THE DEFEAT OF the Spanish Armada in 1588 did not put an end to Spanish attempts to invade Britain or to terminate the reign of the Protestant Queen Elizabeth I. In summer 1593, the Spanish commander Carlos de Amésquita set sail from Brittany, and headed towards the British coast. His fleet sailed towards Cornwall because the Spanish believed that the Cornish might be likely to give up Protestantism and embrace Roman Catholicism.

In late July 1595, the Spanish fleet bombarded the tiny port of Mousehole. They burned and/or reduced to rubble almost every house in the place, and then departed. The inhabitants of the town fled for their lives.

Today, the 3^rd of July 2024, we visited the picturesque village of Mousehole, and came across a house named ‘Keigwin’. It has a wing that projects into the lane, and is supported by stone pillars. A plaque attached to it explains:

“Squire Jenkyn Keigwin was killed here 23rd July 1595 defending this house against the Spaniards.”

His house, which was built by the 16^th century, is the only building that survived the Spanish attack on Mousehole. Jenkyn Keigwin (1531-1595) was the publican who owned the Keigwin Arms pub in Mousehole. The house that survived the Spanish attack was part of a manor house.

A few yards away from Keigwin, there is a newer, smaller house, on which we spotted another interesting plaque. It reads:

“Here lived Dolly Pentreath. One of the last speakers of the Cornish language as her native tongue, Died 1777”

Dolly was born in Mousehole, and baptised in 1692. She made a living selling fish. The lawyer and antiquarian Daines Barrington came across her when he was searching for native speakers of Cornish in 1768, and later published an account of her in his learned paper about the extinction of the Cornish language. In about 1777, the Cornish-born artist, John Opie (he became a professor at London’s Royal Academy) painted her portrait.

Dolly was buried in the churchyard at Paul (close to Mousehole). In 1860, the French philologist Louis Lucien Bonaparte (1813-1891), a nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, set up a monument to honour Dolly. I have only seen a photograph of this. The inscription on it reads:

“Here lieth interred Dorothy Pentreath who died in 1777, said to have been the last person who conversed in the ancient Cornish, the peculiar language of this country from the earliest records till it expired in the eighteenth century, in this Parish of Saint Paul. This stone is erected by the Prince Louis Bonaparte in Union with the Revd John Garret Vicar of St Paul, June 1860. Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. Exod. xx. 12. Gwra pethi de taz ha de mam: mal de Dythiow bethenz hyr war an tyr neb an arleth de dew ryes dees. Exod. xx. 12”

The last few words being in Cornish. I first came across Louis Bonaparte when I met Bejtullah Destani, a diplomat and scholar who researches Albanian history. When he found out that I was researching a book about the Albanian communities which have been in Sicily since the 15^th century, he gave me a copy of “Albanian Dialects”, which is a collection of studies of Albanian dialects written in English by Louis Bonaparte. Although his main philological interest was the Basque language, he was also interested in Celtic languages (of which Cornish is one), as well as the dialects of Sardinia and mainland Italy. His book on Albanian dialects is mainly concerned with the numerous Albanian speaking communities in southern Italy.

Mousehole was attacked by the Spanish, but, fortunately, not by Louis Lucien Bonaparte’s uncle. However, while looking around this beautiful place today, we saw the plaque commemorating Dolly Pentreath. Only after leaving the village, I learned of its slightly tenuous connection with the Bonaparte family.