Talk:Condor of Cornwall

Prosopography of Medieval Lands

I tried to find Cornwall in Prosopography of Medieval Lands but this was a failure.--Johnsoniensis (talk) 02:08, 27 August 2020 (UTC)

Page name: Cadoc or Condor?

It looks like most of the sources given have him primarily under the name Condor. Would anyone object if I moved the page to Condor of Cornwall (over the existing redirect), and created a new article for his son under this name? ‑‑Yodin^T 12:22, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

With no objections, I've started a move request below. ‑‑Yodin^T 16:02, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 25 April 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Andrewa (talk) 20:31, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

---

Cadoc of Cornwall → Condor of Cornwall – The sources that I've come across give Condor (alternatively Condurus/Candor/etc.) as his primary name, with Cadoc as a possible variant; his son's name is given as Cadoc (sometimes spelled Caddock etc.), with Condor II as a secondary variant. This move will free up this title for an article on his son, while distinguishing the two using their most frequently used WP:COMMONNAMEs. ‑‑Yodin^T 15:59, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

William of Worcester

I can't find anything that supports the claim that William of Worcester first mentioned Condor. I've tried searching through the Itineraries; I'm not 100% sure (it's not a simple book to search, and I haven't tried to read through it all) but there doesn't seem to be anything there about Condor. The earliest mention seems to be William Camden's "modern writers", but I can't find who these are. I've also tried to trace the addition of the William of Worcester Condor mention across Wikipedia here, along with any books they add as references:

• Added to this article in September 2007 without any sources
  • Ref added for it in February 2021: Craig Weatherhill (2018). The Promontory People: An Early History of the Cornish. Francis Boutle Publishers. p. 156. (I haven't been able to check this yet, but as it was published in 2018, if they don't provide a source for William of Worcester, then I think it's likely to have been taken from Wikipedia)
• Added to Timeline of Cornish history in December 2007 with this ref: Philip Payton. (1996). Cornwall. Fowey: Alexander Associates (haven't been able to check this yet, but it was challenged and removed from Cornish people)
• Added to Cornish people in December 2007 with this ref: Philip Payton. (1996). Cornwall. Fowey: Alexander Associates (haven't been able to check this yet, but it was challenged and removed from Cornish people)
  • Page number requested for ref in June 2009
  • Worcester removed, and ref replaced in September 2009
• Added to Constitutional status of Cornwall in Feb 2008, citing Christopher A. Snyder (2003), The Britons (doesn't seem to have any mentions of Condor/Cadoc or William of Worcester) and this website (mentions Condor/Cadoc but not Worcester)
  • Removed in September 2009
• Added to History of Cornwall in February 2010 (no ref)
• Added to Earl of Cornwall in April 2010 (no ref)
• Added to Dumnonia in December 2012 (no ref)
• Added to List of kings of Dumnonia in February 2013 with this ref: Philip Payton. (1996). Cornwall. Fowey: Alexander Associates (haven't been able to check this yet, but it was challenged and removed from Cornish people)

See also this discussion, which mentions William of Malmesbury as another source: this looks like it's traced to this website by John Angarrack, from June 2008 or before. This looks like a misreading of the sources: Malmesbury is cited in footnote 1 (for the statement that Athelstan set the Cornish border), while the website cites Worcester (without giving any details) for Cadoc/Condor in footnote 5. ‑‑Yodin^T 19:28, 7 May 2022 (UTC)

I've now checked each of the books given as sources for this:

• Christopher A. Snyder (2003) The Britons
  • As mentioned above, this book doesn't seem to mention Condor/Cadoc or William of Worcester
• Philip Payton (1996) Cornwall
  • This has gone through multiple editions:
    • 1992 The Making of Modern Cornwall
      • p47: "Certainly, at the time of the Norman Conquest in 1066 the Earldom was held by one Cadoc (or Condor), a native Cornishman, and it was to him that the Cornish owed their first loyalty"
    • 1996 Cornwall
      • p91: "At the time of the Norman Conquest what we might term the pre-Norman Earldom was held by one Cadoc (or Condor), a native Cornishman, but he was soon replaced, albeit briefly, by Count Brian of Brittany."
    • 2004 Cornwall: A History Second Revised Edition
      • p76: Has the same quote as in the 1996 edition, above.
    • 2017 Cornwall: A History Revised and Updated Edition
      • p82: This passage has been revised to: "Legend avers that at the time of the Norman Conquest, the Earldom was held by one Cadoc (or Condor), a native Cornishman, but he was soon replaced, albeit briefly, by Count Brian of Brittany"
  • No edition of this that I can find mentions William of Worcester
• Craig Weatherhill (2018) The Promontory People
  • p200: "William of Worcester, writing in 1478, tells us that, at the time of the Conquest, Cadoc (or Candorus) was 'a survivor of the Cornish royal line,' but also the apparent last of a dynasty whose entire status and power had been systematically undermined, weakened and reduced to the point where the Normans were to refer to him as Eorl. King William left him in place. It may be that Cadoc was nearing the end of his life, for in 1068 William appointed Brient, Count of Brittany, as Earl of Cornwall to succeed him."
  • This book's References section lists "PAYTON, Philip. Cornwall – A History (2004)", but no direct source for William of Worcester. This, combined with the year of the book (2018), makes me think that he's using Payton as his primary source here, but adding the William Worcester claim from this Wikipedia article.

I then checked the full edition of William Worcestre: Itineraries (ed. John Harvey, 1969). There is no mention of Condor/Cadoc, but I found what might possibly have been mistaken for it: "Castle-an-Dinas is ruined; it lies on a high hill and a spring rises in the midst of the castle. There Cador Duke of Cornwall, husband of [Igraine] the mother of Arthur was slain" (i.e. Cador mistaken for Condor/Cadoc).

It seems pretty clear that the few sources that mention William of Worcester as a source for this claim aren't accurate, and all are after September 2007, making this look like a case of citogensis. As such I'll remove the claims until we can find either a passage in the Itineraries that mentions him, or a reliable source that explains it. In terms of historicity of Condor/Cadoc, Philip Payton seems to be the only reliable source that I can find, and his backtracking from Condor "certainly" existing (1992), to "Legend avers" (2017), combined with a complete lack of historical evidence until the "modern authors" mentioned by Camden in 1586 (who seems very skeptical of the claims), over five hundred years after Condor was supposed to have lived, makes it look like Condor should not be presented as definitely existing. As no-one else has objected yet, I'll make the changes to remove William of Worcester (maybe keeping it as a comment and/or footnote to avoid it being put back in the article) and follow Payton as the only RS for historicity. If I've missed anything please let me know. ‑‑Yodin^T 16:24, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Original sources

The earliest sources we've got are by Camden and Carew, who say they're working from recent sources:

• Camden: "[Condor] is accounted by the late writers, the last Earle of Cornwall"; "they which are skilfull in Heraldry, have a tradition"
• Carew: "This note I borrowed out of an industrious collection, which setteth downe all the noble mens creations, Armes, and principall descents, in euery Kings dayes since the conquest"

One suggestion is that this could be the records of the heraldic visitations which travelled the country from 1530 to 1688, requiring the nobility to set out their claims to heraldry and titles. It does seem a plausible explanation for why Condor appears at around this time (either as a genuine tradition, or an invention). I haven't been able to find any mentions of Condor/Cadoc or any of the variant spellings in either of the two published editions of the Cornwall visitations (Vivian 1874 and Vivian 1887) or Devon (Vivian 1895), but these could well be edited down versions of the original manuscripts (they don't seem to generally go back as far as "euery Kings dayes since the conquest"), possibly not based on the "originals with signatures" and "office copies", or any "church notes", etc. All that said, there don't seem to be any reliable sources that cover this yet, so there's nothing to add to the article until something's published on it. ‑‑Yodin^T 12:41, 26 November 2022 (UTC)