Stainmore is a civil parish in the Eden District of Cumbria

Cumbria

Cumbria , is a non-metropolitan county in North West England. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local authority, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumbria's largest settlement and county town is Carlisle. It consists of six districts, and in...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, including the villages of North Stainmore and South Stainmore. It has a population of 253.

Geography

Stainmore is drained by the River Belah

River Belah

The River Belah is a river in the county of Cumbria in England.The Belah is formed by the confluence of several small streams or sikes draining most of north and south Stainmore close to the border with County Durham and Yorkshire. It flows west with South Stainmore to north and Kaber parish to the...

 and the River Balder

River Balder

The Balder is an English river that rises on the eastern slope of Stainmore Common in the Pennine Chain and flows eastwards for about 13 miles to the River Tees at Cotherstone.The River Balder is in County Durham...

. It is crossed by the Roman road from Bowes

Bowes

Bowes is a village in County Durham, England. Located in the Pennine hills, it is situated close to Barnard Castle. It is built around the medieval Bowes Castle.-Civic history:...

 to Brough

Brough, Cumbria

Brough, sometimes known as Brough under Stainmore, is a village and civil parish in the Eden district of Cumbria, England, on the western fringe of the Pennines near Stainmore. The village is on the A66 trans-Pennine road, and the Swindale Beck, and is about south east of Appleby-in-Westmorland...

, now part of the A66

A66 road

The A66 is a major road in northern England which in part follows the course of the Roman road from Scotch Corner to Penrith. It runs from east of Middlesbrough in the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire to Workington in Cumbria...

, and formerly by the Stainmore Railway. Each of these lines of communication has made use of the relatively low broad saddle between the higher hills to north and south which is commonly referred to as the Stainmore Gap. The summit of the former railway is around 420m above sea level, though the roads climb to slightly higher elevations. The Gap is coincident with the Stainmore Summit Fault which throws the relatively flat-lying Carboniferous

Carboniferous

The Carboniferous is a geologic period and system that extends from the end of the Devonian Period, about 359.2 ± 2.5 Mya , to the beginning of the Permian Period, about 299.0 ± 0.8 Mya . The name is derived from the Latin word for coal, carbo. Carboniferous means "coal-bearing"...

 rocks of the area down to the south. It acted as a conduit for Lake District

Lake District

The Lake District, also commonly known as The Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous not only for its lakes and its mountains but also for its associations with the early 19th century poetry and writings of William Wordsworth...

-originated ice to pass eastwards during one or more glacial periods

Ice age

An ice age or, more precisely, glacial age, is a generic geological period of long-term reduction in the temperature of the Earth's surface and atmosphere, resulting in the presence or expansion of continental ice sheets, polar ice sheets and alpine glaciers...

.
There are several RIGS sites in the Stainmore area.

History

According to Roger of Wendover

Roger of Wendover

Roger of Wendover , probably a native of Wendover in Buckinghamshire, was an English chronicler of the 13th century.At an uncertain date he became a monk at St Albans Abbey; afterwards he was appointed prior of the cell of Belvoir, but he forfeited this dignity in the early years of Henry III,...

, it was where Eric Bloodaxe

Eric Bloodaxe

Eric Haraldsson , nicknamed ‘Bloodaxe’ , was a 10th-century Scandinavian ruler. He is thought to have had short-lived terms as the second king of Norway and possibly as the last independent ruler of the kingdom of Northumbria Eric Haraldsson (Eric, anglicised form of ; died 954), nicknamed...

 (d. 954), recently expelled from York, was betrayed and killed, an event which some historians believe to have taken place in a great battle

Battle of Stainmore

The Battle of Stainmore was a battle, likely between the Earldom of Bernicia, led by Osulf, and the forces of the last Norse king of Jórvík , Eric Bloodaxe...

.
Ancient monuments include a Roman marching camp at Rey Cross (54.5070°N 2.1552°W), and the Rey Cross itself (54.50579°N 2.14867°W), also called Rere Cross (Scheduled monument, no. 32713).

Further reading

• Collingwood, W.G. "Rey-Cross." Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian Archaeological Society series 2, 27 (1927): 1–10.
• Pearsall, W.H. The "Mosses" of the Stainmore district, Journal of Ecology, 1941
• Ramsden, D.M. From Stainmore to the Tees. Clapham, 1948.
• Richmond, I.A. and McIntyre, J. "The Roman marching camps at Reycross and Crackenthorpe." Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian Archaeological Society series 2, 34 (1934): 50–61.
• Robinson, P. Archaeology on the Stainmore Pass – the A66 Project. Barnard Castle, 1993.
• Vyner, B. (ed.). Stainmore. The Archaeology of a North Pennine Pass. Tees Archaeology Monographs 1. Hartlepool, 2001.