Kea (Breton and Cornish: Ke; French: Ké) was a late 5th-century British saint from the Hen Ogledd ("Old North")—the Brythonic-speaking parts of what is now southern Scotland and northern England.
According to tradition he was chiefly active in Cornwall, Devon and Brittany, and his cult was popular in those regions as well as throughout Wales and the West Country.
[2] Kea is chiefly known through a French summary of a lost Latin hagiography written by Maurice of Cleder in the 17th century, as well as Beunans Ke, an incomplete 16th-century Cornish-language play rediscovered in 2000.
An alternate legend describes Kea as an Irish monk, who, standing on the shore watching Christian missionaries depart for Cornwall, prayed that he not be left behind.
[6] A similar tale is told of Piran, who is said to have floated safely over the water to land upon the sandy beach of Perranzabuloe in Cornwall.