The Dumnonii or Dumnones were a British tribe who inhabited Dumnonia, the area now known as Cornwall and Devon (and some areas of present-day Dorset and Somerset) in the further parts of the South West peninsula of Britain, from at least the Iron Age up to the early Saxon period. They were bordered to the east by the Durotriges tribe.
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👉 Dumnonii in the context of Cornish people
Cornish people or the Cornish (Cornish: Kernowyon, Old English: Cornƿīelisċ) are an ethnic group native to, or associated with Cornwall and a recognised national minority in the United Kingdom, which (like the Welsh and Bretons) can trace its roots to the ancient Britons who inhabited Great Britain from somewhere between the 11th and 7th centuries BC and inhabited Britain at the time of the Roman conquest. Many in Cornwall today continue to assert a distinct identity separate from or in addition to English or British identities. Cornish identity has also been adopted by some migrants into Cornwall, as well as by emigrant and descendant communities from Cornwall, the latter sometimes referred to as the Cornish diaspora. Although not included as a tick-box option in the UK census, the numbers of those writing in a Cornish ethnic and national identity are officially recognised and recorded.
Throughout classical antiquity, the ancient Celtic Britons formed a series of tribes, kingdoms, cultures and identities throughout Great Britain; the Dumnonii and Cornovii were the Celtic tribes who inhabited what was to become Cornwall during the Iron Age, Roman and post-Roman periods. The name Cornwall and its demonym Cornish are derived from the Celtic Cornovii tribe. The Anglo-Saxon invasion and settlement of Britain starting from the late 5th and early 6th centuries and the arrival of Scots from Ireland during the same period gradually restricted the Romano-British culture and Brittonic language into parts of the north and west of Great Britain by the 10th century, whilst the inhabitants of southern, central and eastern Britain became English and much of the north became Scottish. The Cornish people, who shared the Brythonic language with the Welsh, Cumbrics and Picts, and also the Bretons who had migrated across the sea to escape the Anglo-Saxon invasions, were referred to in the Old English language as the "Westwalas" meaning West Welsh. The Battle of Deorham between the Britons and Anglo-Saxons is thought to have resulted in a loss of land links with the people of Wales.
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Dumnonii in the context of Durotriges
The Durotriges were one of the Celtic tribes living in Britain prior to the Roman invasion. The tribe lived in modern Dorset, south Wiltshire, south Somerset and Devon east of the River Axe and the discovery of an Iron Age hoard in 2009 at Shalfleet, Isle of Wight gives evidence that they may also have lived in the western half of the island. There is growing evidence to suggest that women held relatively high status in the tribe due to several factors including: high status grave goods found predominantly in female graves and the society being matrilocal. After the Roman conquest, their main civitates, or settlement-centred administrative units, were Durnovaria (modern Dorchester, "the probable original capital") and Lindinis (modern Ilchester, "whose former, unknown status was thereby enhanced"). Their territory was bordered to the west by the Dumnonii; and to the east by the Belgae.
Dumnonii in the context of Cornovii (Cornish)
The Cornovii is a name for a tribe presumed to have been part of the Dumnonii, a Celtic tribe inhabiting the south-west peninsula of Great Britain, during some part of the Iron Age, Roman and post-Roman periods. The Cornovii are supposed to have lived at the western end of the peninsula, in the area now known as Cornwall, and if the tribal name were correct it would be the ultimate source of the name of that present-day county.
The existence of this sub-tribe, clan or sept, is not mentioned in Ptolemy's 2nd-century Geography, as are many of the other Iron Age tribes in Britain. It has been inferred on the basis of a place-name listed in the Ravenna Cosmography of c. 700 CE as purocoronavis, which is considered to be a scribal error for durocornavis (or durocornovium), interpreted as meaning "the fortress of the Cornovii". The British tribal name Cornovii is also implied by its reflexes in Welsh Cernyw, Breton Kernev, and Cornish Kernow, (all meaning 'Cornwall') which Peter Schrijver argues probably derive from Common Brittonic *kornou̯(i̯)ī.