Dumnonii

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The Dumnonii or Dumnones were a Celtic tribe which inhabited part of the West Country, specifically the southwestern peninsula of England, during the Iron Age and the early Roman period.

Their name was reflected in the Roman name of Exeter, Isca Dumniorum, or "Isca of the Dumnonii". The Latin name suggests that the city was already a Celtic oppidum, or walled town, on the banks on the River Exe before the foundation of the Roman city, in ca. AD 50. They would give their name to the English county of Devon, and their name is represented in Britain's two modern Brythonic languages as Dewnans in Cornish and Dyfnaint in Welsh. Amédée Thierry (Histoire des Gauloises, 1828), one of the inventors of the "historic race" of Gauls, could confidently equate them with the Cornish ("les Cornouailles").

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History

The Dumnonii are thought to have occupied territory in Somerset, Devon and Cornwall and possibly part of Dorset. They do not seem to have been politically centralised: the structure, distribution and construction of Bronze Age and Iron Age hillforts in the southwest point to a number of smaller tribal groups living alongside each other.

Ptolemy's 2nd century Geography, places the Dumnonii to the west of the Durotriges, and names four of their towns: Isca Dumnoniorum (later Caeresk, now Exeter), Tamara (presumably on the River Tamar), Uxella (perhaps on the River Axe) and Voliba (unidentified). The Ravenna Cosmography adds the names of two more settlements: Nemetostatio, a name relating to nemeto-, sanctuary or sacred grove (Probably to be identified with North Tawton, Devon) and Durocornavium (unidentified). The name Durocornavium implies the existence of a tribe called the Cornavii, perhaps the ancestors of the Cornish people {although some trace the Cornish to a hypothetical migration of the Cornovii of the West Midlands).

In the sub-Roman period a Brythonic kingdom called Dumnonia emerged, covering the entire peninsula, although it is believed by some to be effectively a collection of sub-kingdoms. It is claimed by some that the Battle of Mount Badon in which Brythonic Dumnonians fought off Anglo-Saxons took place in Devon, but most historians believe this battle was fought near Bath. Dumnonia's territory was gradually reduced to little more than Cornwall by the expansion of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex. As the eastern boundary of Brythonic Dumnonia receded to the west, many believe that the tribe's history eventually became indistinguishable from that of the Kingdom of Cornwall. The medieval Breton toponyms of Domnonée and Cornouaille/Kernev were probably founded by emigrants from Devon and Cornwall during this period.

Brythonic Celtic peoples are reported by William of Malmesbury to have been living in the area of Devon alongside Saxon peoples during the 10th century. A part of Exeter retained the title 'Little Britain' until the eighteenth century.

The Dumnonii would have spoken a Brythonic dialect ancestral to modern Cornish, this language developed into Cornish and there is evidence some form survived east of the Tamar.

The Stannary Courts and Parliaments which were established after the grant of a charter to the tin miners of the region by John of England in 1201 had recognised the distinctive legal rights and status of Devon and Cornwall. However, Edward I of England split this legal union into separate Stannaries for the two "Counties" of Devon and Cornwall in 1305.

Victorian historians often referred to this tribe as the Damnonii, which is also the name of another Celtic people from lowland Scotland, although there are no known links between the two populations. Another tribe with a similar name (but with no known links between the two) appear to have had a presence also in Ireland, as shown by the presence of a people called the Fir Domnann in the province of Connacht.

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