CORNWALL ONLINE PARISH CLERKS - helping bring the past alive


The parish of

ALTARNUN

is in the Hundred of Lesneweth, in the deanery of Trigg-major and is eight miles west of Launceston. The name means Altar [church altar] of St Nonna. Altarnun Parish is now in the North Cornwall district and part of it lies within Bodmin Moor. The south-west area of Altarnun parish became part of the newer parish of Bolventor.

Altarnun can truly be described as one of the prettiest villages in Cornwall. Across two bridges stands the Church of St. Nonna. The Normans built a church here in the 12th century, but the church as it now stands was built in the 15th century, and was partly constructed of unquarried stone from the moors.

Altarnun
Church of St. Nonna,
© Simon Lewis, 2001

As this area is so picturesque, tourism is now a major industry.
Altarnun
Village of Altarnun © 2002, Simon Lewis

By the church gate stands a fine Celtic cross, possibly dating back to the 6th century, the time of St. Nonna herself. She was the mother of St. David and left her native Wales around the year 527.

The parish is mainly moorland, and grazed by animals, but there are areas of farmland in the Eastern areas. The river Lynher rises in this parish.

The principal villages in this parish are the churchtown, more properly called Penpont, Tredaule, Five Lanes, Gunnon, Treveage, West Carne, Trethyn, Treween, and Trewint. At Five Lanes, large cattle fairs once were held.

Cornwall Online Parish Clerks

The Online Parish Clerk (Genealogy) for Altarnun is Mike Gabriel, who can be contacted by Email.
 
(For information about, and contact details for, the current parish council, please see this website.)

PARISH INFORMATION

CENSUS:

Information can be found at COCP - the Cornwall Online Census Project - which is complete for 1841 to 1891 and has been verified, FreeCen at Rootsweb, which has a very good search engine and information from COCP, as well as GenUKI, which has more reference information and alternate resources.

REGISTERS:

Information can be found in our searchable database (C-PROP), which is updated frequently and contains full transcriptions, or on the LDS website for index-only records. The C-PROP coverage page is here.

The IGI batch numbers for Altarnun are: C053311, E006241, E053311, M006241, M053311, P006241; batch numbers are insertable in the box bottom left. The records are searchable by surname, and the data will be restricted to only transcribed records from Parish Registers. (Miscellaneous donated records will not be included.). Coverage of this parish is 1610 - 1875.

DIRECTORIES:

For information, see GenUKI. Link below.

OTHER:

Many of the items below also mention Parish officials such as Churchwardens and Overseers of the Poor:-

An agreement, involving a dispute over land in the parishes of Altarnun and Blisland, dated 1661 or 1662, naming Daniel and Getrude WILLS, Joseph and Margaret TOKER.

Bastardy/Filiation Documents:

  1. A bastardy order, dated 16 Jun 1755, naming Jone MARK, Antoney, Robert and William GIMBLET.
  2. A bastardy order, dated 30 Jul 1760, for Geare BASTARD, naming Arthur, William and Richard HERRING.
  3. A bastardy order, dated 25 Jul 1825, involving Mary ROWE and Henry PEARSE of Launceston.

Voters Lists:

  1. 1851/52
  2. 1852/53
  3. 1856/57
  4. 1864/65

Wills:

  1. dated 6 May 1746, John LAWS
  2. dated 8 Jun 1746, George HEALE
  3. dated 13 Mar 1747, William SPEAR/SPARE

War Memorial:

Photographs by Mike Gabriel, 2007

Other documents mentioning several parishes, including Altarnun, can be found here.

For more information regarding history, population, etc., visit GenUKI.

MAPS:

For a Parish Locator map, please click here. Altarnun can be located at coordinates I - 7.

For further map information, please visit GenUKI (Genealogy - United Kingdom & Ireland).

To see a current, zoomable Ordnance Survey map, please visit MultiMap, or for maps and satellite images use Google Maps.

ADJACENT PARISHES:

St Breward, Davidstow, St Clether, Laneast, Trewen, Lewannick, North Hill, St Cleer, Bolventor (post-1847) and St Neot (pre-1847).

ONLINE BOOKS:

  1. Altarnun is included in The Parochial History of Cornwall, Volume I by Davies Gilbert, William Hals, Thomas Tonkin, Henry Samuel Boase, originally published in 1838 (page n60). Also downloadable as a pdf.
  2. The Cornwall Register by John Wallis, A.M. F.S.S., then Vicar of Bodmin, printed 1847. If the in-built search produces no results, use the index pages (474-476) to find your parish of interest. Tables of statistics and other data can be found at the beginning of the book, starting at page n9.