Battle of Hehil

Battle of Hehil
Date	c.721—722
Location	"among the Cornish"
Result	British victory
Belligerents
West Britons	West Saxons(probably)
Casualties and losses
Unknown	Unknown

TheBattle of Hehilwas a battle won by a force ofBritons,probably against theAnglo-SaxonsofWessexaround the year 720. The location is unknown, except that it wasapud Cornuenses( "among theCornish").

Sources

The only direct reference to the battle appears in theAnnales Cambriae.A translation from the original Latin is as follows:

The battle of Hehil among theCornish,the battle of Garth Maelog, thebattle of Penconamong the South Britons, and theBritonswere the victors in those three battles.^[1]^[2]

TheAnnales Cambriaeare undated butEgerton Phillimoreplaced the entry in the year 722.^[3]

Although the source does not name the Anglo-Saxons as the enemy in any of the three battles, it has been claimed that the failure to specify the enemy was simply because this was so obvious to all, and that any other opponents would have been clearly named.^[4]

The battle is not mentioned in theAnglo-Saxon Chronicle,andH. P. R. Finberghas speculated that this is because Wessex was defeated.^[5]

Battlefield

The location of Hehil is not known, but many scholars have tried to identify it. In 1916 the Celtic scholarDonald MacKinnonwas not willing to say more than that it was on "the Devonian peninsula".^[6]In 2003Christopher Snydersimply stated that "722 TheAnnales Cambriaerecord a British victory at Hehil in Cornwall ".^[7]

Based simply on the place name,Frank Stentonsuggested that the battle was atHaylein west Cornwall.^[8]In 1987Leslie Alcocknoted that the most obvious interpretation of 'Hehil among the Cornish' is theRiver Haylein west Cornwall, but referred toEkwall's identification of the name with theRiver Camel,previously known as theHeil,and concluded that this "more easterly attribution may be preferable".^[9] Other scholars preferring the River Camel includeW. G. Hoskins,who put Hehil atEgloshayleon that river;^[8]Leonard Dutton, who suggested in 1993 "at or near the spot where the fifteenth century bridge atWadebridgecrosses the Camel ";^[10]andPhilip Paytonwho in 2004 located it "probably [at] the strategically important Camel estuary".^[11]

Malcolm Toddtook the view in 1987 that these sites were "too far west to be taken seriously", and made two suggestions. The first was Hele atJacobstowin north Cornwall,^[12]a place which had been mentioned as a possibility in 1931 in the introduction toThe Place-Names of Devon,^[13]and was also supported by the landscape archaeologistDella Hookein 1994.^[14]Todd's other suggestion wasHelein theCulm Valleyin east Devon.^[12]

In 2022 John Fletcher explained why he thought that the village ofMerton,north of Okehampton, has "potentially excellent credentials as the site for the historic Hehil".^[15]

Significance

The British victory at Hehil in 722 may have proved decisive in the history of theWest Britons:it was not until almost a hundred years later (in 814) that further battles are recorded in the area, a period whichNicholas Ormesees as probably consolidating the division between Cornwall and Devon.^[16]

In 2013 T. M. Charles-Edwards, noting that the battle came "not long afterGeraintwas last attested as king of Dumnonia ", suggested that it might indicate that Dumnonia had fallen by 722 and that the victory of Hehil had secured the survival of the kingdom of Cornwall for another 150 years.^[17]

References

^James Ingram,The Annals of Wales A(London: Everyman Press, 1912)
^For the original Latin for both the A & B texts, see:Annales Cambriaeat the Latin Wikisource.(in Latin)
^Everton Phillimore,Y Cymmrodor9Harleian MS. 3859(1888), pp. 141–83(in Latin)
^Robert Simmons,722 and all thatinCornish World Magazine,August–September 2009, pp. 32–35, accessed 11 July 2012
^H. P. R. Finberg, "Sherborne, Glastonbury, and the Expansion of Wessex", inTransactions of the Royal Historical Society,volume 5 (1953), issue 3, p. 110, jstor 3678711 – viaJSTOR(subscription required)
^Donald MacKinnon,The Celtic Review,Vol. 10 (1916), p. 325
^Christopher Snyder,The Britons(Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2003,ISBN 978-0-631-22262-0),p. 292
^^a ^bCited in: Robert Higham,Making Anglo-Saxon Devon(Exeter: The Mint Press, 2008,ISBN 978-1-903356-57-9), p. 30
^Leslie Alcock,Economy, society, and warfare among the Britons and Saxons(Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1987,ISBN 978-0-7083-0963-6), p. 231
^Leonard Dutton,The Anglo-Saxon kingdoms: the power struggles from Hengist to Ecgberht(Hanley Swan, Worcestershire: SPA, in conjunction with L. Dutton, 1993,ISBN 978-1-85421-197-2) p. 232
^Philip Payton,Cornwall: A History(Fowey: Cornwall Editions Ltd., 2nd edition 2004,ISBN 1-904880-00-2), p. 68
^^a ^bMalcolm Todd,The South West to AD 1000in seriesA Regional History of England(London: Longman, 1987,ISBN 0-582-49274-2), pp. 272–273
^J. E. B. Gover, A. Mawer, F. M. Stenton,The Place-Names of Devon,English Place-Name Society Volume VIII, Part I (Cambridge University Press, 1931), p. xviii
^Della Hooke,Pre-conquest charter-bounds of Devon and Cornwall(Woodbridge, Suffolk, England, and Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 1994,ISBN 978-0-85115-354-4,p. 1
^Fletcher, John (2022).The Western Kingdom – The Birth of Cornwall.Cheltenham: The History Press. pp. 72–3.ISBN 978-1-8039-9000-2.
^Nicholas Orme,Unity and Variety: A History of the Church in Devon and Cornwallin series=PExeter Studies in History,volume29 (University of Exeter Press, 1991,ISBN 0-85989-355-3), p. 6
^T. M. Charles-Edwards,Wales and the Britons, 350-1064(Oxford University Press,2013,ISBN 9780198217312), p. 429

[ACAeng-1] James Ingram,The Annals of Wales A(London: Everyman Press, 1912)

[2] For the original Latin for both the A & B texts, see:Annales Cambriaeat the Latin Wikisource.(in Latin)

[ACA-3] Everton Phillimore,Y Cymmrodor9Harleian MS. 3859(1888), pp. 141–83(in Latin)

[4] Robert Simmons,722 and all thatinCornish World Magazine,August–September 2009, pp. 32–35, accessed 11 July 2012

[F-5] H. P. R. Finberg, "Sherborne, Glastonbury, and the Expansion of Wessex", inTransactions of the Royal Historical Society,volume 5 (1953), issue 3, p. 110, jstor 3678711 – viaJSTOR(subscription required)

[6] Donald MacKinnon,The Celtic Review,Vol. 10 (1916), p. 325

[7] Christopher Snyder,The Britons(Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2003,ISBN 978-0-631-22262-0),p. 292

[H30-8] Cited in: Robert Higham,Making Anglo-Saxon Devon(Exeter: The Mint Press, 2008,ISBN 978-1-903356-57-9), p. 30

[9] Leslie Alcock,Economy, society, and warfare among the Britons and Saxons(Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1987,ISBN 978-0-7083-0963-6), p. 231

[10] Leonard Dutton,The Anglo-Saxon kingdoms: the power struggles from Hengist to Ecgberht(Hanley Swan, Worcestershire: SPA, in conjunction with L. Dutton, 1993,ISBN 978-1-85421-197-2) p. 232

[11] Philip Payton,Cornwall: A History(Fowey: Cornwall Editions Ltd., 2nd edition 2004,ISBN 1-904880-00-2), p. 68

[T272-12] Malcolm Todd,The South West to AD 1000in seriesA Regional History of England(London: Longman, 1987,ISBN 0-582-49274-2), pp. 272–273

[13] J. E. B. Gover, A. Mawer, F. M. Stenton,The Place-Names of Devon,English Place-Name Society Volume VIII, Part I (Cambridge University Press, 1931), p. xviii

[14] Della Hooke,Pre-conquest charter-bounds of Devon and Cornwall(Woodbridge, Suffolk, England, and Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 1994,ISBN 978-0-85115-354-4,p. 1

[15] Fletcher, John (2022).The Western Kingdom – The Birth of Cornwall.Cheltenham: The History Press. pp. 72–3.ISBN 978-1-8039-9000-2.

[16] Nicholas Orme,Unity and Variety: A History of the Church in Devon and Cornwallin series=PExeter Studies in History,volume29 (University of Exeter Press, 1991,ISBN 0-85989-355-3), p. 6

[17] T. M. Charles-Edwards,Wales and the Britons, 350-1064(Oxford University Press,2013,ISBN 9780198217312), p. 429

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