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# History of England/Talk

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I have lived in Britain my entire life and have never heard Cornwall refered to as separate from England (except in such times as predate England as a nation). Can someone offer some justification for this separation? -- Gareth Owen

Surely you mean you have lived in England, Gareth, with a name like your's! Cornwall is no more in England than Wales is. We have our own language and our own history and our own cultural identity. Some of us can even speak English as well as Cornish. The recent British census finally legally allowed us to write 'Cornish' down in terms of ethnicity (I expect you take putting Welsh down for granted, (something the English love to do)). I am Cornish and not English. Cornwall is, was and always will be apart from 'England', although the current political boundaries are wholly inaccurate. The Cornish nation stretched until quite late in the Saxon period as far across as Dorset, and Cornish, the language was spoken in many parts of Devon until the mid sixteenth century.

I belong to a political party Mebyon Kernow. There are others e.g. Unvereth Kernewek, the Cornish Nationalist Party, An Gof, etc. We are serious about getting our own assembly and decentralising from England - if the Scots and the Welsh can do it, why the hell can't we? We didn't sell our birthright away like the Scots, it was seized. An Gof, who are even more ambitious for secession, will probably up the ante, in any case. sjc

There is a difference between deserving independence and having achieved independence. Wales is a distinct body from England and recognised as such in law (extant assembly, bilingual status.)

I have no problem with your belief that, historically, Cornwall has a separate history and culture from England (as does Northumbria) and that the Cornish should gain some measure of independence, but to describe Cornwall as if it were in some meaningful way still a distinct entity from England is to deviate from all common usage.

But this //is// an article about the //history// of England and part of the point I am making is that England is not a static geopolitical entity with determined borders. These borders were (and still yet may be) subject to revision and fluctuation, and certainly I will need to make the point about Athelstan and the later Saxon invasion of Cornwall at some point. How can they be invading somewhere which they already own? Or is already a part of the country which they control?

I have to agree that the notion of England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, and Cornwall is a deeply strange one. Many areas of Britain consider themselves to have regional identity which is unique from the country that they are a part of. For instance its clear that the designation "Scotland" makes little sense, covering as it does both highland and lowland areas. This parts where divided both by "ethnicity" in so far as this has much meaning, and language. Should we remove "Scotland" and replace it with "Highland and Lowland Scotland".

Similarly for instance the War of the Roses suggests that the Lancastershire and Yorkshire have distinct identities.

I think that it is correct that this article should reflect the diverse ethnic origins of England, as well as the population movements which resulted in the current sitation with Cornwall. Perhaps the article could be reworded, or a new article on the population movements within the British Isles be added. But to describe Cornwall as a country in the same sense as we would describe England and Wales to me it nonsensical.

Then you are obviously English with a typically English over-inflated sense of your own importance. The article is not about the British Isles (see, you still can't tell the difference between what is your's and what isn't). The notion that England is not one coherent rural idyll may be a strange one, but one which you are going to have to come to terms with if reality is not to entirely bypass you. I am not, nor am I nor my fellow Cornishmen deceived any longer by your deep England nationalist ideological claptrap (er, if we ever were). Come down here and tell us we're English and see what sort of frosty welcome you receive.... Hopefully it will result in a visit from the local representative of [An Gof]?. For a more enlightened view on the subject, I would recommend you to [Norman Davies]?' [The Isles]? (probably the definitive work on the subject of the development of the British Isles... Of course, I expect all the English would like a nice sanitised view of reality. It kind of fits with their intellectually and culturally deprived Normano-Saxon origins.

You might not enjoy this website: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/kernow_tgg/TGGhome.html

Hmmm what an interesting commentary.

In answer to your question, my passport says that I am British. I really don't place a lot of importance on my nationality other than that to be honest.

I am fully aware that England is not one coherent rural idyll and do not need you tell me this. I live in Manchester, just down the road from Oldham where an openly fascist, and racist party did distressingly well last night in the election. I am also fully aware of what the terms England, Britain, and the British isles mean. I lived for many years in Scotland, and I don't think that I ever called it English once in that time. Or certainly no more frequently than I described England as Scottish.

I am rather upset to be described as "nationalist" of any sort. I've lived in many parts of Britain. On the whole I have felt welcome and at home everywhere I have gone, but have always found that there is someone narrow minded enough to tell me that I don't belong and should leave because of my accent, my opinions or some confused notion of ethinicity.

If I ever did come down to Cornwall to speak to you I would not tell you that you are English, or British to be honest. I might say however that housing, education, health care, and the right to control your own destiny are far more important than the labels that you choose to put on yourself, particularly if those labels appear to be there only to provide the excuse to exclude others.

You are right. I did not enjoy the website.

Your argument becomes progressively less coherent, and fails to address a single point. We are supposed to roll over just because you happen to live near Oldham? Unfortunately we live near England. The Cornish are a Celtic national minority within the terms of the European Convention of Human Rights, Article 14 of which is committed to the "Prohibition of discrimination on any ground such as national or social origin or association with a national minority". But our signposts are in English. Our history and heritage is described (and controlled) by [English Heritage]?. We have been systematically ripped off for centuries. Our language and culture has been systematically suppressed by the English. Even the bureaucracy of the EEC recognise our minority nationality status, to the extent that the British government (read English establishment lackeys) were obliged finally to allow us to proclaim ourselves as Cornish on the recent census, something which they have never allowed us to do before. You English even want to scrub us from the pages of history. I expect you'll want us to thank you for denying us our own existence.

I for one do not find the Oldham election result even remotely suprising. We have been working with a thin veneer of liberalism for a century or so, but you do not even have to scratch the surface and underneath to reveal the traits of the nation that enslaved millions, slaughtering its way around the globe. English history is not some noble undertaking. It is a shady enterprise no more sanitary than the gutter backwash which was the Third Reich, and just as fascinating to the disinterested observer. sjc

I am becoming less coherent!?

My point about Oldham was simple. You suggested that I was unaware that Britain was not some rural idyll. I am fully aware of this. I have seen many aspects of nationalism, including many of its uglier faces.

You have suggested that Cornish are a "celtic national majority". I presume it is for this reason that you suggest the England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and Cornwall division makes sense. I am still left wondering whether we should split Scotland up into the Highlands and the Lowlands, given that these two regions were historically distinguishable both on grounds of ethnicity, and language.

Having described me in your last note as a nationalist, you are now accusing me of being a supporter of British imperialism. I have been accused of many things in my life, but I think that this is the first time that I have been accused of this. As with your comment about rural idyll's I am fully informed about the history of Britain and its empire building and I do not find it a very noble history. I would question though your assertion that "I" helped enslaved millions, whilst "you" were the victim. I can only trace my family history back three generations, but that far at least my ancestors spent their lives down the pits, or working on the trains. At least those which survived the machine guns and the disease in the trenches of WWI. I am sure that there were part of the great imperialist project, but it does not look to me like they benefited greatly from it. It would appear to me that many English suffered extraordinary hardship as a result of British imperialism. No doubt some amoung the Cornish did extremely well out of it. Perhaps it is your notion of dividing the world up according to nationality that is flawed here?

I thank you both for this very interesting dialogue; do continue, but please keep your definitions and purposes clear. Perhaps you are comparing goats to chickens?

Perhaps it would enlighten us all to know what the positive identity of Cornwall really is; not victimised, not enslaved, not obliged, but . . . .

You must be proud of Cornwall. Why is it that important? Why the "Brutal England"-entity? Can I go there on holiday or will I encounter some mental Beirut?

Do go on holiday to Cornwall, its quite lovely and the weather is amongst the best in the British Isles. This viewof brutality and oppression by England an extreme minority position: In the recent UK election, Mebyon Kernow polled a total of 3200 votes, about 2% of the vote in Cornwall, about 0.1% of the UK overall.

My purposes in this discussion were simple enough. I was questioning whether the division of Britain into five entities as was done in the History of England article made any sense. I contended that it doesn't really make sense as far as I could see and therefore asked for clarification.

As a result of this I have been told that I have an inflated sense of my own importance, been threaten with people "paying me a visit", of being a nationalist, and an imperialist. Oh yeah and incoherent.

I can confirm that Cornwall is a lovely place and really nice to visit. I would say that the percentage of total nutters is no higher than in the rest of the UK. Phil Lord

I changed the line about the rise of machine labor to something an economist would not scoff at. Machines resulted in increased productivity not because of tax advantages but because they allowed for worker output to increase.

The line about wealth increasing due to colonial expansion was also removed. There are very few examples of a nation becoming wealthier from colonies. Most British colonies cost more in terms of administration and military expenditures then they returned in tax receipts. The dramatic rise in British wealth from 1780 through the 19th century is due to the efficiencies of the agricultural and industrial revolutions and the policy of free trade.

As to luddites, it might be mentioned that within those industries that used machines in production there were vast increases in the number of workers employed. The luddite predictions were not only wrong but completely wrong. Machines created jobs, by raising output per worker and therefore making each additional worker more valuable.

We should also mention, that in the moral climate created by industrialization and capitalism, people on a mass scale first began to perceive slavery as evil, and sought its eradication, and that this moral climate led the British people to demand an end of the world slave trade, which their Navy successfully enforced. This is one of the greatest humanitarian achievements in history, and is far more important than much of the drivel that is ritualistically mentioned in standard histories (luddites, for instance). - TS

You make some v. interesting points, Tim, and there's not much I'd disagree with in what you say. sjc

Thanks, Tim - good edits and useful take on industry.--MichaelTinkler

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