STANNARY. This term sometimes de notes a tin-mine, sometimes the tin-mines of a district, sometimes the royal rights in respect of tin-mines within such district. But it, is more commonly used as including the tin mines within a particular district, the tinners employed in working them, and the customs and privileges attached to the mines, and to those employed in digging and purifying the ore.
The great stannaries of England are those of Devon and Cornwall, of which the stannary of Cornwall is the more important. The stannaries of Cornwall and Devon were granted by Edward III. to the Black Prince, upon the creation of the duchy of Cornwall, and are perpetually incorporated with that duchy. In general both stannaries are under one duchy officer, called the lord-warden of the stan naries, with a separate vice-warden for each county. The stannary of Cornwall is subdi vided into the stannary of Blackmore, in tho , eastern parts of the county, and the stannaries of Tywarnhaile, Penwith, and Helston, in the west.
All tin in CornWall and Devon, whoever might be the owner of the land, appears to have formerly belonged to the king, by a usage peculiar to these counties. King John, in 1201, granted a charter to his tinners in Cornwall and Devonshire, authorising them to dig tin and turves to melt the tin anywhere in the moors and in the fees of bishops, abbots, and earls, as they bad been used and accustomed. This charter was confirmed by
Edward I., Richard II., and Henry IV. In Cornwall the right of digging in other men's land is now regulated by a peculiar usage, called the custom of boanding. This custom attaches only to such land as now is or anciently was wastrel, that is, land open or nninclos ed.
As part of the stannary rights, the Duke of Cornwall, as guarantee of the crown, has or had the pre-emption of tin throughout the county, a privilege supposed to have been reserved to the crown out of an original right of property in tin mines, but in modern times it is never exercised.
The duties payable to the Duke of Cornwall on the stamping or coinage of tin were abo lished by an Act passed in 1838; and the stannary courts were remodelled by other Acts in 1830 and 1639. By that of 1860 a stannary courts' duty of one farthing in the pound ster ling was imposed on tin and tin ore.