, like Welsh Nationalism is in its essence a pacifist ideology and Cornish national identity is expressed through living one's rich culture and language not in violence.
In history it is true that the Cornish were at times actively involved in battles against their English oppressors. The best example is the Cornish Rebellion of C15th in which a small host of 2,000 heroic Cornishmen were defeated by a much larger army just because they refused to pay an unjust tax to finance a war of aggression against Scotland. The leader An Gof (the Smith) was tortured and executed and has rightly been dubbed the 'Cornish Braveheart'. In recent years, as this book explains, the name An Gof came to be used for a pseudo-terrorist movement supposedly active a couple of decades ago in Cornwall. They were engaged not in killing but in blowing up government buildings etc. While real Cornish Nationalists of the time rightly condemned these acts as the work of fanatics, modern Cornish Nationalists doubt in retrospect whether these acts (attributed to the nebulous group named An Gof) were in fact the work of extremist Cornish Nationalists at all; but rather they were most likely the work of a dirty tricks capmaign organised by the press to disredit the real Cornish Nationalists and bring their cause into disrepute. An analogous example can be seen in modern Greek history where the 17th November (now an important school holiday) commemorates the heroic student uprising against the 'junta' at the Athens Polytechnic in 1973 in which several students were killed. Yet later the same name (i.e. 17th November) came to refer to a terrorist group (supposedly left wing but most probably with higher 'foreign' right wing backing). Cornish Nationalism has long recovered from the dirty attacks of those who have sought to misconstrue its goals. The movement is now strong and thriving. This book is a worthy and detailed historical analysis of this most remarkable cultural movement. It is also a tribute to a most interesting people. If you have difficulty in obtaining this through Amazon.com (I have found that Amazon can find practically EVERYTHING!!) then try the sister Amazon.uk branch. It is still in print.

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