St Cleer

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St Cleer
Cornwall
St Cleer - geograph.org.uk - 361917.jpg
St Cleer
Location
Grid reference: SX247681
Location: 50°29’13"N, 4°28’17"W
Data
Postcode: PL14
Local Government
Council: Cornwall

St Cleer is a village in eastern Cornwall, on the southeast flank of Bodmin Moor approximately two miles north of Liskeard.

The population of the parish in 2011 was counted at 3,339.

Parish church

St Cleer Parish Church

St Cleer parish church is dedicated to St Clarus. Its three-stage tower is 97 feet high and contains a ring of six bells.[1][2]

First built in 800, the church was rebuilt in the 13th century. The tower suffered damage and was repaired in the 15th century.

According to his legend, St Clarus was an Englishman who went to Cornwall to preach to the inhabitants in the 8th century. He founded the church at St Cleer and lived a saintly life nearby. However he rejected the advances of a local chieftainess who had fallen in love with him and when she continued to pester him he fled to France where he lived in an isolated hermitage. The enraged woman had him pursued and then murdered. The place he had lived was afterwards named Saint-Clair-sur-Epte. The saint's feast day is 4 November.[3]

Prehistoric and mediæval remains

St Cleer holy well

Near the village is Trethevy Quoit, a megalithic chamber tomb. Nearby too is King Doniert's Stone, an inscribed stone of the Anglo-Saxon period.

St Cleer's holy well is found near the churchyard, with a small building covering it, built of granite in the 15th century, to allow for a bowssening pool for total immersion.

Outside links

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("Wikimedia Commons" has material
about St Cleer)

References

  1. Information on St Cleer  from GENUKI
  2. Cornish Parish Churches - Cleer, St
  3. Ellis, P. B. (1992) The Cornish Saints. Penryn: Tor Mark Press, p. 7