KEYNE (ST.), or St. KEAN, a village and a parish in Liskeard district, Cornwall. The village stands on the river Looe, 2 miles S of Liskeard r. station; has a postoffice under Liskeard; was anciently called Lametton; took its present name from St. Kayne or Keyna, daughter of Brychan, prince of Brecknock; and has a well, of ancient superstitions repute, dedicated to that saint, and celebrated in a ballad of Southey:- "A well there is in the west country, and a clearer one never was seen; There is not a wife in the west country but has heard of the well of St. Keyne. An oak and elm tree stand beside, and behind does an ash tree grow, And a willow fro, the bank above droops in the water below. If the husband at this gifted well shall drink before his wife, A happy. man henceforth is he, for he shall be master for Life." The water is reported to give the mastery for life to whichever party first drinks it, bride or bridegroom; and a quantity of it was, a few years ago, sent in bottles, as a curiosity, to a bazaar at Mount Edgecumbe.—The parish comprises 944 acres. Real property, £990. Pop., 181. Houses, 30. The property is divided among a few. The manor belonged to the Tresilians, the Coplestones, and others; and passed to the Rashleighs. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Exeter. Value, £198.* Patron, the Rev. H.Cory. The church is good.

(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))