THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND. POPULAR COUN1T HISTORIES. HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND. BY RICHARD S. FERGUSON, M.A., LL.M., F.S.A., CHANCELLOR OF CARLISLE, PRESIDENT CUMBERLAND AND WESTMORLAND ANTIQUARIAN AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY, AND AUTHOR OF SEVERAL LOCAL WORKS. LONDON: ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. 1890. CONTENTS. CHAPTER PREFACE - I. INTRODUCTORY. THE EARLY INHABITANTS - II. THE ROMAN CONQUEST - III. THE ROMAN ROADS IV. THE ROMAN FORTS AND TOWNS V. THE GREAT BARRIER OF HADRIAN : THE TRAIL OF THE ROMAN WALL VI. LUGUVALLIUM VII. STRATHCLYDE VIII. CUMBRIA - IX. THE LAND OF CARLISLE X. CUMBERLAND XI. THE NORMAN SETTLEMENT XII. THE NORMAN SETTLEMENT : II.- BERLAND XIII. THE NORMAN SETTLEMENT : CARLISLE XIV. THE NORMAN SETTLEMENT : IV. THE CHURCH XV. THE SCOTTISH WARS XVI. THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY XVII. THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY : BORDER WARFARE. THE REFORMATION XVIII. THE TROUBLES, THE RESTORATION, AND THE REVOLU- TION - XIX. THE '15 AND THE '45 XX. MISCELLANEOUS - A CLASSIFIED LIST OF BOOKS, ETC., RELATING TO CUMBERLAND - INDEX -...--- I. THE BARONIES -THE FOREST OF CUM- III. THE CITY OF PAGE vii I 19 28 59 78 98 102 1 2O 139 148 157 1 80 191 220 223 237 242 252 269 277 289 299 PREFACE. THE time has gone past for writing a history of Cumber- land, or of any county, on the old-fashioned lines and scale. The work is now subdivided ; the fauna and the flora, the pedigrees and the geology, the ecclesiology, and the everything else, are dealt with by specialists in little books devoted exclusively to one subject. A few years ago one or two ponderous tomes supplied a country gentleman with all that was in print concerning his county, whereas nowadays a whole bookcase is required to house the more portable and numerous volumes that are in vogue. A guide to these volumes is required, and that the writer has endeavoured to supply for Cumber- land in the classified list of books relating to that county which precedes the index. As to this volume itself, it is an attempt to discharge the functions of the " General Introduction " to an old- fashioned county history in two or three quarto volumes. How far the writer has succeeded it is not for him to say. Many monastic chartularies and other documents relating to Cumberland are still unprinted and unindexed. These the writer has done his best to consult, but until they are printed and indexed, he, or any other local writer, must expect in course of time to be set right on many points. THE writer has made liberal use of papers in the Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, and thanks the authors thereof for much assistance and advice, parti- cularly his old friends W. Jackson, F.S.A., the Rev. T. Lees, F.S.A., the Rev. W. S. Calverley, F.S.A., the Rev. H. Whitehead, and others. Dr. Prescott's pamphlets have been of much service, and suggested many important points. Mr. Robert Ferguson's works have been a great help ; but it would occupy too much space to enumerate all the authors from whom the writer has derived information. The Classi- fied List of Books must be turned to. HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. THE EARLY INHABITANTS. THE most northerly point of the county of Cumberland is niched into an angle between the English county of Northumberland and the Scotch one of Roxburgh, at a place in the Cheviots situate on the Kershope Water or Burn, and called on the six-inch Ordnance Map Scotch Knowe, but called by the older writers on local history Lamyford. From Scotch Knowe the western boundary of the county runs down the Kershope Water to Kershope Foot, the junction of the Kershope and Liddell Waters, then down Liddell Water to its junction with the river Esk, and then down the Esk a short distance to a point called Scotsdike : hence the boundary line runs due west to the river Sark, a distance of four miles, defined by an earthen bank, known as the Scotsdike ; the boundary next runs down the Sark to its junction with the Esk, and down the Esk into the Solway Firth. So far the direction of the boundary has been generally south-west. The Solway Firth now becomes the boundary of Cumberland, and runs westerly as far as Skinburness, where it turns to the i History of Cumberland. southward to St. Bees, whose North Head is the most westernly point of Cumberland, and marks the limit of the Solway Firth. From St. Bees the Irish Sea forms the boundary, until the mouth of the river Duddon is reached, where Hodbarrow Point marks the most southerly point of the county. From Scotch Knowe to Hodbarrow the western boundary of Cumberland is defined by water, fresh and salt, with the exception of the four-mile bank of earth cutting off the angle between Esk and Sark. This angle was added to Cumberland on the division between England and Scotland, in 1552, of the Debateable Lands, which, from being a common pasture to both countries, had degenerated into a lawless harbour of ruffians. To return to the Scotch Knowe, the eastern boundary of the county of Cumberland runs from thence in a south-easterly direction over the fells, keeping to the eastward of Christenbury Crag, by a line defined, more or less, by piles of stones and mounds of earth, until it runs into a little affluent of the river Irthing, called variously the Troutbeck and the Gair Beck ; it continues down this affluent to the Irthing, and down Irthing until it meets the Poltross Burn, near Gilsland Railway Station. It next ascends the Poltross and goes up the fells, and after running south for a time it turns due east and makes a great detour to the east side of the watershed to in- clude the mining district of Alston, running up or down one or other burn, over or along one or other watershed, to the most easterly point of the county at Knoutberry Hill : hence over the fells to the river Tees, which it ascends in a westerly direction to its head ; thence over the watershed, and by the Crowdundle Beck to the river Eden, and down the Eden to its junction with the Eamont. It then ascends that river to its source in Ullswater, which lake, for two-thirds of its length, forms the boundary between Cumberland and Westmorland. Introductory. 3 The boundary leaves the lake at the west end of Gow- barrow Park, and by Glencoin Beck ascends Helvellyn, from which it descends over Dolly Waggon Pike to Dunmail Raise on the coach-road between Ambleside and Keswick. From Dunmail Raise it proceeds over Bow Fell to the Shire Stones on Wrynose, where the three counties of Cumberland, Westmorland, and Lancashire meet in a point. From thence it runs to Blackball above Ulpha, and then down the Duddon to the sea. The area thus enclosed is irregular in outline, and the mining district of Alston is separated from the rest of the county, with which it has little in common, by a lofty range of fells, rising in Crossfell to a height of 2,930 feet above the sea-level. These fells extend along the whole east side of the county from Scotch Knowe to close upon Penrith, and are part of the great range which runs from the Tweed to Derbyshire, losing itself in the Midlands ; they include, beside Alston Moor in the extreme east of the county, the bleak expanses of Spadeadam Waste and Bewcastle Fells in the extreme north. The south-west angle of Cumberland is occupied by mountains and fells, and forms part of what is well known as the Lake District ; these mountains and fells extend eastward nearly as far as Penrith, and northward to Caldbeck and Binsey : on the west a narrow strip of plain, widening as it goes to the north, separates them from the sea. They include such famous heights as Scawfell, Helvellyn, Skiddaw, Bow Fell, the Pillar, Saddleback, etc. ; and the lakes of Ullswater, Bassenthwaite, Derwentwater, Crum- mock, Wastwater, Thirlmere, Ennerdale, Buttermere, and Loweswater, as well as many smaller lakes and tarns. The eastern and the western fells approach each other somewhat narrowly at Penrith, from whence they widen out to the north, including between them a plain, the great central plain of Cumberland, afterwards familiar as i 2 History of Cumberland. Inglewood Forest, which has in its centre, rising like the umbo of a shield, the conspicuous hill known as Barrock Fell ; this plain sweeps round to the westward by the alluvial flats south of the Solway to join the strip of plain between the Lake Hills and the sea. The Lake District of Cumberland sends its waters mainly westward t6 the sea. At the south, Duddon gathers the waters from Wrynose, and, running between Cumberland and Lancashire, expands into an estuary some nine miles long, over whose sands, bared at low water, somewhat dangerous fords exist. A little to the north, Esk, Mite and Irt drain Eskdale, Miterdale, and Wasdale, and unite in the land-locked harbour of Raven- glass, now so silted up and shallow on the bar as to be almost useless. Calder and Ehen drain the Ennerdale District, the latter issuing out of Ennerdale Lake. The Derwent, rising in Borrowdale, flows through Derwentwater and Bassenthwaite Lake, and falls into the sea at Workington. Its' affluents are the Greta, which drains Thirlmere, and the Cocker, which performs the same office for Buttermere and Crummock Lakes ; while the Elne, or Ellen, rises in Caldbeck Fells, and drains a range of plain between those fells and the sea at Maryport. From the eastern side of the Lake Fells issue the rivers Eamont, Petteril, and Caldew, all of which empty them- selves into Eden : the first issues from Ullswater, and runs due east ; the second from Greystoke Park, Hutton, and Skelton, and turning to the north drains the centre of the plain of Cumberland, and falls into the Eden close to the east of Carlisle ; the third rises on Caldbeck Fells, and, running north, drains a portion of the plain of Cumberland, and falls into the Eden just west of Carlisle. The Eden itself, the most important river in the county, rises in the eastern fells in Westmorland, and, Introductory. 5 entering Cumberland near Penrith, runs north through the eastern side of the plain of Cumberland, until it receives the Irthing; then, turning westward, it flows past Carlisle to the Solway. The eastern fells in Cumber- land are drained by the Croglin, another tributary of the Eden, and by the Irthing and its tributaries, the Gelt, Kingwater, and Cammock. The two Lynes, Black and White, rise in the Bewcastle Fells, and, coalescing into one, run into the Esk, which with its tributaries, the Liddell and Sark. fall into the Solway. Waver, Wiza, and Wampool drain the alluvial flats south of the Solway into that Firth. With exception of the three last, the rivers of Cumberland are rapid, bright, and clear : shallows and deep pools alternate ; they are not navig- able, with the exception of the Eden, and that only for small craft to a place called Sandsfield, below Carlisle. Fords or waths abound on most of them, even in the lower reaches of the Eden between Carlisle and the sea. Tees and South Tyne rise in a swamp on Crossfell, and Nent in Alston, but can hardly be reckoned among the rivers of Cumberland. The Eden runs from east to west immediately to the north of Carlisle, while its tributaries the Petteril and the Caldew flow into it from the south immediately to east and west. About a mile south of Carlisle their courses approach one another so nearly as to almost make the site on which Carlisle stands a triangular island. In this quasi island a long hill of New Red Sand- stone rises gently from the south to a head on which now stands the Cathedral of Carlisle. A deep valley then intervenes (or once did intervene, for it is now filled up), and then the hill rises again to a second and higher head, whose slopes to east, and north, and west, are steep towards the meads through which the three rivers flow. Some sixty feet above their level the castle - hill of Carlisle looks out towards Scotland like a lion a natural History of Cumberland. fortress to guard the waths over Eden. Under the west of this castle-hill runs an ancient British track. Entering Cumberland at the south, it follows a line west of, and parallel to, the river Petteril, and crosses the neck where that river and Caldew so nearly join. By a line now represented by back-streets called Collier Lane and Back- house's Walk, and by lanes in the Willow Holm, it sneaks under the west side of the hill on which Carlisle and its castle now stand, and, fording Caldew and Eden, runs, parallel to the latter river, to Willie o' the Boats on the marshes between it and Esk, fords the Esk, and passes away into Scotland. That this track is older than the Roman rule is proved by the fact of its crossing the Eden by the dangerous wath of Etterby, which is just about a mile below the site of the Roman bridge over that river at Carlisle, to which the track could easily have been conducted had the bridge existed when the track was first traced out. From the south of Cumberland this track passes southwards over the bleak heights of Shap Fell, and through the Tebay Gorge. Another ancient access into Cumberland from the south is from the great plain of York, over the pass of Stainmoor, down the valley of the Eden, into the plain of Cumberland. A third ancient road into Cumberland from the south is by the sea-coast, crossing the estuaries of Morecambe Bay and the Duddon. To these roads we will recur when we come to deal with the Roman settlement. Up to the present time no implements of the Palaeo- lithic period have been found, either in caves or river- drift, within the area of Cumberland, or, indeed, in the North of England ; and the views of Professor Boyd Dawkins that their absence is due to the presence of glaciers are considered by Dr. Evans to be well founded.* A stone celt found near Keswick, and two in the Carlisle Museum, have, indeed, been assigned to the Palaeolithic * Archaeological Journal, vol. xxxix., p. 441. Introductory. 7 period ; but the better opinion is that they are unfinished implements of the Neolithic or Polished Stone period. Dr. Evans, the President of the Society of Antiquaries of London, however, suggests the possibility that there may be gravels along the valley of the Eden in which drift- implements might eventually be found. Stone imple- ments of the Neolithic period have been found at many places in Cumberland. Those of most common occur- rence are large celts or hatchets, the greater part of them made of felstone, and some of them of a shape almost peculiar to Cumberland. Perforated hammers and heavy stone axes are also very common. Of the three known examples of celts which have been found attached to their original handles two are from Cumberland namely, one from Solway Moss, and the other from Ehenside Tarn in West Cumberland. Stones for sharpening celts have also been found, one at Lazonby having seventy grooves in it.* Several of the long barrows of the dolicho-cephalic, or long-headed, race, who used these stone implements, are to be found in Cumberland. There is a fine one near the Shaws, Gilsland ; another, called Sampson's Bratful, is on Stockdale Moor in Copeland Forest. Many relics of the brachy-cephalic, or round- headed, race, who intruded themselves upon the dolicho- cephalic race, have been found in Cumberland ; but the bronze celts, spear-heads, and palstaves of the brachy- cephalic men too readily found their way into the melting- pot of the brass-founder, and so are of rarer occurrence in the local museums and collections than the relics of their predecessors. A stone mould for casting bronze spear-heads of remarkable size was found at Croglin in 1883, and is in the Penrith Museum. f The round barrows of the brachy-cephalic men are more frequent; and * Archcsological Journal, vol. xxxix., pp. 441, 442. f Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. vii., p. 272. History of Cumberland. Canon Greenwell has opened them on Castle Carrock in the east of the county, and Lord Muncaster at Barnscar in the south-west. Many remain, still untouched so far as known, on Burnsmoor, on Ulpha Fell, Seatallan, Bewcastle, and other places. But it must not be supposed that every mound is a barrow. There are many mounds near Brampton which were supposed to be barrows, until the spade proved them to be knolls of gravel the remains of a great sheet which had perished by denudation. The Ordnance Map marks two tumuli near Dalston Hall as barrows one long, the other round ; but again the spade proved them to be mere natural knobs on an esker of gravel.* The glaciers that at some time or other most probably after the Palaeolithic period covered the area of Cum- berland must have completely changed the surface of the country ; but the men of the Polished Stone period and of the Bronze period saw the country in its main features much as we see it now, though it is possible that three lakes, or meres, at Lazonby, Langanby, and Appleby, occupied the valley of the Eden, and that the Petteril ran into that river at Great Salkeld, and not near Carlisle, and perhaps that both joined the Caldew south of Carlisle instead of north, while Waver, Wiza, and Wampool sought the sea by old channels, to which very little change of level would make them even now revert. f We will venture here to give a picture of Britain as the Romans found it, drawn by a master hand a picture which we have already utilized in another little work : * Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. ix., p. 117. f See " Ice-work in Edenside," Transactions, Cumberland and West- morland Association, part xiii. ; " The Physical History of Greystoke Park and the Valley of the Petteril " ; and " The Old Lakes of Eden," ibid., part xiv., all by J. G. Goodchild, F.G.S., F.Z.S. ; " Notes on Physical Geography of North- West Cumberland," ibid., part vi., by T. V. Holmes, F.G.S. Introductory. 9 It was a land of uncleared forests, with a climate as yet not mitigated by the organized labours of mankind. . . . It is certain that the island, when it fell under the Roman power, was little better in most parts than a cold and watery desert. According to all the accounts of the early travellers, the sky was stormy and obscured by continual rain, the air chilly even in summer, and the sun during the finest weather had little power to disperse the steaming mists. The trees gathered and con- densed the rain ; the crops grew rankly, but ripened slowly ; and the ground and the atmosphere were alike overloaded with moisture. The fallen timber obstructed the streams, the rivers were squandered in the reedy morasses, and only the downs and hilltops rose above the per- petual tracts of wood.* Of the truth of this description as applied to what was afterwards the county of Cumberland there is no difficulty in adducing proofs. The country was covered with forest and with dense scrub of oak, ash, thorn, hazel, and birch, whose stools are frequently found buried beneath the peat at Alston and other places, while the scrub itself remains in many places in the low bottoms. The great hill near St. Bees, known as Tomline, was, even within this century, covered with scrub high enough to hide a horse. The frequent occurrence of the antlers of red deer, many much larger than any of the present day, shows that the deer must have had abundance of " browse " that is, " scrub " for their support in times past, extending over a wide range of country. Edmund Sandford, who wrote, in the time of Charles II., a gossiping account of the county, still remaining in manuscript, tells us that great part of it was then forest. The bogs and mosses of the present day are the puny and degenerate survivals of vast morasses which once covered the alluvial flats bordering on the Solway, and stretched eastward from the vicinity of Rockcliffe along the north of Carlisle for many miles. This last has dwindled down to Scaleby Moss, while * " Origins of English History," by C. Elton : London, Quaritch, 1882, p. 222, cited by the writer in " Diocesan Histories Carlisle," Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1889, p. 15- io History of Cumberland. Solway Moss, Bowness Moss, and Wedholm Flow record others. We have already divided the early inhabitants of the land, whose appearance we have been discussing, into two races the one, the earlier, dolicho-cephalic of the Polished Stone period ; the other, the later, brachy- cephalic of the Bronze period a Celtic race a branch of that great Aryan family which has peopled nearly all Europe and great part of Asia, and which appears always to have possessed a knowledge of the use of metal. This Celtic race was, compared with their non-Aryan predecessors, a set of very ugly customers ; their bones, as dug up, prove them to have been bigger (their average stature over 5 feet 8 inches), thicker, and more muscular ; they had broad jaws, turned-up noses, high cheek-bones, wide mouths, and eyes deep sunk under beetling brows that overhung them like pent-houses the superciliary ridges on their skulls tell that characteristics in striking contrast to the short stature and mild and pleasant countenances which their bones show the dolicho- cephalic men to have possessed. Armed with the superior weapon, the round-heads soon asserted their superiority over the long-heads. They did not annihilate them ; in the round barrows of the round-heads both long and round skulls appear, and in the later round barrows the skulls begin occasionally to appear of an intermediate shape ; this shows that the round-headed men of the bronze weapons probably enslaved the long-headed men with the stone weapons, and took the long-headed women for their wives. The language of the round-headed men swallowed up the language of the long-headed, and the land was in the possession of the Celts. These Celts have been written about under many names ; they have been called Gauls, as being a tribe of the Gauls, who inhabited the neighbouring continent ; Welsh, as being the progenitors of the present inhabitants of Wales ; The Early Inhabitants. 1 1 Irish, for a similar reason ; and Britons, or British, as being found in Britain. That the Celts arrived in this country in two waves of migration appears certain : to the earlier wave belonged the ancestors of the people who speak Erse, or Irish, in Ireland ; Gaelic in the High- lands of the North, and who are called by Professor Rhys Goidals ; to the later wave belonged the ancestors of the people who speak Welsh in Wales, and Breton in Brittany, and are called by Professor Rhys Brythons.* They are called Hiberno-Celts and Cambro-Celts by a local writer, Mr. Sullivan. How far the traces of the language spoken by these people survive in the place- names and dialect of the district is a moot question : that they do survive is undoubted, but the question is as to the degree ; both Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Robert Fergu- son, F.S.A., have written on the subjectt The latter writer says : We find no vestiges of a Celtic origin in the characteristics, physical and moral, of the present inhabitants of the district. Nor does their dialect present any but the faintest traces of the language of the ancient Britons. And though a more considerable number of Celtic names of places exists than in most other parts of England, yet, taking the district of the mountains, where ancient names usually linger much longer than elsewhere, the number of such names is in point of fact less than in some other mountain districts of England, as, for instance, Derby shire. J Mr. Ferguson is of opinion that the rivers in Cumber- land may be said, with very few exceptions, to retain their original Celtic names; he declines to admit the * " Celtic Britain," by J. Rhys, M.A. : London, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1882. f " Cumberland and Westmorland, Ancient and Modern," by J. Sullivan : London, Whitaker and Co. ; Kendal, John Hudson, 1857. "The Northmen in Cumberland": London, Longman and Co.; Carlisle, Steele, 1856 ; "The Dialect of Cumberland": London, Williams and Norgate ; Carlisle, Steele, 1873. Both by Robert Ferguson, F.S.A. J " Northmen in Cumberland and Westmorland," p. 13. 12 History of Cumberland. same in the case of the mountains, with the exception of Blencathra (Saddleback), or " the seat on the peak," Helvellyn, " the yellow mountain," and Rivelyn, by the side of Ennerdale Lake, " the red mountain." Of other place-names he assigns to the Celtic all the names formed from blen, as Blencogo, Blencow, Blencairn, and Blennerhasset ; those from caer, as Carlisle, Cargo, and Cardurnock; those from glen, as Lamplugh (formerly Glanplough), Glencoin, Glenridding, Glenderaterra and Glenderamakin ; in dun, as Dundraw ; also Gilcrux and Gilgarron, which should be Cilcrux and Cilgarron, " the chapel of the cross " and " the chapel of Gerain," who was a Celtic saint. Of the words of the dialect of Cumberland, Mr. Ferguson takes a proportion of about four in a hundred to be probably, and about an equal proportion to be possibly, derived from the Celtic. It may be possible to accuse Mr. Ferguson of too great a partiality for the Scandinavian tongue, but his views now meet with general acceptance. Both he and Mr. Sullivan find in the place-names and dialect traces of the languages of the two waves of Celtic migration already alluded to, and Mr. Sullivan attempts to show the direction from which each wave entered Cumberland, and the limits of their settlements. Such attempts verge on the specu- lative rather than on the exact ; we may rest content with the fact that the relics of the Stone and Bronze periods, the skulls found in the barrows, the place-names and the dialect, taken together, show that there were, prior to the advent of the Romans, three peoples settled in the district, whose history we are endeavouring to tell, namely, two Celtic, and one pre-Celtic. Professor Rhys, however, in his map of Britain showing the relative posi- tions of its chief peoples during the Roman occupation, assigns the district wholly to the Goidels, with faint traces of the pre-Celtic race in the hills. Be the proportions of the mixture as they may, the later The Early Inhabitants. 13 comers conquered and absorbed the earlier ones ; and, under the name of the Brigantes, or free men, as Pro- fessor Rhys conjectures, inhabited, probably sparsely, the mountainous and woody districts now known as York- shire, Lancashire, Westmorland, Cumberland, and Northumberland. Whether the name of Brigantes denoted a league of several peoples, or else a dominant people ruling over a considerable territory' containing a number of subject tribes, is uncertain. The chief sub- tribes of the Brigantes appear to have been the Setantii, whose port was not far from Lancaster, the " Gadeni " and " Otadeni " of Cumberland and Northumberland, and others; but, as Mr. Elton points out,* there were probably a great number of Brigantian clans, both of Celtic and pre-Celtic origin, of which the names have now been forgotten. These probably represented the earlier comers driven into the more remote corners of the district, and held in some sort of subordination by the later comers. The geographer Ptolemy, who lived in the reign of Antoninus Pius, circa A.D. 140, has given, in his description of Britain, the names and positions of the chief towns of the Brigantes as follows : Long, (from the Insulae Fortunatae). Lat. Epiacum - 18.30 58.30 Vinovium - 17.30 58.00 Caturractonium - 20.00 58.00 Calatum 19.00 57-3O Isurium - 20.00 57-4 Rigodunum - - 18.00 57-3 Olicana - - 19.00 57.30 Eboracum (Legio Sexta Victrix) - 20.00 57-2O Camulodunum - 18.15 57-oo Of these towns Vinovium, Caturractonium, Isurium, Eboracum, and Camulodunum, are identified by help of the " Itinerary," or road-book, of Antoninus Pius as Bin- * " Origins of English History," p. 242. 14 History of Cumberland. Chester in Durham, Catterick, Aldborough, York, and Slack, all four in Yorkshire. Calatum is probably the same as the Galatum of the same work, and situate, as will hereafter be seen, in either Lancashire or Westmor- land. Olicana is probably Ilkley in Yorkshire.* Rigo- dunum is not yet identified, but is probably on the Ribble. Epiacum alone remains, and for this Mr. Gordon Hills suggests Keswick, while Professor Rhys suggests Old Penrith, a place where was a Roman camp, identified as the Voreda of the Antonine " Itinerary." Ebchester, Lanchester, and Hexham, have also been suggested ; but the cities of the Brigantes, prior to the advent of the Romans, can have been little else than collections of miserable wigwams, and their roads but forest tracks. We begin to get more positive information about the state of Britain when we come to the expeditions to Britain of Julius Caesar in B.C. 55 and 54. He found in the southern and maritime parts of the island a state of civilization much greater than is generally supposed,t due to a large Belgic immigration from the comparatively civilized Gaul. The tribes that Caesar fell in with were acquainted with the use of iron, and Dr. Evans shows that the inhabitants of the south of Britain must have begun to coin gold pieces in imitation of the Macedonian stater of Philip II. so soon as from 200 to 150 B.C. ; but none of these coins have been found in the territories of the Brigantes, nor had they any of their own. The civilization of the southern coast did not extend very far into the interior. Caesar describes the tribes of the interior as little given to cultivating the soil, but as living on milk and flesh, and clothing themselves in skins. * Watkin's " Roman Lancashire," pp. 2, 3. See also a paper by Mr. Gordon Hills in Journal, British Archaeological Association, vol. xxxvi., p. 367. f Evans' " Ancient Stone Implements," p. 10 ; Evans' " Coins of the Ancient Britons," pp. 42, 263 et alibi. The Early Inhabitants. They were tall and stout, but clumsy; wore their hair long, and shaved all but the upper lip. He says they stained themselves with a blue dye made from woad, to give themselves a more terrible appearance in battle. Many will be deprived of long-cherished ideas when they hear that Professor Rhys only takes this to mean that they painted their faces blue.* Caesar can, of course, have had no personal knowledge of the Brigantes ; but we may safely take it that they were among the fiercest and least civilized of the Celts. Whether those remarkable circles of upright stones, several of which are still existing in Cumberland, belong to the pre-Roman period, which has been under discus- sion in this chapter, or whether they were erected at a much later date, has been the subject of controversy. The common name of Druid temples and circles implies the popular belief as to their origin, but temples they never can have been. The climate of Cumberland does not favour the use of hypasthral temples. Nine-tenths of them the spade and the pickaxe have revealed to be places of sepulchre the places of sepulchre of bodies that have chiefly been burnt and most antiquaries have attributed them to the pre-Roman period ; but Mr. James Fergusson, in his " Rude - Stone Monuments," asserts them to be the work of post-Roman times, and of a people that had been influenced by Roman civilization. The better opinion is that they are of pre-Roman date.f The principal of these remains in modern Cumberland are the circle known as Long Meg and her Daughters, in * " Celtic Britain," by J. Rhys, M.A. : London, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1882, p. 540. f When the Royal Archaeological Institute visited Stonehenge in 1887, Mr. Arthur Evans, F.S.A., arguing as to the date of that great circle, from the finding of an amber necklace in a neighbouring barrow, and proving this relic to be coeval with certain Greek vases of known date, gave Stonehenge an approximate age of B.C. 450. 1 6 History of Cumberland. the parish of Addingham, the stone circle on Castle Rigg near Keswick, those on Burn Moor in Miterdale and Eskdale, the stone circle at Swineside near Millom,* the circle on Elva Plain, the circle at Studfold Gate, the Grey Yauds near Kirkoswald, the circle near Seascale Hall, prehistoric remains at Lacra and Kirksanton. One thing seems certain, and is this that whoever were the builders of these circles, they also inhabited the Isle of Man ; for the kirks, or stone circles, the cairns, and giants' graves of that island, are the exact counterpart of those in Cumberland a fact that would point to Hiberno- Celts as the probable architects. Mr. James Fergusson shows that a circle-building race came from the north, touching first at the Orkneys, and, passing down through the Hebrides, divided themselves in the north of Ireland, one branch settling on the west coast of that island, while the other landed in Cumberland, and penetrated into- England in a south-easterly direction. This fits in with what is known of the migration of the Hiberno- Celts. Careful examinations of some of the stones of these monuments have resulted in the discovery on some of them, and also on the stones of cists, of curious circular markings and cups, notably on Long Meg itself, on the stone of a cist found near Long Meg, and on the cover of a cist found at Redhills, near Penrith.-f- Antiquaries are not agreed upon the meaning of these markings ; but they have been found largely in India, and probably refer to Lingam and Mahadeo worship. * Accurate surveys of Long Meg and her Daughters, of the Keswick stone circle, of the great one on Burn Moor, and of that at Swine- side, made by Mr. C. W. Dymond, F.S.A., are in the Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, vol. v., p. 39, and in the Journal of the British Archaeological Association, vol. xxxiv., pp. 31-36. f Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archtzological Society, vol. vi., p. no. The Early Inhabitants. 17 The cities of the Brigantes have already been dealt with. It is possible to point out various places where the pre-Roman inhabitants of the district had settlements of some sort or other. The late Mr. Clifton Ward compiled the following list of ancient i.e., prehistoric settlements in Cumberland that were within his knowledge the figures refer to the six-inch Ordnance Map on which the remains are, and the letters to the quarters of the maps : Weasel Hills and West Fells - - 48 N.W. Stone Carr - - 57 N.E. and S.E. Above Falcon Crag - - 64 S.W. Threlkeld - 65 N.W. N. banks of Ennerdale - - 68 S.E. Ennerdale, banks of Liza - - 69 S.W. Thirlmere, Deergarth Wood - - - 70 N.E. Tongue How - - 73 N.W. Boat How - - 73 N.W. Cawfell Beck - Stockdale Moor - 73 S.E. Valley of the Bleng - Gray Borran - ,, Greendale - 79 N.W. Burnmoor - - 79 N.W. E. of Raven Crag - - 83 N.W. Around Devoke Water - Ulpha Fell - 83 N.E. Barnscar - 83 S.W. Knott - Brown Rigg - 83 S.E.* Mr. Ward also gives a list of round or oval camps, among which camps on Carrock Fell (48 S.W.), the Fort Fitz Wood (54 N.E.), Castle How, Peel Wyke (55 N.E.), Castle Crag, Shoulthwaite Glen (64 S.E.), Maiden Castle and Dunmallard Hill (66 N.W.),t and Maiden Castle * " Notes on Archaeological Remains in the Lake District," by J. Clifton Ward, Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Anti- quarian and Archaeological Society, vol. iii., pp. 241, 243. Here is also a list of tumuli, circles, and camps. t For these two, see " Vestiges of Celtic Occupation near Ullswater," by M. W. Taylor, M.D., F.S.A., Transactions, Cumberland and West- morland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. i., p. 154. 2 1 8 History of Cumberland. (79 N.E.), are British in all likelihood. A survey of the northern and eastern fells would probably add to the list, and we believe the great hexagonal-shaped Roman camp at Bewcastle to have been originally British. Besides the relics of the Stone and Bronze ages already mentioned in this chapter as having been found in Cumberland, one or two more deserve mention, belonging to the late Celtic period, dating from say four centuries B.C. to shortly after Caesar's invasion. One is a bronze- beaded torque of late Celtic type, which was found in Carlisle, and which is assigned by Dr. Evans to the late Celtic or early Iron Age.* A remarkable sword was found at Embleton, near Cockermouth. It was in a sheath, ornamented with enamel of various colours. Its date Dr. Evans considers as probably not far from the Roman invasion of the country, and the enamelling cor- roborates what the Roman historians tell us of the skill of the Britons in that art.f APPENDIX. The numerals used until recently for sheep-scoring in the Lake District are supposed, with reason, to be survivals from the Celtic language. We give an example from Borrowdale, Keswick ; but others will be found in the Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archceological Society, vol. Hi., where are papers on this curious subject by the Rev. T. Ellwood, Rector of Torver, near Coniston. 1. Van. 2. Tyan. 3. Tethera. 4. Methera. 5. Pimp. 6. Sethera. 7. Lethera. 8. Hovera. 9. Dovera. 10. Dick. 11. Yan-a-dick. 12. Tyan-a-dick. 13. Tether-a-dick. 14. Mether-a-dick. 15. Bumfit. 16. Yan-a-bumfit. 17. Tyan-a-bumfit. 1 8. Tether-a-bumfit. 19. Mether-a-bumfit. 20. Giggot. * Archaological Journal, vol. xxxix., p. 442 ; Transactions, Cumber- land and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. vi., p. 196. f Archaological Journal, vol. xxxix., p. 442. CHAPTER II. THE ROMAN CONQUEST. "THE reign of Vespasian," it has been well said, " opens a new era in the history of the Roman conquest of Britain. It was the campaigns of his legate, Agricola, that fixed upon Britain the Roman rule which continued for three centuries after his departure."* It was under Agricola that the Roman legions first made their appear- ance in the district with whose history this volume is concerned. It is unnecessary here to go into the history of the earlier Roman campaigns in Britain. Suffice to say that prior to the year 78 A.D. the Romans had established themselves, more or less precariously, in the southern parts of the island, and the Brigantes had been in collision in Yorkshire with the Romans under Petilius Cerealis in A.D. 69 and 70, and had been reduced to sub- mission. Agricola was appointed legate of Britain by Vespasian in A.D. 78. He had previously served in cam- paigns in that country, and had commanded the twentieth legion under Suetonius Paulinus. His first campaign was against the Ordovices of North Wales. After they had been sufficiently punished, he completed the conquest * " Roman Britain," by the Rev. H. M. Scarth, M.A. : London, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge ; where is an excellent summary of the Roman conquest of Britain. 2 2 2O History of Cumberland. of Anglesea, which Suetonius had left unfinished. The winter of 78-79 Agricola spent in winter-quarters among the Ordovices, in organizing forces for further campaigns, in improving the civil administration, and in rectifying abuses connected with requisitions for corn and other supplies, which had pressed hard upon the Britons, and probably had been the cause, by the resistance they inspired, of the Ordovices requiring punishment. That Agricola's winter-quarters were at Deva (Chester) there can be little doubt, nor that Deva had an existence prior to that general's day.* It was long the headquarters of the twentieth legion, and a great Roman road of date, how- ever, subsequent to the period now dealt with connected it with Cumberland. From Deva Agricola set forth in 79 A.D. on a second campaign, so soon, it may be imagined, as the weather was sufficiently open, and he must have gone northwards. Wales he had already sub- dued, and southern, eastern, and central Britain had been pacified before his arrival in the country. In order, there- fore, to find communities which had maintained their independence (qua in ilium diem ex cequo egerant), as Tacitus says he did, he must have gone to the north or north-east. The following words still further narrow the limits : jEstuaria ac silvas ipse prcetentare ;-f so that he must have gone to the north, for to the north-east he would have met with no estuary until he reached the Tees. The word cestuaria can apply only to the estuaries of * See " Roman Cheshire," by W. Thompson Watkin : Liverpool, printed for the author, 1886, p. 7. f " Sed ubi aestas advenit contracto exercitu, multus in agmine, laudare modestiam, disiectos coercere : loca castris ip?e capere, aestuaria ac silvas ipse prastentare ; et nihil interim apud hostes quietum pati, quo minus subitis excursibus populareturj atque ubi satis terruerat, parcendo rursus irritamenta pacis ostentare, quibus rebus multse civitates, quae in ilium diem ex aequo egerant, datis obsidiis castellisque circumdatae, tanta ratione curaque ut nulla ante Britanniae nova pars." Tac., Vita Agricola:, cap. 20. The Roman Conquest. 2 i Lancashire and Cumberland, to the estuaries of the Dee, the Mersey, the Ribble, the Wyre, Lune, Kent, etc., in Lancashire, to the sands of Cartmel and of Duddon, and of the Solway. The route by these estuaries would satisfy also the word silvas, which Tacitus couples with cestuaria ; for so late as the Doomsday Survey there were 250,000 acres of dense woods in the region between the Mersey and the Ribble alone,* and the testimony of Sandford as to the woods in Cumberland in the reign of Charles II. has already been cited.f The use of the word cestuaria would suggest that Agricola crossed the rivers just mentioned as near the sea as possible, and that he proceeded north by the west coast of Cumberland, and by a road and chain of forts presently to be discussed. This route is the one that reasons of strategy would recommend. On it, by aid of a small fleet, Agricola could readily keep up communica- tion with his base at Chester, and could easily supply his commissariat from the headquarters' stores ; further, he could relieve himself of impedimenta by sending his sick and wounded back by sea. It is not suggested that the Roman galleys had themselves weathered the Land's End by the time of Agricola's second campaign, but he was probably able to impress or hire sufficient local craft to render his commissariat most material assistance.^ The * " Roman Lancashire," by W. Thompson Watkin : Liverpool, printed for the author, 1883, p. 10. t Ante, p. 9. J That Agricola could not procure transport vessels for his invasion of Anglesea does not prove they did not exist, only that they were taken over to Anglesea or elsewhere out of his reach. Transport vessels would be forthcoming fast enough, after he had pacified the district. A passage in Tacitus' " Life of Agricola," cap. 25, will be cited against the view taken in the text. Speaking of the sixth campaign, Tacitus writes, " Portus classe exploravit qua ab Agricola primum assumpta in partem virium." This passage, however, does not seem to mean that he then first, i.e., in the sixth campaign, employed a fleet 22 History of Cumberland. alternate route would have been, after crossing the Mersey and Ribble, to take to the trackless woods and wild mountains of the interior, to force the terrible Tebay Gorge, and to ascend the heights of Shap Fells, in face of an active enemy who would have every advantage of shelter and knowledge of the country, and who would play havoc with the long commissariat trains that must have followed in the rear of Agricola's columns. From the hill, whereon Lancaster Castle now stands, Agricola must have looked over the sands of Morecambe Bay strange sight to Romans, accustomed to the almost tideless waters of the Mediterranean have there dis- cussed the reports of his intelligence department, cross- examined the spies and guides, and finally decided to start at Hest (Mstus) Bank across the sands with his forces. The sands, strange though they might be, could have few terrors for the men who had forded the Menai Straits to storm the Isle of Anglesea. At the end of the second year's campaign, Agricola took hostages from the hitherto independent communities that he had overcome, and surrounded their territories by a chain of forts, stretching from the Solway to the Tyne. It is probable that in this campaign Agricola was assisted by a detached column marching north from Lindum (Lincoln), and having its base of operations there. To this campaign Prebendary Scarth thinks we and an army in a combined operation, but that he was the first general to do so. Does not the passage mean that Agricola then (if the then is insisted on) first used his fleet as part of his forces, by disembarking the sailors and using them as soldiers, instead of confining them to duty on shipboard ? Was not Agricola the first general to employ a naval brigade on land ? General Roy, in his " Military Antiquities," p. 16, writes : "A.D. 83, the fleet from the beginning had co-operated with the land forces, and on this occasion, being accompanied with the army, the whole made a glorious appearance, the same camp often containing the horse, foot, and marines intermixed and rejoicing in common." The Roman Conquest. 23 may date the rise of Eboracum (York) on the river Ouse. The rise of York, and the subsequent decadence of Chester, are matters of importance in the history of Roman Cumberland. The limits of the campaign of the second year are defined for us by Tacitus : Tertius ex- peditionum annus novas gentes aperuit, showing that in the second year Agricola did not get beyond the Brigantes, who were well known to the Romans. In his third year Agricola marched as far as the Firth of Tay ; and in his fourth year (A.D. 81), he drew a line of forts from the Firth of Forth to the Firth of Clyde ; while in the two following years he went further north, the Roman fleet now co-operating with him ; but beyond the line of Forth and Clyde the Romans made no permanent conquests.' 36 ' But if Agricola was successful as a conqueror, he was great as an administrator. He adopted a policy of conciliation and of seduction. He accustomed the rude Britons to Roman luxuries, to elegancies, and refine- ments, and even to the charms of vice. Baths, porticos, and elegant banquets came into vogue. The sons of the chiefs were educated and taught Latin : Idque apud imperitos humanitas vocabaiur, cum pars servitutis esset. So well did the policy inaugurated by Agricola succeed that the toga became the universal dress, Latin the language of the towns, which everywhere under Roman rule sprang up, and all the wealthier Britons made themselves as Roman as possible, and sent their sons to study at the great schools of Marseilles. The result was that for the * It is right to say that Mr. Skene, in his " Celtic Scotland," advances views as to Agricola's campaigns at variance with those advanced in this chapter. The author has dealt elsewhere with this variance, which is more apparent than real, and forbears here to weary his readers , with controversial matter. See " An Attempt at a Survey of Roman Cumberland and Westmorland " (continued), part Hi., Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Archaological and Antiquarian Society, rol. iv., p. 15. History of Cumberland. long period during which Britain remained a Roman province, its inhabitants made no attempt to throw off the Roman yoke ; and it is probably for this reason that the Roman writers give us so little information about the internal condition of the country. The wild tribes north of the Brigantes appear, under the name of Caledonians, to have given much trouble, and fighting was constantly going on on the borders. Occasionally a British governor set up on his own account as Emperor a matter belong- ing rather to general Roman history than to that of Cumberland. Owing, it would seem, to the border-fighting, Hadrian, on visiting Britain in A.D. 120, found it necessary to build a massive wall, nigh seventy miles long, from Bowness- on-Solway in Cumberland to Wall's End on the Tyne, backed on its southern side by an earthen vallum and a foss, and fortified with twenty-three camps, or fortified barracks, with guard - houses every mile, and with numerous little watch - towers intervening. This great barrier, or fortified camp, followed the line of Agricola's forts, and many, or all of them, were incorporated in its system. In the reign of Antoninus Pius, who succeeded Hadrian in A.D. 138, we learn from Pausanias that the Brigantes, south of Hadrian's Wall, were in revolt in the Lake districts, but were speedily put down by Urbicus Lollius with great severity, and this is the last heard of the Brigantes ; the name disappears. This general also marched north, and drew a great rampart of earth and sods across from the Forth to the Clyde, along the upper line of Agricola's forts ; this rampart is generally known as the Wall of Antoninus Pius, and now rejoices, and long has rejoiced, in the name of the Graham's, or Graeme's, Dyke. Antoninus Pius was succeeded in A.D. 161 by Marcus Aurelius, who took Lucius Verus as his colleague ; Com- The Roman Conquest. 25 modus succeeded in A.D. 180. During his reign the Caledonians rose, forced the Romans to abandon the Wall of Antoninus, and broke through and more or less destroyed that of Hadrian, though the camps or fortified barracks of Agricola probably held out in isolation from one another. Mr. Watkin, in his " Roman Lancashire," shows that the Caledonian ravages extended as far as Lancashire ; they must therefore have swept over modern Cumberland and Westmorland. Commodus appointed Albinus Clodius Governor of Britain, where he was at the death of Commodus in 192. In order to secure the neutrality of Albinus, Septimus Severus made him Caesar; another account is that Albinus proclaimed himself Caesar in Gaul, whither he had proceeded with a large army drawn from Britain. When Severus had disposed of other rivals, he marched against Albinus, and in 197 A.D. defeated and slew him at Lugdunum (Lyons) in Gaul. The absence of Albinus and the withdrawal of his troops gave opportunity to a savage and wild tribe, called the Meatse a supposed new colony from Scandinavia or Germany, and situated north of the Graham's Dyke to burst into the Roman province: so much trouble did they give, that in 208 A.D. the Emperor Severus himself brought large reinforcements to Britain, and took up his abode at Eboracum (York), bringing with him his sons, Caracalla and Geta : to them he entrusted the management of affairs in Southern Britain, while he set off on a campaign against the Cale- donians, whom he reduced to sue for peace at the cost of a loss of 50,000 men to the Roman forces. Severus then returned to York, and rebuilt and repaired Hadrian's Wall, which, in the western part, at least, had remained in ruins since the reign of Commodus. To Severus, therefore, many writers have ascribed the honour of being the original builder of the Roman Wall between the Solway and the Tyne, but of this he has been deprived by 26 History of Cumberland. the critical acumen and learning of the late Rev. John Hodgson, the historian of Northumberland, and the Rev. Dr. J. Collingwood Bruce, the historian of the Roman Wall, who have restored it to its rightful owner, the Emperor Hadrian. Severus died at York in 211 A.D., when Caracalla and Geta made peace with the Cale- donians and the Meatse by yielding to them much that their father had gained. We know little of what happened in Britain for some time after the death of Severus ; fifty or sixty years later, the Meatse and the Caledonians, or their names at least, disappear, and we begin to hear of the Picts and the Scots, the latter an importation, or re-importation, from Ireland ; and the fierce Attacotti, a name which some have thought to merely mean the Scots, who had come from Ireland, as distinguished from those that stayed there : these on the north, and Saxons from the Elbe on the east and south-east coasts, harassed the Roman powers; but the events that a general history of the Roman Empire would have to record are not the over- whelming attacks of barbarians, but rather the attempts of the island to give an Emperor to Rome, or to set up a separate Emperor for itself. For the details of these attempts our readers must consult other works ; but these attempts, trailing on for many years, gradually sapped the Roman strength in Britain, until at last, in a great and final effort, Theodosius (father of the Emperor of that name) drove back both the Picts and the Scots and the Saxons, and when, in 369 A.D., he returned to Rome he left the Roman province of Britain in peace from the Graham's Dyke to the Land's End. The revolt against the Emperor Theodosius (son of Theodosius the successful general) of Magnus Maximus r a Spanish officer in Roman employ in Britain, and his expedition to the Continent, are said to have completely drained Roman Britain of its manhood and its military The Roman Conquest. resources at any rate, the Picts and the Scots and the Saxons embraced the opportunity of attacking the province ; Rome, much otherwise embarrassed, could give no help, and at last the feeble Honorius, in 410 A.D., proclaimed the independence of Britain, a euphemistic way of putting the fact that he could no longer hold it. The stories of Gildas, that about the year 396 A.D. a legion was sent from Rome to the assistance of the Britons, and that under Roman help they made an ineffectual sod wall from the Forth to the Clyde, and a stone wall along the line of Hadrian's barrier, from which the Picts and the Scots pulled them down with hooks, are not to be relied upon. CHAPTER III. THE ROMAN ROADS. AMONG the works on geography which have come down to us from Roman times are four which apply to all Britain (i) The great work of Ptolemy, the geographer, called rewypa^LKr) 'T^rj^cn^ ; (2) the " Itinerary," or road-book, of Antoninus Pius ; (3) the " Notitia Imperil ;" and (4) the " Cosmography of Ravenna." With the information given by Ptolemy we have already dealt in the first chapter of this book. Epiacum alone of the towns that Ptolemy assigns to the Brigantes finds advocates to suggest that it is in modern Cumber- land. If the suggestion depends upon the longitude, as given by Ptolemy, it must be kept in mind that longitudes worked in days when chronometers and portable clocks were unknown can be but little better than guesses, derived from travellers' estimates of the distances between the prime meridian and the places for which the so-called longitudes are worked. The " Itinerary " of Antoninus Pius is a road-book, or posting-book, containing a list of the chief military roads of the Roman Empire, with the names of the stations upon them, and an approximate measurement (milia plus minus, so many miles more or less) of the distances between the stations. Many editions exist of this work ; but the standard one is that of MM. Parthey and Pindar, The Roman Roads. 29 published at Berlin in 1848.* The latest writers differ somewhat in the date they assign to the " Itinerary." Mr. Thompson Watkin attributes its compilation to Antoninus Pius, Emperor A.D. 138-161 ; while Mr. J. B. Davidson puts it to the time of Caracalla, son of Severus, who took the names of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, and was Emperor A.D. 2i2-2iy.f Be its date what it may, it was a working road-book, compiled in the Quartermaster- General's Office at Rome, and altered from time to time as occasions arose, thus probably giving rise to certain puzzling discrepancies in the distances. The third authority, the " Notitia Dignitatum et Administrationum omnium tarn civilium quam militarium in partibus Orientis et Occidentis," is the Military and Civil Service List of the Roman Empire. It gives a list of the Roman provinces, with the titles of the governors and of the civil and military dignitaries ; a list of the forces under each, and the names of the places where they were in garrison. The date of the British part of this document, as Mommsen has pointed out, is about the year 300 A.D. The " Cosmography of Ravenna " is a treatise on geographical science by a writer of that place in the sixth or seventh century. It gives a long list of states and camps in a sequence, which is rather difficult to unravel ; while the orthography is, to say the least, barbarous and eccentric. But many names have been found in this list alone whose genuineness has been proved by the dis- covery of lapidary inscriptions. The " Itinerary " known as " Richard of Cirencester's," edited by Bertram of Copenhagen, is only mentioned here to be dismissed as a pure fabrication. * For lists of the various editions, see Mr. J. B. Davidson, Archceo- logical Journal, vol. xxxvii., p. 319; Watkins' "Roman Lancashire," P. 22. t ArchtEologtcal Journal, vo\. xxxvii., p. 318 ; "Roman Lancashire," p. 24, etc. 30 History of Cumberland. In the counties of Northumberland and Cumberland most important assistance is rendered in the identifica- tion of Roman stations by the numerous lapidary in- scriptions found per lineam Valli, and recorded in that noble work, the " Lapidarium Septentrionale," edited by the venerable historian of the Roman Wall, the Rev. Dr. J. Collingwood Bruce, F.S.A., for the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-on-Tyne. From the first and second " Itinera " of Antoninus we learn that from Eboracum (York) a great road went north, which, after passing through Isurium, or Isubri- gantium (Aldborough), and Cataractorium (Catterick in Yorkshire), split into two roads an eastern and a western one. With the , eastern one we have nothing to do, except, for clearer comprehension, to say that it ran up to the Wall of Hadrian by Vinovia (Binchester), while the main portion continued on by Vindomora (Ebchester) and Corstopitum (Corbridge), crossed the Wall, and passed on into Scotland. The western branch went through Cum- berland, arid after leaving York the stations and distances, I as given in the " Itinerary" of Antoninus (Her II.}, are v.(put for convenience in reverse order) as follows :* * This chapter is largely taken from a paper by the present writer in the third volume of the Transactions of the Cumberland and West- morland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society ', called "An Attempt at a Survey of Roman Cumberland and Westmorland ; with Remarks on Agricola's Line of March, and on the Importance of the Camp at Old Carlisle, and on the Tenth Iter of Antoninus." This paper was written in 1876 ; time and experience have a little modified some of the views the writer then, tentatively, put forth. In that paper he cited authorities for all the statements made by him, but he has not thought it necessary to overload the present volume with them. Other articles on the same subject will be found in the same Transactions, vol. iii., p. 182 ; vol. iv., pp. 15, 318 ; vol. v., p. 124. There are in the same Transactions, vol. iii., valuable papers by Mr. W. Jackson, F.S.A., on " Agricola's Line of March," on " The Camp at Muncaster," and on " Walls Castle," of which the writer has not hesitated to avail himself liberally. The Roman Roads. 31 o .. Roman Miles Modern (more or less). Identification. EBORACUM - York. ISURIUM - xvii. - Aldborough. CATARACTO, or CATARACTORIUM xxiv. - Catterick. LAVATRJE - xiii. - Bowes. VERTER^E - xiv. - Brough. BROVONAC* xiii. - Brougham (some sug- gest Kirkbythore). VOREDA - xiii. - Old Penrith, at Plump- ton Wall, LUGUVALLUM xiv. - Carlisle. CASTRA EXPLORATORUM - xii. - Netherby. BLATUM BULGIUM xii. - Middleby,nearBirrens- wark. The same route is taken from York to Carlisle by Her V. of Antoninus, as follows : ct-iJn., Roman Miles Modern Stations. , i \ TJ L-C (more or less). Identification. EBORACUM - - York. ISUBRIGANTUM - - xvii. - Aldborough. CATARACTO - xxiv. - Catterick. LAVATR^E - - xviii. - Bowes. VERTER^E - - xiii. - Brough. BROCAVUM xx. - Brougham. LUGUVALLIUM ... xx ii. - Carlisle. The remains of large and well-known Roman stations exist at the places whose names are given in the third columns of the above tables, and the identifications given are those now generally received. The older writers used to put the Brovonaca of the second Her at Kirkbythore ; but since it has been pointed out that the camp at Kirkbythore is not on the Iter, a general concurrence has been come to that the Brovonaca of the second Iter, and the Brocavum of the fifth, are one and the same, and refer to the camp at Brougham. The first of these routes makes the distance from York to Carlisle 108 miles, and the second 104. This is accounted for by the distance between Cataracto and Lavatra being variously given as 32 History of Cumberland. eighteen miles and thirteen, clearly a scribe's error, and Lavatrtz and Vertercz being variously given as thirteen and fourteen miles, also a similar error. But any difficulties that attach to these two Iters are for the historian of Westmorland, not of Cumberland, to deal with. They give for Cumberland two positive fixed identifications Voreda, Old Penrith at Plumpton Wall ; and Luguvallum, or Luguvallium, Carlisle. With regard to the identification of Castra Explomtorum and Blatum Bulgium, Camden was inclined to place Castra Exploratorum at Old Carlisle, near Wigton, and Blatum Bulgium at Bowness-on-Solway, at both of which places are Roman camps. But though there is a main Roman road from Carlisle to Old Carlisle, no continua- tion of it on the same scale appears to have existed from Old Carlisle to Bowness, which last place could be more directly reached from Carlisle by the Roman road along the Roman Wall, and by that route is only twelve miles from Carlisle, while to go round by Old Carlisle would just more than double that distance. Camden also con- sidered Old Penrith, or Plumpton Wall, to be the Petriana of the " Notitia Imperii,'' and Horsley took it to be the Brementenracum ; but all antiquaries are now agreed in allocating the stations of the second Iter as we have given them. Indeed, no one doubts that Eboracum is York; and Baeda says expressly that Luguvallum is Carlisle. Given these two fixed points, the rest of the stations between them follow as matter of course, and allocate themselves to the Roman camps whose remains exist to this day at the places whose modern names we have given. This great Iter follows the natural passage from the great plain of York, over the pass of Stainmoor, down the valley of the Eden, into the Cumberland plain, and thence to Carlisle.* It coincides in the main with * It is the western branch of the great road known afterwards as the Watling Street. Mr. Elton gives it thus : " From Netherby and The Roman Roads. 33 the famous North Road of the coaching and posting-days, and the modern line of railway pursues a parallel course over the pass and down the Eden Valley. At the time when the " Notitia Imperii " was compiled the com- mencement of the fourth century the command of all the garrisons in modern Cumberland, and on the Wall, was held by the Dux Britanniarum, who resided at York, at which place many of the Emperors had held their Court. York was, in fact, the capital of Northern Britain, and the road over the pass of Stainmoor through Cum- berland must have been one of great strategic im- portance. This great military road was crossed near Kirkby- thore by another road, which, under the name of " The Maiden Way," runs north and south. Under that name it starts from Overborough in Lancashire, a place which is connected by Roman roads with Manchester, directly via Ribchester, indirectly via Lancaster and Wigan. It passes through the Tebay Gorge, where is a camp at Low Borrowbridge, and over Crosby Ravensworth Fell to Kirkbythore. North of this place it runs through the Cumberland parishes of Kirkland, Ousby, Melmerby, and Alston, until it enters an angle of Northumberland, where it meets the Roman Wall at the station of Magna (Caervoran). At this place this road turns westward, and, re-entering Cumberland, follows the Wall to the next station, Amboglanna (Birdoswald) , where it turns to the north, and runs past the Roman station at Bewcastle into Scotland. This road probably takes its name " The Maiden Way" from Mai-dun, the great ridge, having been raised two or three feet above the adjacent ground. Its gradients make it impossible for wheeled traffic ; but Carlisle across Stainmoor to York, across to Manchester and Chester, down to Wroxeter-on-Severn, and so to London and the Kentish coast, never leaving the Wailing Street." " Origins of English History," P- 344, n. 3 34 History of Cumberland. gangs of pack-horses probably conveyed along it the mineral wealth of Alston on its route to swell the tribute exacted by the Romans. Much of the Maiden Way can still be traced on the wild fells and grouse moors over which it goes. It passes two great camps one at Whitley Castle, in Northumberland, but close to the borders of Cumberland ; the other at Bewcastle, in the latter county. Both these camps were undoubtedly occupied by the Romans, but certain deviations from the usual plan and profile of Roman fortifications makes it probable these camps were originally British. Modern archaeological speculation tends to identify the Maiden Way with the much-vexed tenth Her of Antoninus, a riddle darker than which (says the great historian of Northumberland) the Sphinx never propounded to the Boeotians. The following tables, compiled from Watkins' " Roman Lancashire," and from a paper by Mr. Gordon Hills in the Journal of the British Archaological Associa- tion, vol. xxxvii., and from other sources, shows the variety of views entertained : Roman Roads. 35 *S Jf N N JJ *^ VO . c ^ x 1> I 00 a M J^ bfl j2 _cf c o 1 ^ V 'S S CJ VO 1 Chester! "t- ^ T3 S Manche e cS U Ribches Overboi Borrowl jz g $ oo N PO ^^ G t>. vO N M " 1-1 * K ft V M 73 oo tj w t/j T; B O P o 3 cS S B c c u to 1 11 JG | I "5 'o c 3 1 1 6 | J _u | o. O ^ oo C4 ** PO ^^ o . N N N N " " M N c 5~ c 43" J9 b o 1 V C Whitchurc Middlewic Mancheste Ribchestei Lancaster Kendal Ambleside Keswick 1! 5 B j.^ oo 00 f^ o 00 M 2 N M N PO 1-1 N 0. O K "s rC <2 g Cfi B 9 )-i D M CJ c ffl PO oo " o E o 1 Q Manches Ribchest Overbore V ft a 1 1 n ^^ |1 J oo PO oo (^. PO NO o C4 " PO IN C4 PD N ^^ "c 4) i b a & In rt kT S w v .O "3 V a O Meivod Id "S) U Mancheste Ribchester Overborou Kirkbytho CJ JJ Wai wick Anterchest Northum in Glend; M M PO CO ^^ PD vO O ' iyj ** ' 6 ^ p o 04 PO CJ -^ ^ o x ^ 'S H 2 *P j a O i sT 1 anvethlin, J gomeryshir o-S SS Ji a) CU)J3 U anchester ibchester verborough Lancashire irkbythore, Westmorla | c o _O ; Sue Wentsbe Bothall, N umberland T}- C? u _3 CJ S & O M ^ ^ H 1 S X IIIAX : ? X x u X X .* X X X O u ,G 1 S t-t C IS c U S (5 o 3 pa ^ O 4 ^* 4 IN C - S^ bl ii ~in i ^ X, |Ff? o " u 8 S tj o to J3. 5 6 "*' r "S r^ ? rQ ^* 1 u 'M rt ^*'^ o rt o rt ^ ~ T* ^ -i G t/J ** 3 O S '^ 2 ^ w o an w ^t-* iy !H * -S o*^- 111 ^ c ^ -C IB's'-s M I 1 1 1 tt a c! ^ C o C rt ,g 1^1 oJ o rt rt rt cd 3 D 2 * ^ S ^ S K O OH c/5 Q cn o/~ ^ 00 r^. ^ ^^ ^ N N C 8 o ** o -S"^oo" - 5 s hi 1 J$ -3 ^ "S w +* CJ W 2 "bio 5 N ^ o II g ^ g ^ o c c u ^!i1% 6 rt rz J Q id ^i ^! oo f** fO to ^* ON RJ '(3 *v* c r) t- * 11 J 5 S 1 1 s . (5 Overborough Kendal Amblesicle Hardknott Ravenglass 5r," by the Re' tmorland Arc/ \ Journal, Bri H "Annals of oo t** c*^ r* 1 ) t-^ Oi *j %i <*/*m ^ N N *^ HH >- -t OJ ^ o _e J3 II Li 0) w , H oo C 8 ; & e*. U M N M 5 S 3 S t^. c *S ^3 CL "- _C .a5 ^* *i- w ^ f JO s <,* > x The Rev. Hodgson, ft|| S S c X S S m -2 S5 J5 S BJ Overbore Amblesid Keswick Caermot O I ili g 0^ .^ ..; .,4 x' S:a x :r a c S x _ ^ z < * z * 'x x * Z * ^++= ^ * o S u S'l o i g a & 8 M > o ll Ills s 3 1 8 s < W M aj < 03 O | <: J 3 The Roman Roads. 37 The Cumbrian antiquary might well sit happy if the Maiden Way could be proved to be the tenth Iter. The proof mainly depends upon the identification of Breme- tonacum with Ribchester, and with the Brennatennacum of the " Notitia," and rests on a fine inscribed altar, discovered in the sixteenth century at Ribchester, and erected by the Sarmatian cavalry, styled the Bremetenna- censian.* The weak part of the case for the Maiden Way is that it does not go to Whitley Castle, though it passes near it ; that it does not end at Whitley Castle, but continues past it ; that Whitley Castle is not a likely place for a great Iter to end at ; and that the gradients of the Maiden Way, too steep for wheeled traffic, render it unlikely to have been a great Iter. We own to an idea that some day or other lapidary or other inscriptions will be found which will prove the tenth Iter to have ended at some great military centre like Old Carlisle, or some great harbour like Ravenglass. From strategic and historical reasons we should expect to find another important road round, or through, Cum- berland, older than, and more or less superseded by, those we have just mentioned. In the previous chapter we have put forth arguments to show that Agricola, in A.D. 79, advanced from Deva (Chester) by the western coast, crossing the estuaries, and, Roman like, securing his retreat by the formation of a good road, guarded at frequent intervals by fortified ports or camps. We must now endeavour to trace Agricola's good road. We find it in a road which starts from Lancaster, a place which is in direct communication by a well-known Roman road with Chester. Starting from Lancaster, this road crosses the Morecambe Bay estuary, entering on the sands at Rest (JEstus) Bank, and leaving them by Pigeon Cote * See Watkins' " Roman Lancashire," p. 29. Also a paper by Mr. Hodgson Hinde in the Archaologia jEliana, Old Series, vol. iv., p. 109. 38 History of Cumberland. Lane, near Wyke, in Cartmel. It next passes Wrays- holme Tower and Flockburgh ; at both of these places ancient paved ways, with associated Roman remains, have been found. The road reaches the sands again at Sandgate, crosses the Ulverston estuary, and lands at Conishead Bank, near the ancient priory of Coniston. From this point an ancient road, now called Red Lane from the traffic in hematites, but formerly known as "The Street," runs, via Mountbarrow, Lindal, and Dalton, to Ireleth Gate, on the bank of the Duddon estuary. Roman pavement has been discovered at various places on " The Street," a name which generally indicates a Roman road (stratum, a causeway). Crossing Duddon Sands, this road lands in Cumberland at a point marked by the site of the gallows of the lords of Millom, and by an old lane reaches Silecroft. From Silecroft there runs under Black Combe an ancient road, on which are situated the three ancient parish churches of Whicham, Whitbeck, and Bootle, and the old nunnery of Seaton. This road is also known as " The Street." Hutchinson, in his " History of Cumberland," calls it the " High Street as lying on an old Roman road ;" and Denton, in his History, calls it the " comon high street." If the sea-level were the same as at the present day,* travellers from Lancaster and Chester by this road of Agricola would cross the Esk at the ford marked by the old church of Waberthwaite, and arrive at the great Roman settlement now to be mentioned. In the tongue of land between Esk and Mite, close to the town of Ravenglass, is a Roman camp whose site * There has some time or other been a general elevation of the Cumberland coast, but Messrs. Russell and Holmes adduce facts to show that that elevation took place prior to the Roman occupation of the country. See "The Raised Beach on the Cumberland Coast": Transactions, Cumberland Association for Advancement of Literature and Science, vol. ii., p. 68. The Roman Roads. 39 was for long overlooked and forgotten, as, owing to a passage in Denton's " History of Cumberland," it was generally sought for on the left bank of the Esk, instead of the right. Close to this camp, known as Muncaster Camp, are the ruins of a Roman villa, known as Walls Castle ; and the place-names of the district, as well as the spade and plough, indicate that many acres now agricultural fields were once covered with buildings. The road we have been describing is joined at Muncaster Camp by another Roman road, which starts from Chester, and by Wigan, Overborough, Kendal, Water- head at Ambleside, and the camp on Hardknott, comes down to the Muncaster Camp at Ravenglass. From the Muncaster Camp the Roman road, going northward, survives for some distance in an old lane. The camp itself stands on the great land-locked harbour formed by the estuaries of the Esk, Mite, and Irt, which before its bar was silted up must have been, in Roman times, capable of sheltering an enormous fleet. It would at that period be one of the best harbours on the whole west coast of Britain, and the chief emporium of the Irish trade. It continued, even in late mediaeval times, to be a place of importance, where a very large fair was annually held. North of this camp, except after the first start, the road is difficult to make out. There seems to have been a double coast-road here one close to the shore ; another a little inland possibly a little later in date than the first. An ancient road runs from Drigg to Calder Hall, and, passing by Sella Park, was continued, by roads still in being, to the church of St. Bridget. From Braystones, near St. Bridget, an ancient road runs parallel to the sea-coast ; and, passing through St. Bees, and reaching Whitehaven by way of Preston Hows and Monkwray, ascends by an ancient road, now in part disused, the hill of Bransty, from which it passes to the 4-O History of Cumberland. Roman camp at Moresby. .From Moresby to Ellen- borough (i.e., Maryport) and from Ellenborough coast- wise, past the camp at Mowbray, to Bowness-on-Solway all antiquaries are agreed there has been a road, and even a wall. Camden writes that from hence (St. Bees' Head) the shore drawing itself backe little by little, as it appeareth by the heaps of rubbish, it hath been fortified all along by the Romans, wheresoever there was easie landing. He further states that from Workington many suppose a wall to have run for four miles along the coast. Traces of this great Roman road have been found in several places near the camp at Ellenborough, at Cross Canonby, near the camp at Mowbray, and in the raised road in the parish of Holme Cultram, known as Cause- way Head, which points directly to Bowness-on-Solway, though the estuaries of Waver and Wampool intervene. From Bowness-on-Solway to Carlisle a Roman road ran along the Wall, and was there, no doubt, before the Wall, dating from the march of Agricola. From Carlisle the Roman road ran, in company with the great Wall, into Northumberland, and is well known by the name of the Stanegate, or Carelgate i.e., the Carlisle gate or road. Thus we get a Roman road running round the district now known as the county of Cumberland, from Duddon Sands on the south-west to the boundaries of Northumber- land on the north-east. Now this, before entering Cum- berland, was a road by no means suitable for the march of troops and passage of baggage, being only open over the great estuaries at certain hours, and those variable ones, puzzling to the Romans, who were accustomed to a tideless sea. When possession of the country was obtained, they sought safer roads ; we have already told how they found one from Chester by Wigan, Overborough, Kendal, Waterhead at Ambleside, and Hardknott, to join the coast road from Chester at that important emporium for Irish traffic, the harbour of Ravenglass. They found The Roman Roads. 41 also another route: from Kendal, instead of going to Ambleside, Hardknott, and Ravenglass, the Roman traveller could take a Roman road, which conducted him to the Roman station on whose site Keswick now stands, and thence by the east side of Bassenthwaite Lake to the Roman camp at Old Carlisle near Wigton, the very centre of Cumberland, and a place whose former grandeur is attested by the extent of ground covered by the ruins of its suburbs. Stukeley has the following note respect- ing it: The fairest show of buildings I ever saw : one might almost draw an entire plan of it, and of every dwelling. The importance of the camp at Old Carlisle will be further shown as this chapter proceeds. With the making of these two safer roads from Chester to Cumberland one by Kendal, Ambleside, and Hard- knott to the great harbour at Ravenglass ; the other by Kendal, Ambleside, and Keswick to the great central station at Old Carlisle the old coast road by the sands, Whitbeck and Bootle would become of secondary import- ance. We have ventured to suggest that in one or other of these two places, Old Carlisle and Ravenglass, the much-discussed and puzzling tenth Iter of the Antonine " Itinerary " ended. We are fully aware that the Maiden Way at present holds the field, but in the vast and unex- plored ruins of Old Carlisle lapidary inscriptions may at any time be found, which may upset many theories now received for truths.* Thus we get, beside the Maiden Way, two main Roman roads through Cumberland. The earlier one originally * We have on our side, in favour of Old Carlisle being the termina- tion of the loth Iter, a very great authority. Mr. Elton gives the loth Iter " From Mediolanum, a station north of Wroxeter, by Manchester and the west coast, and/aj/ the head of Windermere to Carlisle" i.e., by Ambleside, Keswick, Caermot, and Old Carlisle to Carlisle. " Origins of English History," p. 344 n. 42 History of Cumberland. went round the sea-coast, and was deviated for con- venience by Keswick to Old Carlisle. The second is the great road from Carlisle to York, the second Her of Antoninus, more modern than the first road, which it would supersede in importance when York became the capital of Northern Britain ; while the removal of the Roman legion from Chester at some period between the date of the " Itinerary " and the " Notitia," would render the first road useless in a military point of view : some of its camps would be deprived of their garrisons, and those on the Wall would be handed over to the commander at York, and form the " Item per lineam Valli " section of his command. We imagine that the general at Chester, while a legion was there, commanded all the camps on the Wall, as far as the Tyne, and we think so because we think that Agricola marched from Chester, and founded all those camps, retaining Chester as his headquarters. Returning to the second Iter, and to the question of its being later in date than the coast road, General Roy, in his magnificent work,* proves that the three great camps, which defended the second Iter, viz., that of Ray Cross on Stanemoor, that on Crackenthorpe Moor in West- morland, and that at Birrenswark in Scotland, present methods of fortification which were not introduced until long after the time of Agricola. General Roy has traced in Scotland the vast temporary camps occupied by Agricola's army. One may be asked to point out these vast camps on the line of his coast march round Cumberland. The attentive reader of General Roy's work will see that this cannot be done, in districts which the Romans occupied for a length of time. The sites of the temporary camps became the sites of permanent camps, much smaller, indeed, but whose suburbs, growing for two or three centuries, would soon wipe out entrenchments made for the occupation of a * " Military Antiquities of the Romans in Brit in," pp. 72, 74. The Roman Roads. 43 night or two. Still there can be small doubt that the sites of the camps now straggling along the coast, and from the Solway to the Tyne, were the sites where Agricola rested on his march. Having pointed out the main Roman roads in Cum- berland, we must now fill up the outline by tracing the cross roads, and placing as far as possible the stations, whose names we learn from the Notitia Imperii. A well-marked Roman road called Plumpton Low Street, runs almost parallel with the second Iter, from Penrith to Carlisle, but on the west of the river Petteril ; this was probably an old British road, improved and used by the Romans prior to the making of the second Iter, and was probably the track by which they first opened out the inland route to Carlisle. Great part of this road is still used as a road, but where it is not it can be traced through the fields. A large and well-known Roman station exists near the Red Dial, Wigton, at a place called Old Carlisle : we have already spoken a good deal about it, and with it we will begin, as some of the cross roads leading to and from it are well in evidence. The high-road from Carlisle through Thursby leads almost direct to Old Carlisle, and runs along the old Roman road, which, in the time of Horsley, was very large and wide, leading directly to Carlisle and the Wall. The road on the other side, leading to the station at Ellenborough, was also until lately distinct ; it is described as running southward along the present turnpike road, nearly to Waver Bridge, then along the high grounds behind Waver Bank farm, north of Priestcroft colliery, where, as it crosses the road to Crookdale, it may be still seen ; then over Leesrig pasture, and Oughterside Moor, where I have been informed traces of it are visible.* A little to the south-east of this road lies a camp near Whitehall ; hence it seems probable that a road ran from * " The Picts or Romano-British Wall," p. 7. Dr. Bruce's " Roman Wall," ist edition, p. 360. 44 History of Cumberland. Waver Bridge past this camp direct to the Roman station at Papcastle, and the extreme straightness of the present turnpike road may lead us to conclude that it follows the line of the Roman road. Dr. West, in his valuable " Guide to the Lakes," gives us the following description of Caermot, on the road between Keswick and Wigton : Caermot is a green high-crowned hill, and on its skirt, just by the roadside, are the manifest vestiges of a square encampment enclosed with a double foss, extending from east to west 120 paces, and from south to north 100 paces. It is divided into several cantonment?, and the road from Keswick to Old Carlisle has crossed it at right angles. Part of the agger is visible where it issues from the north side of the camp, till where it fell in with the present road. It is distant about ten miles from Keswick, as much from Old Carlisle, and is about two miles west of Ireby. On the northern extremity of the said hill of Caermot, are the remains of a beacon, and near it the vestiges of a square encampment. This camp is in full view of Bow- ness and Old Carlisle. From the existence of the camp, and its position, we may conclude that a road ran past it from Old Carlisle to the station at Keswick, branching off from the Ellenborough and Papcastle roads, and running to the head of Bassenthwaite Lake, and thence to Keswick.* In Lyson's " Cumberland," p. cxlvii., mention is made of a Roman road which ran from Old Carlisle to Plump- ton wall by Broadfields. This is probable, as Roman works once existed on Broadfield Common, and Camden considered Rose Castle to have been a Roman station. Mr. Lees, of Wreay, has traced this road, and makes it run into the second Her at Causeway House. The works on Broadfield Common, and the camp, which must have existed at Muncaster, would be points on the western Roman road from Carlisle to Penrith. A Roman road led from Old Carlisle to Bowness, * For Caermot see Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archcsological Society, vol. iii., p. 43, vol. vi., p. 191. The Roman Roads. 45 passing Kirkbride Church, which stands in a Roman camp. Mr. Mackenzie Walcott states* that a Roman road did lead from Old Carlisle to Drumburgh, and that traces of it are visible at Low Moor. There is a long straight piece of road through Aikton, which if produced both ways would lead from Old Carlisle to Drumburgh, and which seems an old Roman road. Another Roman road went from Old Carlisle to Burgh, passing a camp at Foldsteads, where an altar has been found. Other roads probably led to Holm Cultram, or Skinburness. Let us take a map and draw on it these roads radiating from Old Carlisle, and we shall see its importance as a strategic point. Troops stationed here could in a very few hours be at any point menaced by the enemy, from Carlisle along the Wall to St. Bees Head. Did the enemy land south of that point, the garrison of Keswick would move south to intercept them, and be replaced at Keswick by a reserve from Old Carlisle, while the Old Carlisle garrison could be replaced from several points as necessary. By the use of beacons and semaphores their movements could be carried out with great celerity. Further, Old Carlisle was in direct communication with the Roman legion at Chester. If we move ourselves by the Roman road from Old Carlisle to Keswick, we shall find we are at another great strategic point, also in communication with Chester, and also a place where many roads join, and where Roman remains are abundant. t Let us turn to the accurate West for information on the subject. In his " Guide to the Lakes," p. 145, he tells us that in consequence of Camden's silence as to Keswick, and in consequence of a mistake made by Horsley as to Keswick, a regular * " Guide to the Lakes," p. 102. t Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaological society, vol. i., p. 220. 46 History of Cumberland. survey was made of the military or Roman roads, and those from Papcastle, Ellenborough, Moresby, Ambleside, and Plumpton, were found to coincide at Keswick. Mr. West, no mere guide-book writer, but a Roman Catholic clergyman and scholar, writes in 1780, and when the survey of which he writes was made, many traces of the old Roman roads must have been left, which inclosures and the plough have now obliterated. One road he describes for us with an accuracy and minuteness that makes one wish he had deemed it worth while to be as communicative about the others. That road is the one from Plumpton Wall to Keswick. He says : Upon Hutton Moor, and on the north side of the great road, may be traced the path of the Roman way that leads from Old Penrith, or Plumpton Wall, in a line almost due west to Keswick. Upon the moor are the traces of a large encampment that the road traverses ; and a little beyond the eighth mile-post on the left at Whitbarrow, are stray vestiges of a square encampment. The Roman road beyond that is met with in the enclosed fields of Whitbarrow, and is known by the farmers from the opposition they met with in ploughing across it. After that, it is found entire on the common, called Greystoke low- moor ; and lately they have formed a new road on the agger of it. It proceeds in a right line to Greystoke town, when it makes a flexure to the left, and continues in a line to Blencow ; it is then found in a ploughed field, about 200 yards to the north of Little Blencow, point- ing at Coach-gate ; from thence it passes on the north side of Kell- barrow, and through Cow-close, and was discovered on making the new turnpike road from Penrith to Cockermouth, which it crossed near the toll-gate. From thence it stretches over Whitrigg in a right line, is visible on the edge of the wood at Fairbank, and in the lane called Low Street. From thence it points through enclosed land, to the south end of the station, called Plumpton Wall and Old Penrith. It crossed the brook Petteril at Torpenholme. From Whitbarrow, Mr. West, p. 150, makes a Roman road run down by a fort on Soulby Fell to the fort at Dunmallet, and communicate with the well known Roman road, the High Street, leading from Ambleside to Penrith and Brougham. From Whitbarrow camp, The Roman Roads. 47 known as Stone Carron, an ancient, i.e. Roman road, ran between Mell Fells to the head of Gowbarrow Park, and vestiges of it were visible when Jefferson's " Leath Ward " was writ, vide that book, p. 386. It probably continued to Ambleside.* Mr. West's Roman road from Moresby to Keswick must have joined the Ellenborough road at Papcastle. Dr. Stukeley asserts that he had seen vestiges of it. Traces of a Roman road are to be found in Borrow- dale,t and there would be a road to it from Keswick. In the south-west of the county of Cumberland, we have already mentioned the Roman road from Ambleside over Hardknott, passing an enclosed fort, and running down to Ravenglass. This road, the road from Keswick over Borrowdale would probably join. A Roman road ran from Egremont to Papcastle, which would be thus another great converging station. This road was traced by the Rev. James Fullerton.J The Roman road from Ellenborough to Papcastle was traced by the late Mr. Dykes of Dovenby Hall. East of the second Iter of Antoninus, Old Penrith must have had some communication eastward to the Maiden Way, and probably another to Brampton. A Roman fort is in the parish of Kirkland, near the Maiden Way, and is known as the " Hanging Gardens of Mark Antony." The necessity for this apparently intricate mesh-work of roads and forts, west of the second Iter of Antoninus, arises from the Roman position being out-flanked. Their front was to Scotland, along Hadrian's Wall : on their left flank, the western districts of Scotland threatened * Hutchinson's " Cumberland," vol. i., p. 412. t Hutchinson's "Cumberland," vol. ii., pp. 164, 176, 208; West's " Guide to the Lakes," pp. 123, 143. + See Lyson's " Cumberland," cxxxvii. Vide Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archceological Society, vol. i., p. 167. 48 History of Cumberland. them as far as St. Bees Head, while Ireland took up the line where Scotland ceased. Thus, the Romans were bound to refuse their left flank, as it is called in terms of military art, and to fortify and garrison strongly the district thus menaced. From their great camps at Old Carlisle, Papcastle, and Keswick, large reinforcements, moving on the inner and therefore shorter lines, could rapidly arrive at any menaced part on the coast, while the Keswick garrison closed the passes of Borrowdale and of Dunmail Raise, the only passes leading south. The way in which all the stations mutually supported, and could readily supply each other with reinforcements, is very wonderful, and indicates military talent of a high order. The position was worthy of the importance the Romans attached to it ; even while Chester was occupied as a military station, a successful invasion of West Cumberland would have driven the defeated Romans across their lines of communication ; by it they would have been severed from their bases of operation at Chester and York, and compelled to change their front, leaving the garrisons on the west part of Hadrian's Wall blockaded in their stations. This the Romans were too military a nation to risk, and hence the tenacious and iron grasp which they closed on Cumberland. The traveller, who visits the sites of the Roman forts in Cumberland and Westmorland, will notice their well- chosen positions ; how one fort commands a view of its neighbour, or if, for some reason or other, it is in a low position, a beacon stands on some near and elevated spot. By semaphores in the day, and by fires at night, the in- telligence of a hostile expedition would easily be flashed across the country, and troops would be in motion, perhaps even before the Scottish or Irish keels had touched the Cumbrian coast. We have, in thus setting out the Roman roads in Cumberland, made mention of all, or almost all, the The Roman Roads. 49 Roman stations known to have existed in that county ; the harder task of giving to them their ancient names has proved a puzzle which the most eminent antiquaries have failed to solve. In the earlier days of archaeology, antiquaries endeavoured to assign to each station its name from the " Notitia Imperii " rather by guess-work than on any systematic plan. Gordon, in his " Itinerary," above a century since, was the first to attempt to fix the sites of the " Notitia " stations on correct principles. Where a site yielded inscriptions by a cohort named in the " Notitia," he concluded that that site was rightly named. Horsley added new proofs to those of Gordon, and out of the twelve stations from Segedunum to Amboglanna, eight have yielded up inscriptions of this kind.* But this mode of proof fails in toto from the moment we set foot in Cumberland. Dr. Bruce, in that most magnificent work, the " Lapidarium Septen- trionale," writes : In this state of uncertainty, it will be better for us to forbear attempt- ing to give to the camps we meet with, their ancient designations. In due time the key may be found which, without the application of force, will send back the bolt, and make all plain ; till then we must be care- ful to confess our " ignorance." The " Notitia Imperii " gives a list of the officers per lineam Valli, the names of their stations, and the troops they commanded. The first twelve stations have been identified by the inscriptions found within their sites. Eleven of these twelve are situated in Northumberland. For convenience we give these eleven stations in a tabulated form, showing the allocations that have been made for them : See Hodgson's " Northumberland," vol. iii., part ii., p. 168. History of Cumberland. Names of Stations. Rank of Commander. Garrison. Modern Name. I. 2. SEGEDUNUM PONS ^ELII Tribunus Tribunus Cohors IV. Lingonum Conors I. Cornoviorum Wallsend [Tyne Newcastle-upon- 3- GONDERCUM Prsefectus Ala I. Asturum Benwell 4- VlNDOBALA Tribunus Cohors I. Frixagorum Rutchester 5- HUNNUM Prsefectus Ala Saviniana Halton Chesters 6. ClLURNUM Prsefectus Ala II. Asturum Walwick Chesters 7- PROCOLITIA Tribunus Cohors I. Batavorum Carrawburgh 8. BORCOVICUS Tribunus Cohors I. Tungrorum Housesteads 9- VlNDOLANA Tribunus Cohors IV. Gallorum Little Chesters 10. /ESICA Tribunus Cohors I. Asturum Great Chesters ii. MAGNA Tribunus Cohors II. Dalmatarum Caervoran We give the remaining twelve stations in a similar table, but adding to it the various conjectures of anti- quaries from the father of English archaeology down- wards ; but of these twelve only one, Amboglanna, can be positively identified : The Roman Roads. j3 jj g 4 5 2 _ 2 B u >, o w elli.lS fs IsS -^J 3 u "> & O I 1 U 3 ell 3 3 c o o e 3 -2i vSJ 3 ;> gj JJ -Q 53 B . n *C ^ ! N r'lrfi'ivd t~.OO CT>C> MMMMMMM-Mlin 42 52 History of Cumberland. jf^g eu * 1 2 JO U f O 1) 1 a j^ *n >, 'C c al ^ ,^ ft M R rt 1r S o "- 1 6 > eu C j o b U d o 1) o c i> *- rt pq O pi H C O pq > V 43 73 U C* Wl CO ct "O y 2 CL) O o *h4 U H Birdosw; Hexham d PH * en CD O Ellenbor Bowness JU Borrowb Ribchest 2 M S V "rt _g i 73 O : : ?5 o 9 o C p},H "H 31 P3 PH W n 613 a Z 30 5 r- o r-t o *c o 'C < .-ss U P- *> in O 1 t g 1 | U i S ,J ^ 13 E 0, O JU E % Cfl pq e2 g S S _cu o n irdoswald astlesteads c a, S in O U 43 Is :anwix f G 3 , 43 S g owness In O 43 c 2 'a, S Id Carlisle llenborough ^ W U pq ? c pq Q en ^ pq O W in s I be 1 Birdoswald Lanercost Castlesteads C f O U O 1 Linstock Stanwix Kirksteads Eo 3 pq Boustead H Drumburgh Bowness = J3 c Birdoswald Castlesteads fr 2 u CJ I Stanwix f pq Drumburgh Bowness 2 o Q CJ o "H. S rt B Old Carlisle Ellenboroug a D < g en S L^ z o MBOGLANN ETRIANA BALLABA ONGAVATA XELODUNU ABROSENTI UNNOCELU LANNIBAN: 13 REMETENN LENACUM IROSIDUM < PH H f'l 4- ir> VO r^ cx> o\ o" M cJ co N N W 1 The Roman Roads. 53 Camden, in making his conjectures, was guided only by the resemblances of names, and little trust can be placed upon such guesses as the placing Aballaba at Appleby. Gordon first, and Horsley after him, found the true method, and by it they and Hodgson assigned positions to the first twelve stations per lineam Valli, to which all their successors have agreed. The method they em- ployed has until very recently, and with the exception of the well identified Amboglanna, utterly failed in Cumber- land. This failure is due to the nature of the country, more amenable to cultivation than the wilds of North- umberland traversed by the Wall, and cultivation is near akin to obliteration of ancient ruins. Cumberland is not frequent in stone quarries, but the ruins of the Roman masonry furnished a ready supply of material to all who wished to build, while a much-to-be-cursed superstition led the Cumbrian peasants to pound and deface the " uncanny " written stones they so frequently found in cultivating their fields, and in building their farmsteads. Thus, then, west of Amboglanna, Gordon, and Horsley, and Hodgson could only guess. Finding that the first twelve stations per lineam Valli follow along the Wall in exact sequence, they concluded this must be so through- out, and to each ruined station they assigned in due sequence its name, differing over this point mainly, that one held, and the other denied, Watchcross to be a station. Horsley and Gordon had five stations, and Hodgson six, for which no places could be found on the Wall itself. These they allocated in supporting stations south of the Wall, in a line from east to west. The late Mr. Maughan, Vicar of Bewcastle, convinced that all the stations must be actually on the Wall itself, called in the aid of etymology, and in several ingenious papers * worked out his proposition. Etymology is but a deceitful * Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, vol. i. 54 History of Cumberland. guide, and we can hardly put much trust in Mr. Maughan's results. Mr. MacLauchlin, in his " Memoirs during a Survey of the Roman Wall," has also trusted greatly to etymology. The misfortune of the etymological method is that it fits any place. Thus both Mr. Maughan and Mr. MacLauchlin make Axelodunum to mean " a fortress on high ground," and one adjusts it to Watchcross, and the other to Stanwix; but out of the twenty-three stations per lineam Valli this description would fit twenty. So they both make Glannibanta to mean the cliff over or near the valley or plain, an equally comprehensive description, and accordingly both apply it to different places. In the midst of all this guess-work, a light has recently seemed to break in upon us, and the clue it shows, if followed right, may lead to victory : Dr. McCaul thinks that the compiler of the " Notitia '' ceases after Amboglanna to give the stations of the Wall in regular order. If the proper order was to be abandoned, this (Amboglanna) seems the fitting place for doing so, as the Maiden Way, coming from the south to Magna, and continuing northwards from this station, brings Ambog- lanna into direct intercourse with the contiguous forts in all directions. This is from a note by Dr. Bruce, in the " Lapidarium Septentrionale." In the opinion therein expressed we humbly venture to coincide, but with this qualification that we fancy the compiler of the " Notitia " intended to give all the stations in a due sequence from east to west. He could not have drawn up the "Notitia" from personal knowledge, but must have had access to documents in the offices of the Roman army, answering to the offices of our quarter-master and adjutant-general. The general in supreme command of the forces along the Wall then resided at York ; but, as in our army, so must he in his, have had subordinates, lieutenant-generals, and inspecting officers, constantly visiting and reporting to him on the efficiency of the garrisons under his command. Suppose The Roman Roads. 55 one of these inspectors to have a tour of duty from York north by the eastern route, and then along the Wall to Amboglanna, and so to York by the Maiden Way: his report to his chief at York would furnish the compiler with the first twelve stations running from east to west. From the report of another inspector who took the western country, the compiler would get the western stations ; and through mistake might easily invert the list, and put the most westerly station next Amboglanna. If we conceive four inspectors instead of two, or an inspecting tour which doubled upon and crossed itself, we can clearly conceive the compiler inverting the order of some of the stations. That he has done so will presently appear. In the year 1870,* a find of Roman altars was made at Ellenborough by Mr. Humphrey Senhouse, of Netherhall, seventeen in number, of which thirteen give the names of the commanders of the station, and seven of these were prefects of the first cohorts of Spaniards, which the " Notitia " places at Axelodunum. Hence Professor Hiibner without hesitation pronounces Ellenborough to be Axelodunum. Moresby has yielded two altars erected by the second cohort of Lingones,^ and three by the second cohort of Thracians.J The " Notitia " places the second cohort of Lingones at Congavata, and the second of Thracians at Gabrosentis. Thus Moresby may be easily one or the other. In two inscriptions found at Papcastle the word " Aballavensium " occurs, and the conclusion is that Pap- castle is Aballaba or Aballava. We thus get three * Vide the Lapidarium Septentrionale, p. 429, and the Transactions^ Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. i., p. 175. j- Lapidarium Septentrionale, No. 911 ; Archceological Journal, vol. xliii., p. 288. J Lapidarium Septentrionale, No. 912 and 914 ; Archaeological Journal, vol. xxxix., p. 357. 56 History of Cumberland. stations between St. Bees and Bowness, which have always been looked for between Bowness and Birdoswald a fact which points to the inversion we have just suggested. We have now got as far in the identification of the Roman stations in Cumberland as positive evidence will carry us. We have CASTRA EXPLORATORUM - - at Netherby. LUGUVALLUM or LUGUVALLIUM - - at Carlisle. ,, t at Old Penrith, VOREDA { Plumpton Wall. AMBOGLANNA at Birdoswald. ABALLABA - at Papcastle. CONGAVATA or GABROSENTIS - at Moresby. AXELODUNUM - at Ellenborough. In the " Cosmography of Ravenna " we get the follow- ing names of stations in the following sequence : JULIOCENON. GABROCENTIO - - (Gabrosentce). ALAUNA. BRIBRA. MAIO. OLERICA. DERVENTIONE. RAVONIA - Ravenglass (?) Then again we have : VALTERIS - - Verterae (Brough). BEREDA - - Voreda (Old Penrith}. LUGUBALUM - Luguballium (Carlisle). MAGNIS - - Magna (Caervorari). BABAGLANDA - Amboglanna (Birdoswald). VlNDOLANDE. LlNEOJUGLA. And also : AESICA - - yEsica (Great Chesters). BANNA - - Banna (Beiucastle or Birdoswald). UXELUDIANO - Axelodunum (EllenborougK). AVALARIA - Aballaba (Papcastle). MAIA. The Roman Roads. 57 From an enamelled cup known as the Rudge Cup, found in Wiltshire, we get a sequence of stations as follows : A . MAIS . ABALLAVA VXELODVM . CAMBOGLANS {Papcastle) (Ellenborough) Amboglanna(-5/rd(9.ywaA/). or Cambeck Fort. BANNA {Bewcastle or Birdoswald ).* From the identified places in these sequences it would seem that some of the unidentified ones must, or may be, in Cumberland; and there is room for much conjecture in designing routes to fit in with these sequences, and with those of the " Itinera " of Antoninus and the " Notitia." Thus the last two sequences seem to point to the same road or Her. BANNA occurs on an altar found at Amboglanna Deo sancto Silvano ve- natores Bannienses sacrum f and is suggested to be Bewcastle, where is a great camp, or Gilsland, whose mineral waters were probably known to the Romans. From the Ravennas we get this route : Great Chesters, Bewcastle, or Gilsland, Ellenborough, Papcastle, and MAIA. From the Rudge Cup we get Bewcastle, Birdoswald, Ellenborough, Papcastle, and MAIA. The inference is that MAIA is some unappropriated station in S.W. Cumberland, and Hardknott Castle has been suggested ; but Ravenglass is equally probable, except for the jingling guess that it is Ravonia.\ In addition to the twenty-three stations given by the " Notitia " as per lineam Valli, it gives in a separate section the following : * Lapidarium Septentrional 'e, pp. 204-207. f Ibid., No. 370. % " The Western Stations," by W. H. D. Longstaffe. Archceologia , New Series, vol. viii., p. 154. History of Cumberland. DANUM, identified as Doncaster. MORBIUM, ARBEIA, DICTIS, CONCANGIUM, LAVATRES, identified as Bowes in Yorkshire. VENERJE, or VERTERJE, identified as Brough on Stainmore. BRABONICUM, identified as Brougham. MAGLOU/E. MAG^E. LONGOVICUM. DERVENTIO, identified by the aid of the " Itinera" as New Malton, in Yorkshire. From the sound, MORBIUM has often been assigned to Moresby in Cumberland, and ARBEIA to Ireby in that county, while DICTIS and CONCANGIUM have been as- signed to Ambleside and Kendal. But these allocations are mere guesses, and the first of them is contradicted by lapidary proof that Moresby is CONGAVATA. We have elsewhere discussed these allocations with a view to placing them in Yorkshire.* * Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. ii., pp. 93 and 182. CHAPTER IV. THE ROMAN FORTS AND TOWNS. THE reader by now must be familiar with the names, at least, of various places in Cumberland where remains of Roman camps and towns exist. We propose to ask him to accompany us, in this chapter, on a circular tour to these remains. We will endeavour to show him what is now in existence, and to bring before his mind some idea of what has vanished. Let the reader, then, imagine himself to be, in the year 300 A.D., in our company at Lancaster with the intention of making a tour through the district now known as Cumberland. After viewing from the Castle Hill the route over the Sands, and learning that on it the Romans have no station in Cumberland nearer than Ravenglass, we decide to adopt the inland route, and we travel past the camp near modern Kendal to that at the head of the great lake of Windermere.* Spending the night there, we make an early start, and, after a long and toilsome ascent, reach the summit of a pass, 1,270 feet above the sea-level, on Wrynose.t Hence we descend down an uninteresting * As we do not know the ancient names of the places we shall visit, we must be allowed to use the modern names, though they did not then exist. We must have some means of indicating places, and the roundabout way of saying "the district afterwards called Cumber- land " is awkward. f "The Three Shire Stones" on Wrynose, where Cumberland, Westmorland and Lancashire meet in a point. 60 History of Cumberland. waste by the side of a brawling beck, and up again over a still higher pass (Hardknott, 1,290 feet). On the road we meet with slowly-moving herds of cattle, which, we are told, have been landed at Ravenglass from an island in the Western Ocean. Trains of pack-horses, carrying merchandise, pass to and fro. From the top of the second pass we catch a glimpse of the sea, and on arriving at the 700 feet level we come upon a scene at once lively and imposing. Our road crosses a well-kept and level parade-ground of some two acres in extent, from which the stones that litter the adjacent fellsides have been carefully cleared away. On the north side is a mound bearing a tower, from which signals, by sema- phore, are being rapidly sent and received up and down the valley. Martial music fills the air. The cohort in garrison is drawn up in review-order on the parade- ground, under its tribune, for the inspection of an officer of high rank sent from York by the Dux Brittaniarum. The draconarius holds aloft the dragon standard, trumpets blare out a point of war, the centurions lower their vine saplings as the general rides slowly down the line on his stately war-horse. The straps of his glittering cuirass are decorated with phalerce of chalcedony and jet, while laced on his breast is a silver-gilt gorget, on which a captive figure crouches before a Roman soldier, and the , DEVIC . legend BRITTA is engraved.* We cross the parade-ground, and are confronted by a stern quadrangular fort of dressed stone with towers at the angles. Presenting our credentials to the officer on duty, we ride in under an archway, over which is a much- weathered inscription, of which we can only decipher the letters : GRIG LA CoH. While partaking of his preferred hospitality, we inquire * " Devicta Britannia," Archceologia, vol. xlix., p. 439. The Roman Forts and Towns. 61 of the officer of the guard how he likes his quarters, and are not surprised to hear him complain that they are dull, no ladies' society, and climate perfectly awful men have constantly to be invalided down to the sea-coast, which is warmer. In the winter the frosts and snows are terrible. Plenty of deer on the fells, who afford good sport, though the wild natives poach and drive them about a good deal, and would not be above robbing and ill-treating any solitary Roman hunter. They don't now molest the traffic on the road, and have not done so for long, the garrison having in past times given them some severe lessons. He further tells us the fort is nearly a square of about 116 yards each way, and that the bricks and dressed stone used in building it had been brought from a vast distance as much as fourteen miles, he believes, in the case of the stone. The camp has no suburbs, beyond a British wigwam or two nothing to induce officers to bring their families up here, or any settlers to come. Even the tribune had to live in bachelor quarters in barracks. These are the worst quarters in the service ; even at Low Borrow Bridge the tribune has a villa outside the barracks for his residence. It is a nice change to get down to Ravenglass, where something is generally going on, if only a little cock- fighting ; but he hopes soon to get long leave, and go up to Luguvallium, which he believes is a very gay place. No, he cannot tell which Agricola the weathered inscrip- tion over the gate refers to whether the great Agricola himself, or the legate Calpurnius Agricola. Thanking this courteous but unfortunate exile from Italy, we travel down the valley, and after a ride of some nine or ten miles reach Ravenglass, where a fort, pre- cisely similar to that we have just left, though larger, stands on the right bank of the chief of the three rivers which form the noble harbour. On the western side of the fort a sheltered terrace, some fifty feet above the 62 History of Cumberland. river, which is here full of salmon-nets and traps, is reserved for the officers of the garrison and their friends. A commodious villa, or, rather, collection of villas at the north-east of the fort, affords luxurious accommodation for the chief military and civil officials, and is warmed by an admirable system of hypocausts, whose external pre- furnium and tall chimney find ample fuel in the abundant woods of the district. The windows of this palace for such it is in these septentrionalian regions even boast the luxury of glass. Numbers of settlers, some engaged in commercial, others in agricultural, pursuits, some tradesmen and hangers-on to the garrison, inhabit large suburbs to the north and east of the fort. A little dis- tance to the south a remarkable hill, artificially scarped, carries a beacon for the guidance of vessels wishing to make the harbour. We find that place a busy scene, full of craft loading and unloading. Wild-looking men from Hibernia are discharging cargoes of cattle, with a total absence of regard for what the cattle feel ; while Spaniards and Italians, with much more care, are unloading from their craft great amphora full of wine, olives, anchovies, sardines, garum, and other luxuries which the Romans love, and have taught the Britons to love, or to pretend to do. In return they are shipping, among other com- modities, large sporting dogs and dejected-looking natives, some of whom are recruits for military service, others to be sold as slaves. The beach is strewn with bales and packing-cases. Foreign sailors stroll to and fro, and mix with the soldiers of the garrison who are off duty, and chaffer with the women of the town. By special invita- tion we take up our abode for the night in the tribune's villa, and from the guests at his table we learn much as to the trade and commerce of the district ; while the tribune's wife shows us with pride a necklace of British pearls, collected from one of the rivers which form the harbour. She also calls our attention to the rose-coloured The Roman For is and Towns. 63 plaster of the walls, on which mythological and other figures are floating in mid-air, as it might be ; while in a niche in the western wall of one of the rooms stands a marble bust of the Emperor, presented by himself to the tribune. Let us now go back to Hardknott Castle, and change the date from A.D. 300 to this present year. The tribune and his cohort have disappeared ; the military music is silent. The brawling brook, the desert fells, and the eternal mountains remain. The parade-ground is deserted, but there it is, still to be seen, and it is known to the country people as the Bowling Green. The mound and signal-tower remain in ruins. Long heaps of fellstone trace out the lines of the fort. The dressed ashlar-work is almost all gone. The very reasons which caused the Romans to drag it from quarries so distant as Gosforth have caused the country people to drag it away again for the purpose of building the farms and cottages which sparsely dot the scene. The stone on which we saw the letters GRIG LA COH was found, in 1855, near the western gateway, and is supposed to refer to Calpurnius Agricola, legate A.D. 162 to 169.* The silver-gilt gorget of the inspecting-omcer has afforded an evening's subject of discussion at the rooms of the Society of Antiquaries of London. f The military road is grass-grown, and the traffic has dwindled down to summer tourists and shep- herds, whose sheep graze on the hills where once the mighty deer roamed. The ruins were explored and planned, in 1792, by Messrs. Serjeant and Irton,J and although they found no * Proc. Soc, Antiq., First Series, vol. iii., p. 225. f Archaologia, vol. xlix., p. 439. We do not venture to assert that the wearer of this gorgeous trinket ever was at Hard-knott, but several Roman officers of high rank in Britain probably received this decoration. \ Hutchinson's Cumberland, vol. ii., p. 569. Jefferson's Allerdale above Derwent, p. 186. 64 History of Cumberland. lapidary inscriptions, they found ample proof that the ruins were those of a Roman fort. The leaden pipes for supply- ing the camp with water have also been found and taken up. It was brought from a well about a mile and a half off. We have mentioned in a previous chapter that it has been suggested that the Roman name of Hardknott Castle was Maia* At Ravenglass less now remains of the fort than at Hardknott Castle. Its site is covered by a fine green sward, on which the outline of three of the sides of the fort can be traced. The fourth is obliterated by the railway, which also cuts off the terrace above the river, which we have imagined reserved for the Roman officers. The salmon-nets and traps remain to this day. Excava- tions within this camp show that almost every stone available for building purposes has been carried away, the walls, internal and external, having been robbed down, in most places, to the very foundations. This was the convenient quarry out of which the ancient market town of Ravenglass was built/f But a fragment of the villa still rears its walls, some twelve feet above the ground, near the north-east angle of the fort. The character of this ruin was long overlooked, and Mr. W. Jackson, F.S.A., was the first to recognise that it was Roman. Under his direction, assisted by the writer, the place was thoroughly explored, excavated, and the external pre- furnium and an elaborate system of hypocausts laid bare.J In the walls above ground the sills and sides of windows remain, and fragments of window-glass were * Ante p. 57. " The Western Stations," by W. H. D. Longstaffe. Arckaologia ALliana, New Series, vol. viii., p. 154. f Dr. Bruce and the writer were present at these excavations, which were made by Lord Muncaster. So thorough was the plunder that we advised Lord Muncaster that the continuance of the excavations was useless. I " Walls Castle." Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archceological Society, vol. iii., p. 23 ; vol. vi., p. 216- The Roman Forts and Towns. 65 found in the debris. The walls internally are covered with a fine warm rose-coloured plaster, and in one of them is a niche apparently for a bust or image. The field-names of Castle Meadow, Castle Field, Stone Warron, Stone Acre, Broad Walls, Walls Field, Walls Close, Black Stones, etc., give ample evidence of the acreage once covered by suburbs, while living evidence can be adduced that Walls Castle itself has, both by accident and by design, been much diminished within the present century. That so unique a fragment remains above ground is due to the fact that it appears to have continued to be inhabited long after the Romans left, and even down to mediaeval times tradition says by the ancestors of the Penningtons of Muncaster. The water on the harbour bar is now so shallow that the harbour cannot be used, except occasionally by a coaster of light draft with a cargo of coals or wood. The great amphora, of which fragments everywhere occur in Cumberland, must have come by sea, as these unwieldy things could scarcely have been dragged overland from Dover, while the voyage from Cadiz, or even Marseilles, to Ravenglass would be an easy run. Ravenglass, a natural harbour, and Chester must have been ports for the wine trade long ere Bristol, or Liverpool, or Glasgow, ever owned sea- going craft. Ravenglass as a port flourished down into mediaeval times, and was killed by the rise of Bristol and Liverpool, and by the silting up of its bar. The scarped hill, called now Newton Knott, still carries a sea beacon. No lapidary inscriptions, bar one, have been found at Ravenglass. Camden says he heard of, or saw, some ; but he does not record them, and they are lost. One was found by a labourer employed in excavating at Walls Castle, who, seeing the letters to be English in shape, at once threw it into the sea as valueless. Careful search failed to recover it. It has been suggested that Raven- 5 66 History of Cumberland. glass is the Ravonia of the Ravennas, but there is no evidence in that behalf. It may be wsll now to drop the machinery of an imaginary tour, and to turn to a map. There is a con- siderable stretch of coast from Ravenglass northwards without any fort to guard it ; but the fact is, one was not wanted. From Ravenglass to St. Bees Head the coast is devoid of harbours, and therefore no fort was required. Hutchinson, in his " History of Cumberland," indeed, writes : Upon Ponsonby Fell are the vestiges of an encampment said to be Roman ; but the ground having never been opened, no altars or other antiquities have been found in or near to it to ascertain to what age or people it belonged. Nothing has yet been found in this camp, which is on Infell, Ponsonby, and not on Ponsonby Fell. It is five- sided, enclosed by a ditch, from which the earth has been thrown out to both sides, forming ramparts, about two feet in height at the present time.* Neither the plan nor the profile are Roman, so that the evidence of the camp being made or used by that people is of the slightest. Very competent authorities consider that a Roman station has existed at Egremont, where three Roman roads converge ; but little or nothing now remains. f It is not, indeed, clear where the site of it was probably covered by the town ; fragments of Roman masonry were found in the church when it was rebuilt in 1881. But at Moresby an undoubted station did exist ; the plan of its fort can still be traced in the green sward on the top of the cliff near the church. At the foot of the cliff is a small natural harbour, now much spoilt by railway * "Camp on Infell, Ponsonby." By C. A. Parker, M.D. Trans- actions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. viii.. p. 82. t " Egremont Castle." By the Rev. E. H. Knowles and W. Jack- son, F.S.A. Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, vol. vi., 1623. TJie Roman Forts and Towns. 67 works, to which paths lead down the cliff from the camp. This station was partly excavated by Lord Lonsdale in 1860 ; but the finds were not of great importance, and no record was published. It is identified as the Congavata of the "Notitia," on the strength of two inscriptions by the second cohort of the Lingones. But three by the second cohort of the Thracians have also been found, and thus, on the score of lapidary remains,* its claims to be Gabrosentis are equally good, or better ; but preference is apparently given to Congavata, on account of the order in which the stations follow one another in the "Notitia." Little has been ascertained as to the extent of the suburbs here; but the commerce was probably trivial compared with that at Ravenglass, the terminus of a great road from the heart of Britain. Moresby is, indeed, connected by good Roman roads with Hadrian's Wall ; but the troops at the western part of that fortification could be more easily supplied from ports higher up the Solway, and the difficulty of dragging heavy goods up the cliff must have been considerable. On the other hand, the situation of this garrison is well adapted for watching the movements of the natives in the Lake District. The port might thus be rather for the supply of the garrison itself than for any general commerce. At Borough, or Burrow, Walls, on the north side of Workington, are the remains of a large Roman station, which appears to have been completely overlooked until about 1852. In that year draining operations led to the discovery of some blank or uninscribed altars. The area of the fort and suburbs is said to exceed twenty acres.f The reason for this station is obvious : the mouth of the river Derwent must have been, from early days, a harbour for shipping, and from it St. Cuthbert's body was * Lapidarium Septentrionale, Nos. 911, 912, 914, &&& Archaological Journal, vol. xliii., p. 288. Ibid., vol. xxxix., p. 357. t Whelan's "History of Cumberland," p. 464. 52 68 History of Cumberland. embarked for Ireland, so long ago as the ninth century. A very ancient tower, on a hill ninety feet high, near the sea, forms a beacon for ships wishing to make the har- bour. The Roman camp at Workington, and Working- ton generally, have been neglected by local antiquaries ; but they have the excuse that at one time they were only permitted to view the site of the camp from the adjacent highway. There has been another Roman station a little inland, on a cop or hill called Papcastle, on the right bank of the Derwent, about a mile below where the Cocker falls into that river. The site of the station is nearly obliterated by modern villas, and it was extensively used as a quarry for building the town of Cockermouth, which is immediately to its south ; two inscriptions found here name the CVNEVS FRISIONVM ABALLAVENSiVM, and so enable us to identify Papcastle as the Aballaba of the " Notitia."* The older suggestion was that Papcastle was the Derventio of the " Notitia," which is now generally placed at New Malton, in Yorkshire. Returning to the seaboard, we have at Ellenborough, or Maryport, as the place is somewhat indifferently called, t the manifest remains of a large Roman station on the cliffs overhanging the Solway Firth, while to the south of the station the mouth of the river Ellen afforded a natural harbour, where vessels could lie and load and unload with facility. The estate on which the station is situated has for many generations belonged to the ancient family of Senhouse, who have been zealous custodians of the same, and of the many relics of antiquity found thereon cus- todians from whom the eager antiquary has ever received the most courteous reception when prosecuting his * Lapidarium Septentrionale, Nos. 906, 907. f Ellenborough is the name of the manor in which the camp is situated, and the camp was known by that name before the very modern town of Maryport came into existence. The Roman Forts and Towns. 69 inquiries. Camden thus records his visit to Ellen- borough : And I cannot chuse but with thankful heart remember that very good and worthy gentleman [I. Sinhous], not only in this regard that most kindly he gave us right courteous and friendly entertainment, but also for that being himselfe well learned, he is a lover of ancient literature, and most diligently preserveth those inscriptions, which by others that are unskilful and unlettered be straight waies defaced, broken and converted to other uses, to exceeding great prejudice and detriment of antiquity. The traditions of the family are well maintained by the present lady of the manor, Mrs. Senhouse, and her son, Mr. H. P. Senhouse, who had the gratification, in 1870, of discovering not less than seventeen altars buried in a small plot of ground about three hundred yards to the east of the fort. The altars had been concealed in a series of pits. They lay for the most part with their faces down- wards, and were carefully covered over with stones and earth. Other pits contained fragments of inscribed stones ; others, again, were empty. These altars were probably buried on the occasion of some emergency, when the garrison was called away. That this was during the early part of the Roman occupation is clear from the fact that among the altars found are none to the uncouthly- named local gods, whom the Roman soldiers, in the later part of their occupancy, adopted. Well-directed excavations have at various times been made on the site of this fort and its suburbs. Some undertaken by Colonel Senhouse so long ago as 1763 are recorded in the second volume of the Archceologia. As the result of such enterprise, Dr. Bruce was able to record in the Lapidarium Septentrionale upwards of fifty inscribed and sculptured stones as found here.* Since the publication of that work in 1875, considerable excavations were, in the years 1880 and 1881, carried on * Lapidarium Septentrionale ; pp. 429-452. 7O History of Cumberland. by Mr. Joseph Robinson, of Maryport, with the readily- given permission and assistance of the lady of the manor. Further inscribed and sculptured stones were found, but to go into the details is beyond our limits of space.* The camp, fort, or fortified barracks t at Ellenborough stands on a high and precipitous brow overlooking the sea. Recent quarrying operations show that this brow has been extensively quarried by the Romans, who afterwards turned their main sewer into it, and also, possibly for sanitary reasons, flung into it the wood ashes from their fires. The cliff has at some time or other given way, and carried with it into the debris the ruins of Roman build- ings that once stood on its edge. Considerable suburbs were found to the north-eastwards of the fort, and the foundations of several buildings were bared. Beyond, an extensive cemetery was discovered, with large numbers of interments, most of which seemed to belong to poor people, though here and there urns and other relics denoted the graves of people of position. One remark- able sepulchral monument was found, indicative of the worship of Mithras, the so-called Serpent Stone, a column on one side of which is a female face, and on the other a gigantic crowned serpent. J More than sixteen altars found at this station mention the first cohort of the * For an account of the excavations and finds see Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archcsological Society, vol. v., p. 237 ; Archaological Journal, vol. xxxvii., p. 280. f " Camp " does not seem the right word to apply to these places. To our modern notions camp implies something of a nomad character, and we associate it with canvas, or at most with wooden huts. " Fort " or " fortified barracks " seems to best suit the permanent buildings the Romans erected : such a fort, by gathering suburbs round itself, generally became the nucleus of a more or less considerable station or town. J For an engraving see Transactions, Cumberland and Westmor- land Antiquarian and Archceological Society, vol. v., p. 255 ; Archaeo- logical Journal, vol. xxxvii., p. 280. The Roman Forts and Towns. 71 Spaniards or the commanders of that regiment, and so prove it to be the Axelodunum or Uxellodunum of the " Notitia." Continuing northwards along the coast, we come to a camp or fort, whose very site was, until recently, lost. The county histories mentioned a camp, which they variously placed at New Malbray, Mawburgh, and Beck- foot,* and they spoke of an inscription which com- memorated the second cohort of the Pannonians. These writers also stated the site to have been ploughed up, and corn grown upon it. By the year 1879 the very memory of the site had perished in the vicinity, and the in- habitants were unable to point it out. In that year Mr. Joseph Robinson, of Maryport, and the present writer, acting independently, fixed upon some fields called Castle- fields, near Beckfoot (Mowbray), as the site of the lost camp, and excavations carried out by Mr. Robinson laid bare the foundations of a Roman fort of the usual character, covering about two and three-quarter acres of ground. A large stone lintel, on which is inscribed LIA . PRAEF . COH . II . PANNON . FECIT was found built up into some farm buildings at Newt own of Mowbray.t The drifting sand that obscured the site of the fort has also covered its suburbs, and it is impos- sible to say if they were extensive or not probably not. The fort is close to the sea-beach, and has no gate in its seaward face. It is situate just opposite the foot of the magnificent anchorage, or roadstead, now known as St. Catherine's Hole, four miles in length, and capable of * Hutchinson's " History of Cumberland," vol. ii., p. 346 ; Lyson's Afagna Britannia, vol. iv., p. 147 ; Whelan's " History of Cumber- land," p. 286. t Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, vol. iv., p. 318 ; vol. v., p. 136. 72 History of Cumberland. affording berthage for 400 sail of vessel in all weathers.* The modern village of Skinburness is at the head of this anchorage. Here there was a port extensively used in the time of Edward I. for importing stores, wine, etc., for use of his armies. The market town of Skinburness, which stood a few yards westward of the present village, and not in the Waver and Wampool estuary ,*f- was washed away by the sea about the year 1305. From a Roman altar, coins and other relics having been found on the beach here, the Romans probably used this place as a port.J They may even have had a fort at it, now drowned under the sea. Continuing along the coast, we come to a place marked Campfield on the Ordnance Survey. This place, it was suggested, was a Roman fort, and it presents much of the appearance of one ; but no relics are on record as having been found here, and the spade revealed the fact that the supposed ramparts are merely shingle ridges. Beyond this place, at no great distance, is Bowness-on-Solway, the first station, beginning at the west end, on Hadrian's Great Barrier. Many authorities entitled to respect have considered Bowness-on-Solway to be the Tunnocelum of the " Notitia," where the Cohors I. Mlia Classica was stationed, the notion being that Bowness is the Ituna Ocellum, or promontory of the Eden. As the Cohors I. j?Elia Classica'wa.s a regiment of marines, Tunnocelum must have been a station of the Roman fleet. Now, no admiral in his senses would ever take a fleet to a place like Bowness, accessible only by a narrow and tortuous * See report marine surveyors ; Whelan's " History of Cumber- land," p. 241. f See a paper " On the Destruction of Skinburness by the Sea, about the Year 1305," by T. V. Holmes. Transactions, Cumberland Association for the Advancement of Literature and Science, vol. vi., p. 121. % Lapidarium Septentrionale, No. 904 ; Whelan's " History of Cumberland," p. 241. The Roman Forts and Towns. 73 channel, where he would be probably wind-bound for most of his time, and where his vessels must, unless mere fishing smacks, take the ground every ebb tide. To select such a station, when close to it lies the magnificent anchorage of St. Catherine's Hole, from which his vessels could get out to sea in almost every wind, would be madness. Ituna Ocellum is more likely to be Skinburness Spit (the Grune Point) than Bowness, and Tunnocelum to be the suggested fort under the waves at that place. If not, then the rediscovered fort near Beckfoot (Mowbray), situate at the foot of the anchorage, may claim to be Tunnocelum. It may well be mentioned that the channel of the Ituna, or Eden, does not lose itself in the sands of Solway until it enters the upper end of St. Catherine's Hole. This channel above St. Catherine's Hole shifts its course continually ; but St. Catherine's Hole is known not to have varied for more than a century, and probably is the same now as it was in the days of the Romans, for the causes which produce it are ones which existed in the times of the Romans as they exist now, viz., the strong flood-tides round the Mull of Galloway, which are directed by the trend of the Scottish coast upon the Cumberland strand. It may be asked, Why would not the Roman admiral take for his station one or other of the ports lower down the Solway Ravenglass, Moresby, Workington, or Maryport ? The answer is an obvious one : Those ports are only open to certain winds, and many a merchant- vessel bound to Workington or Maryport has had to sail past those ports and lie in St. Catherine's Hole until the wind changed, when she would sail back down the Solway to her port of destination. The fact is, St. Catherine's Hole is the only anchorage or roadstead on the Cum- brian coast that is available for a station for a fleet, and Tunnocelum must be in its vicinity, and not round the corner at Bowness-on-Solway. Skinburness was probably 74 History of Cumberland. a commercial port in the days of the Romans, as it certainly was in the days of Edward I. Three ports on the Cumbrian coast, Ravenglass, Work- ington, and Ellenborough (Maryport), have been indicated as Roman commercial centres, and it has been suggested that vessels traded to Ravenglass direct from Spain and the Mediterranean ports. The same would be the case with Workington, Maryport, and the minor ports. Cor- roboration of this is to be found in the fact that the Roman cohorts in garrison in the district now Cumber- land were mainly composed of troops drawn from Spain (Spaniards and Astures), from North Africa (Moors), and from the distant ports of the Mediterranean (Dalmatians, Thracians, Dacians, Pannonians, etc.). In Northumber- land the Roman garrisons were mainly drawn from Gaulish and German sources. This clearly shows that the Spaniards, Astures, Moors, Dalmatians, Thracians, Dacians, and Pannonians, came by sea from the ports nearest the places at which they were raised to Cum- brian ports, from which they marched to their allotted stations. Their recruits followed in the same manner ; and probably the same vessels that brought detachments of recruits to join their regiments, brought also the pro- duce of the countries of those recruits : the trade follows the flag. This may also account for the discovery in sea- ports on the Cumbrian coast of altars dedicated by regi- ments other than those in garrisons there. Successive detachments of Thracians or Dalmatians landing at Maryport or Moresby might well erect, in fulfilment of vows made during a long and stormy voyage, altars at their port of disembarkation, while resting there prior to marching inland. If the imaginary traveller, with whom we started this chapter, and whom we have supposed to go from Amble- side, by Hardknott Castle, Ravenglass, and the sea-coast, to Hadrian's Barrier, had chosen, he might have reached The Roman Forts and Towns. 75 it from Ambleside by taking the Roman road past the stations at Keswick and Caermot, to that at Old Carlisle, whence he could have choice of at least four roads to the Roman Wall. Or, had he preferred it, he might have crossed by Whitbarrow to the great fort at Plumpton Wall (Old Penrith), which has been identified as the Voreda of the second Iter, and the Bereda of the Ravennas. At Whitbarrow he would pass a fort, now known as Stone Carron, where several Roman roads converge. No in- scribed stones have been found here.* The station at Plumpton Wall is of the usual character, and has yielded a large number of inscriptions, most of which have been lost.f Excavations in and about the fort here would probably yield a rich harvest. From Voreda, an imaginary traveller would pass, by an easy stage, to Luguvallium (Carlisle), where, at present, he will not be permitted to linger. His next stage on his road north would be Netherby, the Castra Exploratorum of the second Iter. This station was large and important, boasted a riding-school (basilicam equestrem exercitatoriam) , and has yielded several inscriptions, most of which are still preserved at Netherby Hall. The Hall has been erected within the precincts of the fort, which has thus been almost wholly obliterated. The station at Bewcastle, which our traveller would have passed had he gone into Scotland by the Maiden Way, is hexagonal, and has yielded a few inscriptions. The suggestion has been made that it is the Banna of the Rudge Cup, but Banna seems likely to be an abbreviation of A mboglanna, and hence to be Birdoswald. Beginning at the westward, the Roman stations on the line of Hadrian's Barrier are, Bowness-on-Solway, Drum- burgh, Burgh-on-Sands, Stanwix, Watch Cross, Bramp- * Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archceological Society, vol. iv., p. 320. f Lapidarium Septentrionale, p. 404. 76 History of Cumberland. ton, Castlesteads, and Birdoswald (Amboglanna). The nucleus of these stations, as of the others we have men- tioned (except Bewcastle), was a quadrangular fort, or fortified barrack, with towers at the angles, which were rounded off, and with walls of stone from five to eight feet thick. The area included varied from three-quarters of an acre at Drumburgh, and one and a half acres at Watch Cross, to five and a half at Birdoswald. Drum- burgh and Watch Cross are exceptionally small, and but for their existence we should have put the lower limit at two and three-quarter acres. These two small forts may have been exceptionally treated, but the others were all laid out on the same general plan, with a gate in the centre of each side: Birdoswald, being larger, has, like some of the Northum- berland forts, two gates in its eastern and western sides. Each gate was connected with the gate opposite to it by a broad street, thus dividing the interior into four or six quarters. These quarters were crowded with buildings, including offices for the military and civil administrators, a treasury, a small market hall, and, of course, quarters for the men. The other streets ran parallel to the main ones, and were not more than three feet wide. Guard- chambers were provided at each gate, and a fosse strengthened the defences, helped in some cases by an outer rampart of earth. These fortified barracks gathered round them suburbs more or less extensive, in accordance with the conveniences of the site, varying from none, or next to none, in the case of a hill-fort like Hardknott Castle, to the towns that grew up round the forts which guarded the harbours on the coast, or that which gathered under protection of the fort at Stanwix. Some of these forts, or fortified barracks, were actually incorporated by the Roman military engineers into the great fortification known to us as Hadrian's Barrier, or the Roman Wall. Others, though not so incorporated, The Roman Forts and Towns. 77 were passed at so close a distance by that great work as to virtually become part thereof. These forts will be dealt with in the next chapter. There are a few places in Cumberland at which it is suggested, rather than proved, that the Romans have had small stations Holme Cultram Abbey, Kirkbride Church- yard, Rose Castle, Nether Denton Church, Lanercost, and other places ; but to discuss the questions arising thereon would require a history on a greater scale than this. There is in the park at Netherhall a small camp, which is supposed to be a sanatorium for men invalided from more exposed situations. Among the Roman towns of modern Cumberland, Luguvallium stands alone, in a class of its own. Its his- tory presents problems which cannot well be dealt with until the Roman Wall has first been considered, and we must leave it to a separate chapter. CHAPTER V. THE GREAT BARRIER OF HADRIAN : THE TRAIL OF THE ROMAN WALL. THE Great Barrier of the Lower Isthmus, as Dr. Bruce calls the Roman Wall, to distinguish it from the Wall of Antoninus, or the Barrier of the Upper Isthmus, is, by that learned antiquary, shown to consist of three parts : I. A stone wall, strengthened by a ditch on its northern side. II. An earth wall, or vallum, south of the stone wail. III. Stations, castles, watch-towers, and roads for the accommoda- tion of the soldiery who manned the Barrier, and for the transmission of military stores. These lie, for the most part, between the stone wall and the earthen rampart. The whole of the works proceed from one side of the island to the other in a nearly direct line, and in comparatively close companionship. The stone wall and earthen rampart are generally within sixty or seventy yards of each other. The distance, however, between them varies according to the nature of the country. Sometimes they are so close as barely to admit of the passage of the military way between them, whilst in one or two instances they are upwards of half a mile apart.* The stone wall extends from Bowness-on-Solway to Wallsend on the Tyne, a distance of about seventy-three English miles and a half. The vallum, or earthen wall, * " The Handbook to the Roman Wall," by J. Collingwood Bruce, LL.D., D.C.L., F.S.A., 2nd edition : London, A. Russell Smith ; New- castle-upon-Tyne, Andrew Reid, 1884. See also "The Roman Wall," by the same author ; various editions. The Great Barrier of Hadrian. 79 falls short of this distance by about three miles at one end, and five and a half at the other, not extending beyond Newcastle on the east side, and Dykesfield on the west. The wall varies considerably in thickness, from six feet to as much as nine and a half, but the average width may be taken at eight feet. About the height it is more diffi- cult to be precise, but old writers record having seen fragments of it standing to the height of fifteen and six- teen feet ; if to this a parapet of four feet be added, we get a probable height of twenty feet. The wall was built essentially in the Roman manner; that is to say, it was not of masonry throughout, but consisted of a facing on each side of wrought stone, the core being entirely of concrete filled in between the facing-stones, and without any tie or bond. The facing-stones themselves were square on the face, and tapered to the inside of the wall, so as to allow of a wide key for the grout (or matrix of the concrete) to be run into, thus forming an intimate connection with the facings of the wall. The rubble, or hard aggregate, of small size, was filled in by hand, and the whole, facings and core, formed, when set, a mono- lith, depending for its strength on the admirable nature of the mortar used. In bridges and gateways masonry was generally used throughout, each stone being dressed to fit and bond in with its neighbour ; and, in the case of the piers of a bridge, they were keyed to one another by iron cramps. A broad fosse, the north ditch, added strength to the wall, and is estimated to have been thirty- six feet wide and fifteen deep on the average. In some places it has a rampart of earth on its north side ; in other places, as when the wall runs along the edge of a cliff, it is dispensed with. The vallum, or earthen wall, consists of a rampart of earth of large dimensions, twenty-four feet thick at the base : twenty-four feet distant from it that is, to the 8o History of Cumberland. south, it has its fosse similar to, but not so large as, that on the north side of the stone wall : this fosse has a rampart on its south side, and twenty-four feet to the south of the fosse comes another rampart, rather less than the first. There are, then, three ramparts and a fosse. The necessity for two ramparts south of the fosse, instead of only one, arises from the fact that a sloping rampart of earth, unlike a perpendicular wall of stone, might be carried by a storming party at the double. But a double march over the first and second rampart, and a descent into the fosse, would leave the stormers somewhat short of wind with which to double up the third or main ram- part. The northern edge of this fosse and the main rampart were probably defended by lines of palisades. No gateways have been found in the vallum, but some of some sort must have existed, in addition to those at the great forts. The stations, castles, watch-towers, and roads come up next for mention. At an average distance along the Great Barrier of about four miles, we meet with large stations on or near the line of the Wall. The nucleus of each of these stations is, as in the case of the other stations in modern Cumberland, a quadrangular fort, such as we have described in our last chapter, and around each suburbs, large or small, have grown up. These forts, to our judgment, appear older than the Wall, as a careful examination of the way the Wall comes up to them reveals. They are generally supposed to have been the work of Agricola, incorporated by Hadrian into his Great Barrier. Between these forts (' camps ' or ' stations ' they are usually called by writers on the Wall) smaller forts, called mile castles, are found at distances of about a Roman mile. They are quadrangular buildings, about sixty feet by fifty feet ; the Wall itself forms their north wall ; their east and west walls are tied into the Great Wall, and are, as are also their south walls, of the The Great Barrier of Hadrian. 81 same thickness and masonry as the Great Wall itself; they are thus coeval with it, and part of its original design. They have gateways in their south walls ; in their north walls other gateways go through the Great Wall itself. Of their internal arrangements little has been ascertained. They probably provided rough shelter for an officer's guard, relieved every twenty-four hours from the larger forts, and charged with the duty of guarding the passages through the Wall at these mile castles, and of providing the sentries for the little stone sentry-boxes that, at quarter-mile intervals, dotted the Wall. A military road, eighteen feet wide, lies between the Wall and Vallum, while in places where the Wall and Vallum curve, another road south of the Vallum cuts off the angles. This road was long known as the Stanegate, or Carel Gate, i.e., the Carlisle Gate. It is, of course, not to be expected that the parts of Cumberland through which the Great Barrier takes its course, long under high cultivation, can show the remains of the Great Barrier in the perfection in which they can be found on the wastes of Northumberland. But the remains in Cumberland present features of the highest interest, and no one is competent to write upon the sub- ject of Hadrian's Great Barrier unless he has followed its trail throughout Cumberland as well as Northumberland. There is growing up a practice of " sampling " the Great Barrier from Chesters (Cilurnum) to Housesteads (Borco- vicus), or Birdoswald (Amboglanna), or even as far as Lanercost Abbey. The " sampler " then jumps to the conclusion that he knows all that can be known about the Great Barrier, and rushes off to read a paper upon the relative age of the Stone Wall and the Earthen Vallum. Having made these preliminary remarks, we now pro- ceed to take up " the trail of the Wall," and to follow it through Cumberland. The Wall commences at Bowness, the village of Bow- 6 82 History of Cumberland. ness-on-Solway. In accepting this statement, it should, of course, be kept in mind that the Great Barrier was only a portion of a vast system of defence, which embraced all Cumberland, and whose forts and roads have been largely dealt with in the preceding chapters. Some writers of credit believe that the Wall, in some modified form, extended far down the coast of Cumberland. Tra- dition points out a place just past the high end of Bowness as the spot where the trail of the Wall, known from the stones that have been dug out, emerges from the sea, whose encroachments render it now mere matter of con- jecture whether the Wall was carried down to the then low-water mark, or ran along the coast on land now submerged. The ramparts of the station at Bowness cannot now be distinctly traced, but their general outline is discernible. It was situate just to the north of the site of the church, and contains five acres and a half. The Rampire Head marks its eastern limit, and the western ditch is easily found where it crosses the main street through the village. Only three inscribed stones are given in the Lapidarium Septentrionale as having been found at this station ; one of these is lost, but two still remain. The first is an altar to Jove, which is built into the wall of a barn in the middle of the village, while the other, a fragment of an altar, is built into a cattle-shed at Herd Hill, a mile west of Bow- ness. A legionary stone (Legionis secundce Augusta cohors tertia) found at Glasson, near Bowness, is built into a wall of a house in the back street of Bowness. From Bowness to Port Carlisle, a distance of about a mile, the trail of the Wall may be followed through the fields, along the hedge, a field's length from the road on the shore, making an angle concave to the shore, and running down again to the shore at the high end of the village of Port Carlisle, a little west of the old wooden pier. A bit of the core of the Wall is to be found in a The Trail of the Wall. 83 thick fence, but the facing-stones have long ago dis- appeared. Over the door of the old Steam Packet Inn at Port Carlisle is the fragment of an altar, with the dedication, Matribus Suis. From Port Carlisle to Drumburgh, a distance of two or two and a half miles, the Wall lies on the land side of the road, until it runs into that road at Drumburgh school- house, and thence continues along the road for a short distance, until the road turns off to the right, at a right angle, opposite a small house. Between Port Carlisle and this school-house the Wall runs almost parallel to the road, both crossing the railway twice to ascend to a small height, where the angle of the Wall cuts and recuts the angle of the road. Two houses, Westfield and Lowtown House, stand exactly upon the Wall. The road from Port Carlisle to Drumburgh, after it passes the Drum- burgh school-house, turns, as just mentioned, sharp to the right at a small house ; by following through the fields the line of the road, instead of turning with it, the camp will be reached. The station or camp at Drumburgh is small, only about three-quarters of an acre, but its ramparts are well defined, particularly on the north and west sides. A portion of its site is occupied by a house. The north side of this camp presents a curious feature. The rampart appears double, and suggests that a road (the military road, Dr. Bruce thinks) ran between it and the Wall, which is represented by the most northern of the two ramparts. Only four inscribed stones and one figure are engraved in the Lapidarium, and stated to have been found here. None of them give any clue to the name of the station. Drumburgh Castle, a manor-house erected by the Dacres, is entirely built of stones from the Roman Wall, and two Roman altars are preserved at it, which are said to have been brought from Old Carlisle. 62 84 History of Cumberland. There has been great dispute as to the route followed by the Wall between Drumburgh and Dykesfield, the point in dispute being whether it ran straight across the two adjacent marshes, known as Burgh Marsh, and Drum- burgh and Easton Marsh, or whether it followed the edge of these marshes by Easton and Boustead Hill. The prevalent opinion among the authorities* is that it fol- lowed the latter route. From Drumburgh to Easton, and from Easton to Boustead Hill, a bank separates the marsh from the solid ground, and this bank exactly re- sembles the remains of the Wall, as seen in other places, except for the absence of stones, which is attempted to be accounted for by the fact that in this neighbourhood, utterly devoid of stone of its own, the Roman Wall was the only quarry available, and was used as such. From Boustead Hill the Wall would, on the supposition that it skirted the marshes, follow the edge of the high ground to Dykesfield. It has been suggested that a Roman station existed at Boustead Hill ; the supposed site is at the west end of the village, and is now a garden and orchard, partly covered by some buildings in the rear of Orchard Hill House, with a cart-road occupying the south and east sides of the station.-f- This supposed station may be an additional reason for believing that the Wall skirted the two marshes, instead of crossing them. Great as are the authorities who take this view, we feel unable to agree with them ; further research and a free use of the spade are required. The Wall has been traced both at Dykesfield and Drumburgh actually down unto the level of the marshes. During the year of the great cattle plague, 1866, cattle were buried in a corner of Burgh Marsh, and the * " A Survey of the Roman Wall," by H. MacLauchlan, p. 83 ; privately printed. "The Guide-Book to the Roman Wall," by Dr. Bruce, p. 220. t Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and A rchcEO logical Society, vol. i., p. 153. The Trail of the Wall. 85 foundations of the Wall were found there. When the Carlisle Canal was cut, the foundations of the Wall were also found actually on Drumburgh and Easton Marsh, and the piece of Wall between Drumburgh Camp and the point where the canal cut it is in an exact line with the point where the Wall is lost at Dykesfield. The spade will probably some day settle the point, and the local archaeological society have the matter in hand. Thus far, the Wall alone has been traced. At Dykes- field, among some cottages in the rear of Dykesfield House, the Vallum commences, and Wall and Vallum run near together from this spot to the camp at Burgh Church ; but their trails are found rather by tradition than by any marks very apparent at this day, except when deeper ploughing than usual turns up fragments of stone on the line of the Wall. Both lie at first to the north of the main road, but the Vallum presently comes to the south, and may be seen in a field on the east side of the road to the railway-station. Burgh Church occupies the south-eastern portion of the Roman station, and covers about three acres, but its limits are barely now discernible. The church itself is built almost wholly of Roman stones, and very fine examples of Roman tool-marking many of them are. The inscribed stones found at Burgh and in its neighbourhood are few and unimportant. Eight and a bronze figure are described in the Lapidarium, but some of these are now lost. From Burgh eastwards the Wall and Vallum diverge. The Vallum, cutting off the angle made by the Wall, runs to Kirkandrews-on-Eden, along, for the most part, the line of the highway from Burgh to Carlisle by Monkhill. The Wall runs direct from Burgh Church to Beaumont Church. At first it runs through a field or two, and then enters upon an occupation road, leading to Beaumont Church in a direct line from Burgh Church. A great 86 History of Cumberland. portion of this road, or lane, is most distinctly on the core of the Roman Wall, and has the north ditch well marked by its side. Near to Beaumont the road leaves the Wall to its south, and the trail of the Wall may be seen in the fields, discernible by the thin line of herbage. Beaumont Church occupies the site of a small camp, no doubt a mile castle. From Beaumont the Wall follows the edge of the high ground between the highroad and the river Eden to Kirkandrews Churchyard, where Wall and Vallum meet, and where was another mile castle. From Kirkandrews, Wall and Vallum again diverge to approach one another again near Knockupworth, to which place the Vallum runs past a mill known as Sour-Milk Mill, situate on a beck which crosses the highway. The Wall from Kirkandrews follows, with one small exception, the edge of the high cliff over the alluvial flats of the Eden to the point near Knockupworth, where it ap- proaches the Vallum. The small exception is that it runs across the south end of the village of Grinsdale, cutting off the neck of land on which Grinsdale Church stands. From Grinsdale, Wall and Vallum run together along the high cliff over Eden, which is here the north ditch, to the North British Railway sheds. Thence they diverge widely. The course of the Vallum is now almost untraceable. It ran on the north side of Caldewgate, and crossed the river Caldew and the Caledonian Railway close to the north of Caldew Bridges. Its trail is still discernible across the " Castle Orchards," or outer green, of Carlisle Castle, where the houses fronting the castle stand upon it ; it is marked in this position in Speed's map of 1610, as " Hadrian's Vallum "; from thence it ran across the Eden, cutting the Weavers' Bank, at the angle near the river, as proved when Carlisle was sewered some thirty- five years ago ; it ascended, by a ridge still visible, to the iron wicket-gate at the north end of Eden Bridges, and proceeded up the brow to the fort at Stanwix. The Trail of the Wall. 87 From the railway sheds the Wall, passing behind Newtown Pumping-house, descends to the alluvial flats of the Eden, and all trace of it above ground disappears. Its foundations were cut in 1854, in the course of making a deep sewer, and the place is marked by a stone post : in 1886 they were found again in excavations made under the writer's direction, and one or two points were marked by similar stone posts. The most easterly place in which it was found was just east of the Caledonian Railway ; eastwards of that point no trace whatever of it could be found in the alluvial flats on either side of the river Eden, nor could the foundations of the bridge, which Camden positively says were visible in his time, be found, though the dry summer permitted a careful search to be made in the river-bed. These excavations thus failed of their object, viz., to ascertain how the Wall crossed the alluvial flats of the Eden itself. Little surprise need be caused at this ; the greensward showed no sign, and where the foundations of the Wall were found, they were below eight feet of alluvial deposit ; the Wall, in fact, proved to be plundered down to its very foundations, and must have been the quarry from which the castle, cathedral, and walls of Carlisle were built. It may be conjectured that the bridge was a very long one, of, probably, some fifty openings, so as to let the winter and spring floods through ; and that the Wall ascended the cliff at Hyssop Holm Well diagonally, so as to present a shoulder commanding with its fire the front of the bridge.* From the top of Hyssop Holm Bank the Wall is easily traced by its north ditch to the fort at Stanwix, whose north wall it formed. The church and churchyard of Stanwix (Stanewegges, * For an account of the excavations undertaken in 1886, in search of the Roman bridge over the Eden, by the Cumberland and West- morland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, see their Trans- actions, vol. ix., p. 162 ; see also Archaologia sEliana, New Series vol. xii., p. 159. 88 History of Cumberland. the stony way) occupy a small portion of the site of the fort, which included the Vicarage and Vicarage grounds : its north-east angle abutted on the Edin- burgh Road, just where the High Street of Stanwix joins it. This fort possessed considerable suburbs lying on the sloping green bank between it and the river Eden. The old Roman road may yet be traced running from the south gate of the fort obliquely down the slope to an ancient wath, or ford, over Eden, immediately east of the present bridge over that river. Here we are disposed to think the Romans had, if not a bridge, a trajectus, a paved ford, of older date than the Wall, whose bridge would be in the line of the Wall itself, or nearly so. The northern road from this fort survives to this day in a lane which was formerly the mail-coach road into Scotland ; the western road survives in a lane leading towards Hyssop Holm Bank ; while the eastern one is traceable in footpath and byway for many a mile, being known in Northum- berland as the " Stanegate " or " Carelgate." A ceme- tery belonging to the fort is situate in the alluvial flats of Rickerby Park.* Several inscribed and sculptured stones have been found within this fort and in its vicinity. These and those found at Carlisle are described in the Lapidarium. The Wall runs from hence a little north of the main street of the village of Stanwix, and north of the lane leading past the old Reformatory. It then coincides with the footpath to Tarraby, which is the " stony way " from which Stanwix takes its name.* The Vallum, barely dis- cernible, lies between the Wall and the Military t or New- castle Road, and crosses the Newcastle Road exactly at * For plan and account of this station see Cumberland and West- morland Antiquarian and Archaological Society's Transactions,vo\.\y.., p. 174. t Not the Roman military road, but that made by General Wade after the outbreak of 1745. The Trail of the Wall. 89 White Close Gate, and continues to Drawdikes Castle along the avenue on the south of the Newcastle Road, crossing to the north near the bridge over Brunstock Beck. Within the last hundred years large masses of the Wall were standing between Stanwix and Tarraby, and the north ditch was very distinct, but in recent years it has been much obliterated by repeated ploughings. From Tarraby the Wall continues up the main street of Tarraby ; it is easily traced through the fields as a raised way along the hedges, with the ditch on its north, till it crosses the Houghton Road, which has been cut through it. Thence it is easily traced eastwards, passing a little to the north of Millbrook Cottage, which stands almost in the Vallum. When the mill behind the cottage of Millbrook existed, a road ran by it parallel to the Newcastle Road, and went through Brunstock Park up to the Walby Lane. This road, the footpath from Stanwix to Tarraby, and the Walby Lane, are all fragments of the old packhorse road from Carlisle to Newcastle, a landmark when the present or Military Road was made after the 1745. This old pack- road followed, through Cumberland at least, in great part the exact line of the Wall, often exactly on its core, and it was known as the " Stanegate," and in Northumberland, if not in Cumberland, as the " Carelgate," or Carlisle Road. The two Wall and Vallum now converge, and pass through the bottom of Brunstock Park. Both emerge from Brunstock Park close together, the Vallum at the lane to Walby, and the Wall at the lane just to the north; but the Wall runs immediately into the Walby Lane, which for a long way is on the Wall, while the Vallum lies to its south, only here and there traceable. The north ditch is very apparent, just north of the Walby Lane, and the dip in the hedges which successively cross it is very remarkable. The trail of the Wall can be made out running straight from Walby through Wallhead, 9O History of Cumberland. almost to Old Wall, where is an angle. The present road runs along the trail of the Wall, in fact on it, to Wall- head and Bleatarn ; but after Bleatarn the road goes into and along the north ditch, and a field-path goes along the Wall. The Vallum can be made out opposite Wallhead, and again on the White Moss, west a little of Bleatarn, which is a very remarkable place, having a large mound or tumulus, the residence probably of a Danish or Saxon landowner. East of Bleatarn the road terminates, or, rather, has gates over it, and is continued by the headriggs of fields up to Old Wall. From Old Wall the trail of the Wall goes up a lane, known as Primrose Lane, which leads to a common, where the road goes south to Irthington, and a footpath follows the trail, which turns to the north a little, and takes to the fields. Along this path the north ditch is extremely well marked, deep, and holding much water. The trail of the Wall leads to the angle of a road which takes into Newtown of Irthington, the road being just north of the Wall, which runs under the cottages. Going back, westward, to Millbrook Cottage, a Roman road hereabouts left the line of Hadrian's Barrier, to save distance by following the arc of the chord. It may be seen at Crosby immediately south of the Newcastle Road ; just to the south of the village of Irthington it passes through some remarkable cuttings in a field called " Buck-Jumping." A small Roman fort once existed at Watchcross, about a mile to the south of Bleatarn, and on this road. The site has been so much and so often ploughed up, that all trace of the fort has vanished, bar a discoloration of the soil. No inscribed stones have been found here, and but very few between Stanwix and Castle- steads, to which place we shall next follow the trail of the Wall. The Wall goes east from Newtown of Irthington to the brow of the hill over the plains of the Cambeck, the core The Trail of the Wall. 91 of the Wall being very perfect. It descends the brow, which is remarkable for having a gap cut through it for the Roman military road to descend. The place can be made out where the excavated earth has been thrown aside. The Vallum deviates here from the Wall, and runs towards the station of Castlesteads. The trail of the Wall can be followed by the farms of Headswood, the Beck, and Cambeck Hill, whence a portion of the old pack-road follows it down to the Cambeck, which it crosses at the dam, by a deep cutting through the red sandstone. Above the Cambeck stands the fort of Castlesteads, which is not actually incorporated into the Great Barrier. Here is the residence of G. J.Johnson, Esq., whose garden occupies the site of the fort, which is about 400 yards south of the Wall, and about 100 south of the Vallum. It was formed about the end of the last century by the grandfather of the present proprietor. Over fifty sculp- tured and inscribed stones are engraved in the Lapi- darium as belonging to this station, about twenty-five of which, with other Roman remains, are most carefully preserved in the garden. Several beautiful intaglios, set as rings, have been found here, and are in the possession of Mr. Johnson. One of the altars preserved here is remarkable as being dedicated to Discipulintz Augusti. None of the inscribed stones found here give any clue to the name of this station. About a mile and a half to the south of this fort is another, near Brampton Old Church, which is now ob- literated by cultivation. The road previously mentioned as passing the fort at Watchcross passes this fort also, and can be traced for a considerable distance west of it by old lanes, etc., in the direction of Lanercost, where it has been suggested the Romans had another small fort. Returning to the Wall, which we left where it crosses the Cambeck at the dam, its trail is easily discernible to where the house of Sandysike stands, close to its south ; 92 History of Climber land. the trail continues, immediately north of the carriage- drive, to Walton village, and thence north of the road down to the Kingwater. The Vallum can be seen south of the road as it descends to the Kingwater. Opposite the farm of Dovecote the core of the Wall forms the north hedge of the field on the north side of the road, and is thence easily traced for a long way through fields, generally being a broad headrigg close to the hedge, with the north ditch very well defined and deep, passing a little north of the farms of Low Wall, How Gill, and Walldub. The trail of the Wall continues in this state, as headrigg, and large pieces of the Wall occur in the hedges, four or five feet high, the first pieces of that size now to be seen in Cumberland, starting from the Solway. Up the side of Hare Hill the north ditch looks like a vast gash in the hillside, from the top of which a magnificent view is obtained. The Vallum can be found in the woods to the south, and at one place, near Moneyholes, is trace of an extra or double north ditch. At the bottom of Hare Hill is a fine piece of the Wall, nigh ten feet high, but without the facing-stones. This is the bit of which old Hutton says : " I viewed this relic with admiration : I saw no part higher." The way in which the military road that accompanies the Wall winds down the steep descent of Hare Hill is note- worthy. Crossing a stream, we are now at the hamlet of Banks, and for some three miles (to Birdoswald) the coach- road runs exactly on the line of the Wall itself, with the north ditch to its north, deep and defined, and at some seasons bright with large yellow flowers. At Pike Hill the road was recently lowered, and the remains of a mile castle destroyed. The remains of the Vallum are magnificent at a place called Appletree, where is also a great extra or double north ditch, which for some reason or other was dug The Trail of the Wall. 93 here. The remains of the Vallum continue very fine up to a farm called High House, about three-quarters of a mile from Birdoswald. Just before reaching Birdoswald portions of the Wall are found remaining, with the facing-stones in situ on each side : the thickness of the Wall is from seven to eight feet. The fort at Birdoswald is the largest on the Wall, covering five and a half acres ; its eastern and western sides have each two gates. The number of altars found here and dedicated by the first cohort of the Dacians (cohors JElia Dacorum) prove it to be the Amboglanna of the " Notitia." From this fort the Maiden Way runs north into Scotland, and the plough and tradition still reveal its track. From Birdoswald the trail of both Wall and Vallum can easily be followed to the lofty cliff over the Irthing. The Wall probably descended the cliff obliquely with a shoulder, so as to command the bridge, two or three of whose piers yet remain in mounds of earth on the east side of the river. From the Irthing to the Poltross the trail is equally easily followed, passing first nigh the farm of Willowford, and thence to the Vicarage, which stands in the north ditch, while the school-house is close to the Vallum. At the Poltross Burn both Wall and Vallum pass into Northumberland. The military road descends to cross the Poltross, by a bridge, through deep cuttings, whose sides have been held up by massive masonry.* A mile castle on an unusual scale, known as the King's Stables, guarded the crossing of the Poltross. The great question that has exercised the minds of historians and antiquaries is whether the Stone Wall and the Earthen Vallum are parts of one design, or whether the Stone Wall was a later work the work of Severus in- * For excavations here see Transactions, Cumberland and West- morland Antiquarian and Archaological Society, Jvol. ix., p. 162 ; Archceologia dLliana, vol. xii., p. 159. 94 History of Cumberland. tended to supersede the Earthen Vallum of Hadrian. What may be called the ^Elian theory, namely, that both are the work of the Emperor Hadrian, has been most ably ad- vocated by the Rev. J. Hodgson and the Rev. Dr. Bruce, and now holds the field. To the works of those autho- rities our readers must refer.* We would point out one argument in favour of the ^Elian theory, which is apt to be overlooked by those who only visit the show-pieces of the Roman Wall. To the west of Carlisle, between that place and Beaumont, the Stone Wall runs on the top of the high cliffs, which in Roman times formed and now in part form the southern bank of the river Eden ; the Earthen Vallum pursues its course at no great distance south of the Wall, but on lower ground, so that from it the river, though close at hand, cannot readily be seen. Let us carry our minds back, obliterate the Wall, and leave the Vallum standing alone, as some theorists suggest it did. What use is, then, the Vallum alone ? Is it a " defence against cattle-lifting "? Surely no one, Roman or Briton, would, to prevent cattle-lifting, pile up four miles of heavy earthworks, parallel to and within a few yards of a deep and rapid river, fordable only at some three well-known and easily-defended waths ! The notion is absurd. Is it a boundary and line of defence of a northern tribe against their southern enemy ? Surely no ! A northern tribe would have adhered to the line of cliffs on the northern bank of the Eden. Had they wished to include territory to the south of the Eden they would not have taken a mere strip a few yards wide, but would have gone a mile or two more to the south, to the defensible line on the high ground near Kirkbampton. It is equally unlikely to be the boundary and line of defence of a * See Hodgson's "History of Northumberland ;" Bruce's "Roman Wall," and his '' Handbook to the Roman Wall ;" also Elton's " Origins of English History," p. 324, etc. ; Guest's " Origines Celticae," vol. ii., p. 90. The Great Barrier of Hadrian. 95 southern tribe against a northern enemy ; a southern tribe would never have drawn their boundary-line a few yards to the south of the river Eden, and in such a posi- tion that their sentries could not see the river. Between Carlisle and Beaumont the Vallum, by itself, would be a piece of folly of which even a pre-Roman-Briton, much less a Roman military engineer, could not be guilty. We will now attempt to show on the ^Elian theory that Wall and Vallum are part of one and the same great engineering work, and the function discharged by the Vallum. We have already shown that the district with which we are dealing was covered with primaeval " scrub," which would flourish best in the rich soil of the river valleys. The valleys of the Tyne and Eden, and the valleys down which run the various streams that cross the Roman Wall, must have been, in the time of the Emperor Hadrian, and for long afterwards, full of primaeval " scrub," ex- tending northwards in many places almost to the site of the stone portion of the Great Barrier, certainly touching it at the points where it is crossed by the Cambeck, the Kingwater, the Irthing, the Tipalt, the Cawburn, the North Tyne, etc. This " scrub," until cleared away the task, probably, of generations must have sheltered in its recesses large numbers of Britons, stone implement men, broken men from tribes the Romans had defeated, fugitives from tribal or Roman justice, and others men who would have an intimate knowledge of the paths and tracks through the " scrub," where no heavy-armed Roman soldier could follow them. Such men, assembling suddenly at unexpected places, perhaps by night, in bands of from, perhaps, a dozen to two hundred, would quickly demoralize the Roman troops defending the Stone Wall ; sentries would be constantly harassed, small parties would be cut off, and night alarms would perpetually spoil the rest of the legionaries, who could no more follow their tormenting foes into the "scrub " than they could fly over it. 96 History of Cumberland. The idea then occurs that the great military engineers who laid out Hadrian's Great Barrier made up their minds from the first that their valuable troops should not be harassed in this way ; accordingly they planned the Great Barrier with an embattled Stone Wall as a defence to the north against the attacks of hordes of barbarians that might be called armies, with a palisaded Earthen Vallum to the south, against the attacks of guerillas, banditti, and dacoits, that infested the scrub in their rear. The first the Roman general dealt with more Romano, by flinging open the gates of his mile castles and precipitating his troops on both flanks of the advancing foe. But as for the guerillas, the banditti, and the dacoits, there were no gates in the palisades for them to come through ; and the field-officer of the day, some veteran centurion, hirsutus et hircosus, could be trusted to see they did not come over. One or two other points about the Great Barrier may well be noticed. It has been the subject of remark that no gates have been discovered in the Vallum, except at the great forts. They were probably dispensed with as worse than useless. The Roman general would not want to launch large masses of troops upon guerillas ; and numerous gates would have necessitated equally numerous guards, which would mean a large number of extra men on duty day and night. The Roman engineers were not so pedantic as to make gates where they were of no use. If the use conjectured for the Vallum be the right one, it does away with criticism as to its not always taking the most advantageous ground for defence towards the south. In the case of the foes expected from the south, strict adherence to the rules of military engineering would have been pedantry. The places where the Great Barrier crossed rivers must have been weak points, as the bridges must always have had dry openings during most of the year, necessitated The Great Barrier of Hadrian. 97 by the strength of the winter and summer floods. Where the " scrub " approached these bridges, great vigilance must have been necessary on the part of the sentries. With this in our mind, we have already suggested that the Stone Wall crossed Eden and Irthing with a shoulder in its line, so that sentries could see along the front of the bridge, and, if necessary, cover it with their fire. We have elsewhere suggested that the dry arches were closed by movable hecks or portcullises.* To this day on the Kingwater and other streams dry arches are closed by movable hecks, or by bushes hung from a wire rope, to prevent cattle straying. * Archaologia &liana, New Series, vol. xii., pp. 162, 163. CHAPTER VI. LUGUVALLIUM. IN the first chapter of this book we have given an account of the hills, the Castle Hill and the Cathedral Hill, now one, on which modern Carlisle stands. In subsequent chapters we have said somewhat of the Roman roads converging to that place ; and in the last we showed how, from a point west of modern Carlisle (the North British Railway sheds) the Stone Wall and the Earthen Vallum of Hadrian's Great Barrier diverge ; the Wall running across the alluvial flats of the Eden direct, or nearly so, to the fort at Stanwix, while the Vallum makes a detour to the south, so as to include between itself and the wall the Castle Hill of Carlisle, but not the Cathedral Hill. It thus included only a very small portion of the area of modern Carlisle, in which Roman remains abound. Luguvallium appears as a station in the " Itinerary " of Antoninus, whose date has already been assigned to A.D. 212-217, but it does not appear as a station per lineam Vatti of the " Notitia," whose date Mommsen assigns to A.D. 300. It was not, at the time of the " Notitia," a gar- rison town, but depended for protection on the fort at Stanwix, which was one of those whose erection we have attributed to Agricola, and which was afterwards incor- porated by Hadrian into his great work. In the last Luguvallium. 99 chapter it has been mentioned that this fort at Stanwix had suburbs to its south on the slope between it and the river a somewhat cramped site at the bottom of which a ford exists across the river Eden, with a road to it from the fort at Stanwix, still traceable down the slope. Thus much for what we know about the fort at Stanwix. What do we know about Luguvallium ? First of all it was not girt in the Roman days with stone walls ; it has, indeed, been asserted that the west wall of mediaeval Carlisle has in it Roman stones in situ. Roman stones in plenty are in the wall, for it was built of stones from the great Roman Wall ; but the spade has proved that its foundations stand upon several feet of made earth full of Roman remains.* Excavations made at various places in modern Carlisle at various timest have proved the existence of a stockade, consisting of three rows of oak posts, each row a foot apart, and each stake a foot apart, set quincunx fashion : or the stakes of the middle row opposite the interstices of the outer rows. This stockade was found (i) on the site of the present Bush Hotel, in English Street ; (2) in Bank Street, near Lowther Street ; (3) in Citadel Row ; and (4) crossing Castle Street. It thus appears to have enclosed a space on the Cathedral Hill of Carlisle some- * Archceologia ^Eliana, Old Series, vol. ii., p. 313 ; " Remarks and Memoranda as to the Subsoil De'bris and Ancient Remains discovered in cutting the Sewers in the City of Carlisle," by H. U. McKie ; Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian andArchceo- logical Society, vol. iv., p. 337. t " On the Remains of a Stockade found in Carlisle," by R. S. Fer- guson, Ibid., vol. iii., p. 134. 72 ioo History of Cumberland. what smaller than the subsequent mediaeval city. The upper parts of the stockade showed traces of fire, but the lower portions were as fresh and as sharp at the angles as if cut yesterday. This stockade was buried several feet beneath earth full of Roman rubbish ; it must there- fore have been British or early Roman. Now, no remains have ever been found in Carlisle to show that any large number of Britons dwelt there ; the soil teems with Roman and Romano-British relics, but British are wanting. There probably were a few Britons in the vicinity, dwell- ing in wigwams on the Castle Hill, which is near the Eden, on whose salmon they would live to a large extent ; but there was no such colony of them as to cover an area equal to the mediaeval city. The conclusion, then, is that this stockade is early Roman. We would read the history of Luguvallium thus : Agricola built the fort at Stanwix, and suburbs soon gathered on the cramped slope between it and the river. As the settlers increased, more room was required, and they built upon the Cathedral Hill of Carlisle, and pro- tected themselves with a stout palisade of oak. Bad times came, and in the troubles that preceded the arrival of Hadrian, Luguvallium was burnt, and lay desolate and waste, when that Emperor included the Castle Hill, and not the Cathedral Hill, within the lines of his great work. With the return of peace and security Luguvallium grew up again upon a larger scale ; the hypocausts of villas were discovered outside the limits of the early stockade when the present gaol was built. Many things combine to show that it became a city of luxury, covering a large area, and with an extensive cemetery to the south. It is named in the Antonine " Itinerary," as a stage on an Her, because the traveller would halt at Luguvallium to change his horses, or to rest, and not at the cramped suburbs under the Stanwix fort, whose name we do not know. The ruins of Luguvallium were evi- L uguvallium. i o i dently remarkable in days when Roman ruins must have been plentiful, for the local archaeologists in the seventh century took St. Cuthbert to see them. What Leland says of the place has often been quoted : " In diggyng to make new buildyngs yn the towne, often tymes hath bene, and alate fownd diverse foundations of the old cite, as pavi- mentes of stretes, old arches of dores, coyne stones squared, paynted pottes, mony hid in pottes, so hold and mouldid that when yt was strongly touchid yt went almost to mowlde. ... In the feldes about Caerluel yn plewhyng hath bene fownd diverse Cornelines and other stoneys well entaylid for seals." The sculptured and inscribed stones found here include some fine sepulchral slabs, and the soil teems with pottery, red and black, and with coins. It should be noted that the area within which Roman remains occur is the area of the mediaeval city, showing that the last edition of the Roman city and the mediaeval city must have covered much the same ground. The Roman cemeteries, of course, are outside that area. Whether the Roman had buildings or not on the Castle Hill of Carlisle is unknown. That hill is covered by ten to twelve feet of made soil, but the opportunity rarely presents itself of ascertaining what that soil contains. It is possible that Agricola's fort was there, and that it was ruined by the Brigantes, and that Hadrian built a new fort at Stanwix. Dr. Guest seems to incline to this view,* but no trace of any- thing like one of Agricola's camps is known to exist, except at Stanwix. * " Origines Celticae," vol. ii., p. 93. CHAPTER VII. STRATHCLYDE. WHEN Britain was abandoned by the Roman authorities, the legions themselves were withdrawn, but it is not improbable that many garrisons, composed of auxiliary forces drawn from all parts of the empire, as well in Europe as in Africa, were left to waste away for want of recruits rather than that the almost bankrupt exchequer of Rome should be at the charge of transporting them thither, where they would not be wanted, or to their birthplaces, whither they would not be willing to go. These auxiliary forces, long stationary in the same garri- sons, were rather in the nature of military colonies than of the marching regiments of the present day. The majority of the rank and file, at least, neither cared nor expected to return to their birthplaces, but looked for a grant of land on which to settle down, after service completed, in marriage with some native or half-caste woman. Lapidary inscriptions enable us in some cases to trace the superior officers, generally Italians, back to Italy, but Jhe men must have become amalgamated with the people amongst whom they lived. Great question has been raised as to the effect on the population of the intermarriage of these foreign troops, and its influence on the national character, but in Cumberland, where the garrisons were numerous, they have left no visible mark Strathclyde. 103 on the character or physique of the peasantry as known to us. Nor do these garrisons, judging from their names so far as known, appear in Cumberland to have been drawn in any way from North Germany, or to have con- sisted of Teutons, so as to have prepared the way for a friendly immigration of English into that county. Whatever was the fate of these garrisons, whether withdrawn en masse or left to dwindle away for want of recruits, they were no protection to the hapless Britons, who were harried by foes on every side, by Picts and Scots from Ireland, Galloway, and the West of Scotland, and by Saxons on their eastern and southern shores. These eastern and southern shores had formed under the Roman rule, at the date of the " Notitia Imperii," a military district, under the command of an official styled the Comes (count or warden) Littoris Saxonici per Britan- nias,* who had the charge of nine garrisons on the coast, extending from Portchester, or Porchester, in Hants, to Brancaster, in Norfolk. The phrase, the Littus Saxoni- cum, was formerly taken to mean " the shore settled by Saxons," and as proof that ere the Romans had left Britain there were large Teutonic colonies in that coun- try. These views have been completely disposed of by the late Dr. Guest in the Salisbury volume of the Royal Archaeological Institute,f where that scholar shows the phrase the Littus Saxonicum to mean the march or shore exposed to Saxon attack, the " Saxon Frontier." Under the name of Saxon, the Roman included three piratical Teutonic tribes dwelling in what we now know as Sles- wick, namely, the Jutes, to north of the present Jutland ; the Angles, or English proper, just below them, and the Saxons on the Elbe ; these, as the nearest, were the * The formal title of this officer was " Comes Limitis Saxonici per Britanniam." f Reprinted in the " Origines Celtics," vol.'ii., under the title of "The Early English Settlements in South Britain." IO4 History of Cumberland. best known to the Romans, who used that name to cover the whole three. The three leagued tribes called them- selves Englishmen, and they called the people whom they found in Britain Wealas, or Welsh that is, strangers and we shall use Britons and Welsh as meaning the same people. The English conquest of Britain commenced some forty years after the evacuation of the island by the Romans ; with the landing of the English pirates Hengist and Horsa in the Isle of Thanet, English history begins. Little is known of the doings of the Romanized Britons when left to their own resources. It seems certain that they imitated the fatal Roman policy of matching one foe against another, and hired, by promises of land and pay, a parcel of English adventurers from Jutland, under Hen- gist and Horsa, who in 449 established themselves in the Isle of Thanet. The details of the English conquest have been most accurately and painfully worked out by the late Dr. Guest in valuable papers originally scattered through the Transactions of the Royal Archaeological Institute, but since the death of that great scholar col- lected in his "Origines Celticse." A condensed but clear account is to be found in the late Mr. Green's " History of the English People," from which we quote the following graphically written passage : The Battle of Aylesford [A.D. 449, between the English and the Britons] did more than give East Kent to the English : it struck the keynote of the whole English conquest of Britain. The massacre which followed the battle indicated at once the merciless nature of the struggle which had begun. While the wealthier Kentish landowners fled in panic over sea, the poorer Britons took refuge in hill and forest, till hunger drove them from their lurking-places, to be cut down or enslaved by their conquerors. . . . The English conquest was a sheer dispossession and slaughter of the people whom the English con- quered. * "A Short History of thelEnglish People," by J. R. Green, M.A. London : Macmillan and Co., 1874, p. 9. Strathclyde. 105 When defeat was so disastrous, its results so terrible, the contest was sure to be stubborn, and it took the invaders, reinforced by large numbers of Saxons, full sixty years to complete the conquest of Southern Britain alone ; and in 520 a victory of the Britons at Mount Baden (Badbury, in Dorsetshire) checked severely the Saxon advance. But the Britons had another attack to resist the Angles poured into Lincolnshire, Norfolk, and Suffolk, and thus the West Saxons were encouraged to continue their advance. The Battle of Deorham, in 577, gave them the Severn, and the rich cities that stood thereon Gloucester, Cirencester, and Bath. Of the con- quest of Mid Britain and of North Britain we know very little. The Humber was the great passage by which the invaders entered. Those who turned south filled the country between the Trent and Humber, and penetrated to Leicester, to Lichfield, and to Repton, and, being on the borderland between the English and the Britons, became known as Mercians men of the march or border. Those who turned northwards founded the kingdom of Deira, with York for its capital, and met, further to the north, another English kingdom, that of Bernicia, founded by Ida, who in 547 had planted his kingdom on the rock of Bamborough. The unreclaimed forest-land, that ex- tended from the Tyne to the Tees, formed the march, or boundary, between Deira and Bernicia. These two king- doms were often at war, until they were united under ^Ethelfrith, who thus founded the kingdom of Northum- bria, which stretched from the Humber to the Forth. ^Ethelfrith was of the royal house of Bernicia, and had married a daughter of Ella, King of Deira, whose kingdom ^Ethelfrith seized at Ella's death, when Ella's son, of whom presently much, was but an infant of three years old. Of the usurper, ^Ethelfrith, Baeda writes that he de- feated ^dan, King of the Scots, at a place called Degsas- tan, Degsastone, or Daegsastan, which some persons place 106 History of Cumberland. at Dalston, near Carlisle, and others at Dawston in Liddes- dale. " From that time," writes Baeda, "no king of the Scots durst come into Britain to make war on the Angles to this day." In 607 ^thelfrith drove a wedge between the Britons of North Wales (that is, the Wales of the present day) and those to their north, by the conquest of Chester, and by the consequent reduction of what is now Lan- cashire, exactly as in 577 the West Saxons had driven a similar wedge between the Britons of West Wales (Corn- wall and Devonshire) and of North Wales. As the landing of Hengist and Horsa, in 449, was the beginning of the English conquest, so the Battle of Chester, in 607, was the end. Of the nature of that conquest mention has already been made. It was a dispossession ; the language of the Britons disappeared, as did their Christianity ; the one was superseded by the English tongue, the other by the religion of Woden and of Thor. Later on, and by milder warfare, the British or Welsh kingdoms that re- mained were subjected to the English sway. At the end of the sixth century, among a mass of smaller and more obscure principalities, seven kingdoms in Teutonic or English Briton stand out in a marked way, " Seven kingdoms of which," says Mr. Freeman, " it is possible to recover something like a continuous history, seven kingdoms which alone supplied candi- dates for the dominion of the whole island." These were : 1. Kent, a Jutish kingdom. 2. Essex \ 3. Sussex > All Saxon. 4. Wessex ) 5. East Anglia \ 6. Northumbria > All Anglian. 7. Mercia ) In the western and more mountainous parts of the island, the Britons and Welsh held their ground. There was a Welsh kingdom of West Wales, which took in Strathclyde. 107 Cornwall, Devon, and a part of Somerset, the country south of the river Axe. All the land west of the Severn formed a second Welsh kingdom North Wales in- cluding what is now called North and South Wales. To the north was a third Welsh kingdom, called by Mr. Freeman the kingdom of Strathclyde, which, as marked on the map in his " History of the Norman Conquest," took in Galloway and the rest of the south-west of. Scot- land, together with modern Cumberland, Westmorland, and Lancashire, all down to the river Dee, thus ex- tending from the Clyde to the Dee. At any rate, these were the boundaries prior to the Battle of Chester, in 607. Strathclyde was separated from Northumbria, which extended from the Forth to the Humber, including {as we must not forget) the Lothians and the site of Edinburgh, by the range of mountains running down the centre of the country, the great Pennine range. Above the Clyde and the Forth were the Picts and the Scots, which latter nation had swarmed over there, and into Galloway, from Ireland. To the question of what was going on in this kingdom of Strathclyde during the English conquest we can but answer, we do not know. Some have associated Carlisle with King Arthur, and with Merlin, but modern critical acumen has either abolished King Arthur and his court in toto,* or reduced him to a simple Welsh Prince of Somersetshire, who fought bravely against the English, and sometimes defeated them. The Arthurian legend was common to all the Welsh kingdoms, and many places round Carlisle by their names Arthur's Head (Arthuret), Arthur's Seat, Arthur's Chair, King Arthur's Round Table record the local prevalence of the Arthurian romance. Modern historians are even in doubt as to what was, or * Burton's "History of Scotland, 1 ' vol. i., p. 174 ; Freeman's " Old English History," p. io8 History of Cumberland. is, the name of this last retreat of the Romanized Britons before the English advance ; for though Mr. Freeman roughly puts it that Strathclyde extended from the Clyde to the Dee, yet he himself, Mr. Burton, Mr. Green, and Mr. Hodgson-Hinde, give it a narrower signification,* Mr. Burton defining it as the present shires of Ayr, Ren- frew, Lanark, Stirling, and Dumbarton. The solution of this puzzle seems to be that the English conquest left to the Britons, or Welsh, a territory extending from the Clyde to the Dee, consisting of petty states under different rulers, of whom first one and then the other exercised an ill-defined and shadowy supremacy over the rest. Sir Francis Palgrave names the chief of these petty states as follows : First, Reged perhaps in the forests of the South of Scotland ; second, Strathclyde, which may perhaps be placed in Clydesdale ; strictly the name ought to have been confined to that region, but it was early extended beyond its proper boundary ; third, Cumbria, which in- cluded the modern county of Cumberland, together with its appendages or dismemberments of Lancashire and Westmorland. We should not like to attempt to define its southern limits there are many lines of natural defence between the Dee and the Derwent which appear to have been in succession held against foes advancing from the south. Nor must we be understood as suggest- ing that the name of Cumbria was in existence quite so early as the time we are now dealing with. On the abandonment, or evacuation, of Britain by the Romans, the shadowy supremacy we have mentioned naturally remained with the Romanized rulers of Lugu- ballium. Rhydere, or Roderic the Magnificent, is said to have been head of a Christian party there, and to have been opposed by a pagan party headed by a native Briton called Gwendolow, descended from one Coil Hen, or The * Burton's " History of Scotland," vol. i., p. 183 ; Green's " History the English People," p. 15 ; ArchceologicalJournal,VQ\. xvi., p. 221. Strathclyde. 109 Aged, while Rhydere had some Roman blood in his veins. A great battle was fought between these contending parties, in 573, at Ardderyd, or Arthuret (i.e., Arthur's Head), situated on a raised plateau on the river Esk, about nine miles north of Carlisle, a most important strategic position, commanding the fords of the river Esk, and the road over them from Cumberland into Scotland. Rhydere was victorious, and became head of the Cum- brian Britons, reigning at Alclyde or Dumbarton, from which his kingdom came to be called Strathclyde. In the name of a brook near Arthuret the Carwhinelow, or Carwhinley Beck Mr. Skene recognises Gwendolow.* Luguballium thus fell from the dignity of a local capital into comparative insignificance. The people who dwelt in this British, or Welsh, district were called Cumbri, a designation we first meet with the chronicle of Ethelwerd,t who applies it to the Britons of Strathclyde in describing their sufferings from the invasions of the Danish leader Halfdene in 875. Mr. Hodgson- Hinde considers that jEthelfrith, the victor at Chester in 607, colonized, or made tributary to himself, the petty states of the Cumbri south of Strathclyde proper, perhaps Strathclyde itself. The place-names of modern Cumberland a subject hereafter to be dealt with go far to prove an extensive English colonization of the best and most fertile and most accessible spots of the county. Ecgfrith, King of Northumbria, who reigned from 670 to 685, destroyed the last semblance of domestic * Skene's " Celtic Scotland," p. 1 57. f " The people here called of Strathclyde are in the Saxon chronicle, in recording the same event, termed Stracled Wealas, and this name is rendered by Ethelwerd into the Latin Cumbri^ which is the first appearance of the term of Cumbri or Cumbrians as applied to the Britons of Strathclyde. 'And oft ge hergode on Pehtas and on Strascled Welas': Sax. Chron. ad An. 875. 'Ast crebius inducunt Pihtis bellum Cumbrisque': Ethel-werd Chron." Skene's "Celtic Scotland," p. 326. no History of Cumberland. government in all the petty states of the Cumbri except in Strathclyde proper, and a large district round Carlisle seems to have been incorporated with Northumbria. After the Danish dismemberment of Northumbria, about the end of the ninth century, Carlisle and the district round it, Galloway and Strathclyde, were incorporated under the name of Cumbria, and this is the first occasion on which Cumbria is applied as a territorial designation to any part of the territory of the Cumbri. The term is sometimes used as equivalent to Strathclyde, but in the tenth century it had come to apply to the English portion only of the old British territory. Occasionally Cumbria appears as Cambria, and Jocelyne of Furness, in his "Life of Kentigern," speaks of Strathclyde as Regnum Cambrense, Regnum Cambriensis, and Cambria, in which he is unsup- ported by any earlier or more authentic writer. We have been anticipating a little, and must presently hark back; but what we have just stated should be mastered.* Let us return to the year 607, and go more into the details. Arthur and Merlin put to one side, nothing almost remains. Strathclyde proper figures as the scene of the miracles of St. Kentigern, the patron saint to this day of Glasgow. The names of a few of its rulers can be raked up, and nothing, or next to nothing, more, except the fact that it endured perpetual attacks from the Picts, the Scots, and the English, and from the vikings of the north. For the less that is known of the petty states south of Strathclyde proper, we must go to the history of the great Northumbrian kingdom, that reached from Forth to Humber. Indeed, owing to the subjection by tribute, or otherwise, of the petty states of the Cumbri to North- umbria, that term is frequently used as reaching from the eastern to the western sea, and as including modern Cum- * The reader might well refer to the " History of the Anglo-Saxon," by Sir Francis Palgrave, pp. 185-189. Strathclyde. 1 1 1 berland and Westmorland, of which the southern por- tions, at least, were reckoned as belonging to the Deiran Province of Northumbria. From the date of ^Ethelfrith's victory at Chester in 607, the character of the English conquest of Britain changes. " It dies down," says Mr. Green, " into a war- fare against the separate British provinces West Wales, North Wales, and Cumbria, as they were called which, though often interrupted, at last found its close in the victories of Edward the First." A more important change was that the English conquerors began to fight one with the other, ^thelfrith, King of Northumbria, and in some undefined way supreme over the petty states of the Cumbri, engaged in a struggle with his English co-conquerors of Britain for the Overlordship over them, or right to military supremacy and tribute, in which his foremost rival was ^Ethelberht, King of the Jutes, who commenced the assertion of his claim from the south northwards and westwards, as did ^Ethelfrith from the north southwards and westwards. Sooner or later these two must have met in arms, but in 617 ^Ethelfrith was defeated and killed in a battle on the river Idle, a tributary of the Trent, by Raedwald, King of East Anglia. ^Ethel- frith, as we have said before, had made the kingdom of Northumbria by adding to his hereditary possession of Bernicia Deira, of which he had dispossessed Eadwine, his infant brother-in-law, and the young heir of Ella, the last King of Deira. Eadwine's first place of shelter from the tyranny of his brother-in-law was the Court of Cearl, King of Mercia, whose daughter Qwoenberga he married, and by her he had two sons, Osfrid and ^Edfrid. From the Court of Cearl he fled to that of Raedwald. Eadwine succeeded to ^Ethelfrith's kingdom of Northumbria, and made himself supreme over Britain as no English King had ever been. Northwards, his rule was bounded by the Forth ; and the city of Edinburgh, or Eadwine's burght 112 History of Cumberland. to this day attests his glory. Chester was his, and he reduced Anglesey and Man by fleets equipped in the Dee. South of the Northumbrian kingdom all the English, except the men of Kent, owned him as Overlord, and the men of Kent gave him their King's daughter in marriage " a step," says Mr. Green, " which probably marked political subordination." In his day the district whose history we are attempting to tell would be but a more or less tributary part of Northumbria, and to Northumbrian history we must now resort. During the latter ipart of the Roman rule in Britain, and the time of the English invasion, the Christian Church comprised, in name at least, every country, save Germany, in Western Europe, as far as Ireland itself. The irruption of our heathen forefathers, worshippers of Woden and of Thor, drove a great wedge of paganism into the Christian Church, and split it into two. So com- plete was the severance, that when the Celtic Christians again came in contact with Christians from Italy and the South of Europe, they were found to differ on points which both sides considered of such vital importance as barely to be willing to recognise one another as Chris- tians. The first point was that the Celtic clergy shaved their heads in front, and the Roman clergy shaved their heads at the top. The second was that the Celtic Chris- tians had altogether lost reckoning of the calculation by which Easter and the order of the ecclesiastical year were observed by the rest of Europe, and Easter was celebrated by the rival Churches at times differing by a week or two. The situation of the heathen English in Britain between two differing Christian Churches, one on either hand, exposed them to missionary attacks from both sides at once a fact of much importance in the history of that district with which this book deals. uEthelberht, King of Kent, had married Bercta, daughter of King Charibert of Paris, a Frank and a Christian. On Strathclyde. 113 her marriage Pope Gregory the Great carried out a dream of his youth the story of his punning conversation with the slave-dealers, who exposed for sale at Rome some English lads, is too well known to need repetition and sent a band of monks, with St. Augustine at their head, to preach the Gospel to the English. ^Ethelberht gave them protection ; they settled at Canterbury, and after a little time the King himself was converted. The heathen Eadwine married for his second wife ^Ethel- berht's daughter, and she took to the north with her one Paulinus, a follower of St. Augustine, for it was a condi- tion of the marriage that the lady, ^Ethelbercta by name, should retain her own religion, and her children and other members of her husband's family were baptized Chris- tians long before that monarch himself accepted the Gospel. He hesitated long and pondered much, but Basda tells us that Eaclwine, with all the nobility of his nation and a very large number of the common sort, were baptized in 627,* and we read that afterwards Paulinus was occupied for thirty-six days in baptizing people at a place in the Cheviot Hills. This was the first stage of the Northumbrian conver- sion ; the attack from the side of Europe, and the petty states of the Cumbri, which in some way or other owned the sway of King Eadwine, would, more or less, be in- fluenced by the teachings of Paulinus. It would be possible, and even probable, that the Cumbri had before this received some knowledge of Christianity from the side from which the next great attack on heathenism was to come from the Celtic Church for the proximity of Ireland, the easiness of the passage, known well in the Roman days, renders it certain that the intercourse between Ireland and the district now Cumberland was * The story of the conversion of Eadwine by Paulinus, and the parable of the sparrow flying through the hall, is a beautiful one, but belongs to the history of Northumbria, rather than of Cumbria. 8 H4 History of Cumberland. frequent. The southern Picts, or those of Galloway, are said to have received Christianity in the fourth century from St. Ninian, a British Bishop, who built a church of stone and founded a bishopric at Whithern, in Galloway, or Candida Casa, so called from a stone church being then unusual. From Galloway St. Ninian probably visited the opposite coast of the Solway, and St. Ninian's Church at Brougham, and St. Ninian's Well at Wreay by Carlisle, speak of his influence ; while eight churches, those of Irthington, Grinsdale, Caldbeck, Castle-Sowerby, Mungrisdale (Mungo-grisdale), Crosthwaite, Bromfield, and Aspatria, all dedicated to St. Mungo, or Kentigern, tell that the Glasgow Bishop and patron saint has had even more influence than St. Ninian. To the west of Scotland the passage from Ireland was equally easy with that just spoken of, and from the oak forests of Derry came, in the sixth century to lona, an island on the west of Scotland, Columba, who, with his companions, founded there the famous monastery of lona, a centre from whence Christianity was radiated among the northern Picts. Conversions so sudden as those by Paulinus bring with them an inevitable reaction, and the terrible Penda, King of Mercia, stood forth as the champion of Woden and of Thor. He formed a strange, almost unnatural alliance with the Welsh, and Penda, King of the English Mer- cians, and Caedwallon, King of the Welsh, made war on Eadwine, who fell in a battle at Hatfield in 633, and with him, or shortly after, fell Osfrid and ^Edfrid, his sons by his first marriage. On Eadwine's fall Paulinus fled from Northumbria, taking with him Queen ^Ethelbercta, and on their flight the North of England probably relapsed into heathenism as rapidly as it had embraced Chris- ty tianity. Osric, nephew of Eadwine, succeeded to the throne of Deira, and Eanfrith, son of ^Ethelfrith, once King of Northumbria, to that of Bernicia. Penda, leaving Strathclyde. 115 Northumbria to Caedwallon, turned his attention to others of his neighbours and absorbed them, while Caedwallon speedily disposed of both Osric and Eanfrith the one he slew by treachery, and the other in fight and thus made himself ruler of Northumbria. Oswald, brother of Ean- frith, raised a small army and advanced against Caed- wallon. Oswald was a Christian, and had been in his youth a refugee at lona. Under the Cross as his standard, he, in 635, met the Welsh under Caedwallon at a place near the Roman Wall, since known as Heavensfield, or Heavenfield, but then as Deniesburna, or Denisbrook, and said to be Dilston near Hexham. There the Welsh were defeated, and Caedwallon slain. Who was Caedwallon ? Was he a King of the North Welsh, of the inhabitants of what we now know as Wales, or was he a potentate of the Cumbri ? Probably of the Cumbri or Strathclyde Welsh. At any rate, among them he must have had allies and friends. The position of his last battle-field goes to prove that, and he could hardly have held and ravaged North- umbria as he did without the Cumbri to fall back upon. Oswald, after his victory, succeeded to both the thrones of Bernicia and Deira, and thus again united Northum- bria, which had been in danger of dissolution, and doubt- less demanded and obtained tribute from the petty states of the Cumbri. Now came the second great attack on English heathenism. Oswald sent to his friends at lona, and procured the assistance of Aidan, who settled in Lindisfarne, hence called Holy Island, in view of the huge cliff of Bamborough, on whose top stood the palace of his royal patron. Aidan could speak no English, and availed himself of the assistance, as interpreter, of Oswald, who, from his residence in lona, understood Gaelic ; and thus together the missionary and the King went to and fro awakening the sparks of religious enthusiasm which the early Roman missionaries had either been unable to excite or had allowed to fall into torpor. Aidan was not the 82 1 1 6 History of Cumberland, only missionary who came forth from Lindisfarne or Holy Island. Boisil came thence, and established the monas- \/ tery of Melrose, and Chad carried the Gospel to the Mercians. Penda still struggled on as the champion of paganism, and ravaged the Christian kingdom of East Anglia, to whose protection Oswald advanced. At the Battle of Maserfeld, in 642, Oswald was defeated and slain, and Penda became supreme in Britain, as Oswald had been. After the death of Oswald Northumbria became divided ; Oswi reigned in Bernicia, and Oswine in Deira. For six years they reigned in harmony, but in the seventh Oswi had Oswine put to death, and again united the two kingdoms, setting his son Alcfrid, who had v/ married Cyneburga, daughter of Penda, as regent over Deira. The struggle between paganism and Christianity, between Penda and the kingdom of Northumbria, was a long one, and during it Penda oft ravaged Northumbria. But Northumbria still continued Christian, and Peada, son of old Penda, actually turned Christian to marry a daughter of Oswi and sister of Alcfrid, a conversion to Christianity which, after Penda's death, turned to Chris- tianity the kingdom of Mercia, where Peada reigned in his father's stead, but subject to the Northumbrian Over- lordship, for Penda fell, defeated by Oswi, in 655, at Winwaed, nigh Leeds. Oswi celebrated his victory by establishing and endowing twelve monasteries, six in Bernicia and six in Deira. As Bseda does not give the names of these monasteries, we cannot say whether any of them were situated within the confines of modern Cumberland. Dacre and Carlisle might possibly be among the number. Peada was succeeded by Wulfhere, his brother, and all Mercia was consolidated into the bishopric of Ceadda or St. Chad. Mr. Green says : The labour of Aidan, the victories of Oswald and Oswi, seemed to have annexed England to the Irish Church. The monks of Lindis- farne, or of the new religious houses whose foundation followed that of Strathclyde. 1 1 7 Lindisfarne, looked for their ecclesiastical traditions, not to Rome, but to Ireland, and quoted for their guidance the instructions, not of Gregory, but of Columba. Whatever claims of supremacy over the whole English Church might be pressed by the See of Canterbury, the real Metropolitan of the Church as it existed in the north of England was the Abbot of lona.* But Rome was not apt to yield up the supremacy she claimed without a struggle, and in the famous Wilfrith of York, and in Benedict Biscop she had allies whose love for her amounted to a passionate fanaticism. To appease the strife that ran so high, Oswi summoned the Synod of Streonoshalch, or Whitby in Yorkshire, where stood the Westminster of the Northumbrian Kings, the Abbey of St. Hilda. Colman, the successor of Aidan, on the one side argued for the Irish fashion of the tonsure, and the Irish fashion of keeping Easter ; Wilfrith pleaded for the Roman fashion, and King Oswi decided in his favour. Aidan and his Irish brethren left Lindisfarne for Ireland ; the North of England was won by the Roman Church, and all the seven kingdoms of the heptarchy owned Rome supreme. That Church, in 668, sent to Britain a Greek monk, Theodore of Tarsus, who, as Archbishop of Can- terbury, was accepted as Metropolitan, and who reor- ganized the English bishoprics into sixteen, all subordinate to Canterbury. This arrangement was shortly modified, so as to allow the Bishop of York his old title of Arch- bishop and the allegiance of three suffragans Hexham, Lindisfarne, and Whithern. The kingdom of Deira, which after the capture of Chester stretched from the German Ocean to the Irish Sea, formed the diocese of York. The kingdom of Ber- nicia was split up into Hexham and Lindisfarne. This is very important locally; the northern boundary of the Deiran, or Yorkshire portion of modern Cumberland, is thus proved to be the river Derwent, the boundary of the * Green's " History of the English People," p. 28. n8 History of Cumberland. great Archdeaconry of Richmond, part of the diocese of York, until Henry VIII. formed the diocese of Chester. This boundary was afterwards the boundary between the dioceses of Carlisle and Chester, until Carlisle was ex- tended at the expense of Chester in 1856. The Deiran portion of Cumberland was evidently Anglicised at an earlier date than the other portion, the Bernician portion of Cumberland we may call it, though it is clear the hold of Bernicia upon it was much less than that of Deira upon its portion. In fact, the south-west of Cumberland was actually English ground, and part of England in the time of Theodore of Tarsus, while the north-east was British, or Welsh. To some of our readers we may have appeared, in referring so much as we have done to the history of Northumbria, to have been both superfluous and vague ; but two reasons have moved us thereto : one, that how our predecessors in Cumberland became Christians, and what manner of Christians they became, or had the opportunity of becoming, could not be told without so referring to Northumbrian history; the second, that the present Cum- berland was then more or less subject to, or a tributary of, Northumbria, and that therefore the history of one is that of the other. Of this we now come to a remarkable proof. Oswi, King of Northumbria, died in 670, two years after the arrival in England of Theodore, and long ere Theo- dore's ecclesiastical arrangements were complete. Alcfrith, his son, who reigned as his father's assistant, or deputy King, in Deira, died in his father's lifetime, prior, there- fore, to 670 though there is doubt about this, for Oswi was succeeded by Ecgfrith, another of his sons, and he, in 685, was succeeded by Alcfrith, said to be Ecgfrith 's brother, and son of Oswi. Bseda, in his life of St. Cuth- bert, states positively that Ecgfrith's successor was his bastard brother, and there may have been to Oswi two sons of that name, one legitimate, and the other not. Now, Strathclyde. 119 there is at Bewcastle, in Cumberland, a very famous and very beautiful monument a column formed of one entire block of gray freestone. Suffice it here to say that the Runic inscriptions on this monument have been read by Professor Stephens, of Copenhagen, thus : on the west side, " Christus " and " ^ Jesus Christus." Then follows the principal inscription, which is thus translated by Pro- fessor Stephens : This slender sign beacon set was by Hwaetred Wothgar Olufwolth after Alcfrith, once King, eke son of Oswin Bid (pray) for the high sin of his soul. Below is a figure supposed to be Alcfrith himself. On the south side we get an imperfect inscription, which Professor Stephens translates thus : In the first year of the King of ric (realm) this Ecgfrith. On the north we have the names of Alcfrith's Queen, Cyneburga, of his sister-in-law, Cyneswitha, and of his brother-in-law, Wulfhere, King of the Mercians, who, with the three thanes mentioned in the principal inscrip- tion, set up this monument to King Alcfrith in the first year of the reign of King Ecgfrith i.e., 670 ; and it is fair to conclude that it marks the burial-place of King Alcfrith. Now, the importance of this monument con- sists in this that it is situate well to the westward of the great mountain barrier behind which the Britons had retreated before the English advance ; and it proves that the Northumbrian English had in the time of Alcfrith .., before the end of the seventh century advanced their power across this barrier, and had a hold over the petty states of the Cumbri. CHAPTER VIII. CUMBRIA. Oswi, King of Northumbria, died in 670, and was suc- ceeded by Ecgfrith, his son, whose reign, up to its very close, marks the highest pitch of Northumbrian power. Greatest of all the successors to Oswald's and Oswi's friend Aidan was Cuthbert, who migrated to Lindisfarne from Scotland, and whose biography is a succession of those strange visions and wonders by which in those days, as in some degree in ours, the work of reviving religious feeling is often carried on. It would take another lecture to describe the arrival of the fantastic youth from Melrose, his settlement at Fame Islands, his driving away the devils who rode about on wild goats, and who might still be seen brandishing their spears on the rock to which he banished them, the wandering of his bones until they rested at last where the most massive and awful of English cathedrals, huge and vast, looks down upon the Wear.* The life of St. Cuthbert, with its many miracles and wonders, has been written for us by Baeda himself, and in the north aisle of Carlisle Cathedral are depicted, rudely, indeed, and now much defaced and obliterated more by neglect and cruel whitewash than by the milder influence of time the various incidents of St. Cuthbert's strange * From a report in the Newcastle Daily Journal, of April 7, 1875, of a lecture given by the late Dean Stanley at Sunderland. Cumbria. 121 life, for which we will refer to Mr. Green's " History of the English People " : Born on the southern edge of the Lammermoor, Cuthbert found shelter at eight years old in a widow's house in the little village of Wrangholm. Already in youth there was a poetic sensibility beneath the robust frame of the boy, which caught even in the chance word of a game a call to higher things. Later on, a traveller coming in his white mantle over the hillside, and stopping his horse to tend Cuth- bert's injured knee, seemed to him an angel. The boy's shepherd-life carried him to the bleak upland, still famous as a sheepwalk, though the scant herbage scarce veils the whinstone rock, and there meteors plunging into the night became to him a company of angelic spirits, carrying the soul of Bishop Aidan heavenwards. Slowly Cuthbert's longings settled into a resolute will towards a religious life, and he made his way at last to a group of log shanties in the midst of untilled solitude, where a few Irish monks from Lindisfarne had settled in the mission station of Melrose. To-day the land is a land of poetry and romance. Cheviot and Lammermoor, Ettrick and Teviotdale, Yarrow and Annan Water, are musical with old ballads and border minstrelsy. Agriculture has chosen its valleys for her favourite seat, and drainage and steam-power have turned sedgy marshes into farm and meadow. But to see the Lowlands as they were in Cuthbert's day, we must sweep meadow and farm away again, and replace them by vast soli- tudes, dotted here and there with clusters of wooden hovels, and crossed by boggy tracks, over which travellers rode spear in hand, and eye kept cautiously about them. The Northumbrian peasantry among whom he journeyed were, for the most part, Christians only in name. With Teutonic indifference, they yielded to their thegns in nominally accepting the new Christianity, as these had yielded to the King ; but they retained their old superstitions side by side with the new worship ; plague or mishap drove them back to a reliance on their heathen charms and amulets ; and if trouble befell the Christian preachers who came settling among them, they took it as proof of the wrath of the older gods. . . On foot, on horseback, Cuthbert wandered among listeners such as these, choosing alone all the remoter mountain villages, from whose roughness and poverty other teachers turned aside. Unlike his Irish comrades, he needed no interpreter as he passed from village to village ; the frugal, long-headed Northumbrians listened willingly to one who was himself a peasant of the Lowlands, and who had caught the rough Northumbrian burr along the banks of the Leader. His patience, his humorous good sense, the sweetness of his look, told for him, and not less the stout vigorous frame which fitted 122 History of Cumberland. the peasant preacher for the hard life he had chosen. " Never did man die of hunger who served God faithfully," he would say, when nightfall found them supperless on the waste. "Look at the eagle overhead ! God can feed us through him if He will,'' and once, at least, he owed his meal to a fish that the scared bird let fall. A snow- storm drove his boat on the coast of Fife. " The snow closes the road along the shore," murmured his comrades ; " the storm bars our way over sea." "There is still the way of heaven that lies open," said Cuthbert."* Such was the Apostle of the Lowlands, whom, in 684 or 685, in his wished-for seclusion, King Ecgfrith, and Trumwine, Bishop of Whithern or of Abercorn,t pre- vailed upon, unwillingly, to accept the bishopric of Lindis- farne, says Baeda of Hexham, says the Anglo-Saxon chronicle, a discrepancy which Florence of Worcester explains by saying that he was elected to Hexham, but exchanged to Lindisfarne. These two sees afterwards became one, with the episcopal seat at Lindisfarne, whence it was removed to Chester-le-Street, and thence to Durham, which diocese thus represents the kingdom of Bernicia, as York does that of Deira. King Ecgfrith spent a long portion of his reign in war with his neighbour of Mercia, who wished to throw off the Northumbrian Overlordship. The struggle between Briton and Saxon had revived, and the West Saxons had gained very great advantages over their British neigh- bours. It was probably the example of the West Saxons which spurred Ecgfrith to a series of attacks upon his British neighbours in the west, which raised Northumbria to its highest pitch of glory. Up to the moment of his fall, indeed, the reign of Ecgfrith marks the highest pitch of Northumbrian power. His arms chased the Britons from the * Green's " History of the English People,'' p. 24. t Trumwine was probably Bishop of Abercorn, and not of Whithern. See Haddon and Stubb's "Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents," vol. ii., part i., p. 7 n. Green in his " History " makes him Bishop of Whithern. Cumbria. 123 kingdom of Cumbria, and made the district of Carlisle English ground.* It did not, however, as yet become part of the English kingdom. Mr. Hodgson Hinde says Ecgfrith seems to have destroyed the last semblance of a domestic government in all the petty states of the Cumbri, with the exception of Strath- clyde.f The district of Carlisle the land of Carlisle was the district between the Solway and the Derwent, and the Valley of the Eden up to its source the district which was afterwards the earldom of Carlisle and the bishopric of Carlisle, as it was bounded until 1856. Ecgfrith bestowed the ecclesiastical jurisdiction over the conquered country upon the See of Lindisfarne, and St. Cuthbert at once visited Lugubalia, or Luel, and found that the King had gone north on an expedition against the Picts. St. Cuthbert is said to have founded a nunnery and a school at Luel (Carlisle), the former of which was presided over by the sister of Queen Eormenburga, who was herself an inmate within its walls at the time of her husband's ill-fated expedition against the Picts, whose issue she there intended to await. There was a monastery at or near Carlisle^ whose church St. Cuthbert conse- crated, and to whose brethren he preached, and the wording of Baeda would imply that the nunnery as well as the monastery existed before Cuthbert's visit. Pro- bably the monastery was one of those founded by Oswi to celebrate his victory over Penda in 655. What St. Cuth- bert probably did, and what he probably came for, was to introduce into the land of Carlisle the Roman traditions * Green's " History of the English People," p. 32. f " Early History of Cumberland," Archceological Journal, vol. xvi., p. 222. \ Baeda's " Life of St. Cuthbert," c. xxvii. 124 History of Cumberland. to which the Northumbrian Church had, after the Synod of Whitby in 664, adhered. Ecgfrith also gave St. Cuthbert, as well as spiritual jurisdiction over the land of Carlisle, a valuable endow- ment out of a small portion of it. Symeon of Durham informs us why this was given. Cuthbert had established a monastery at Craik, near Easingwold, in Yorkshire, where he had a grant from Ecgfrith of the village and three miles round ; and there he had a mansio for his residence when he went to York. Et quia ilia terra minus sufficiens erat, Lugubalium quas Luel vocatur in circuitu xv milaria habentem in augmentum suscepit, ubi etiam sanctimonalium congregatione stabilita, reginam dato habitu religionis consecravit, et in perfectu divinae servitatis scolas instituit. The expression civitas, used in another account, would seem to indicate that Carlisle had some political organiza- tion of its own ; that its circuit was fifteen miles shows that more was included than the mere inhabited town. Now, the old parish of St. Cuthbert-without-the-Walls would, with the town, be about fifteen miles in circuit, and this was what Ecgfrith gave St. Cuthbert. It occupies the angle between the rivers Eden and Caldew, and was probably the only land then cleared from scrub and cul- tivated in the vicinity of the town. A day or so after Cuthbert's arrival, as some of the citizens were taking him round for the purpose of show- ing him the walls of the city, and a fountain of marvellous workmanship constructed by the Romans,* he suddenly * " Fontem miro quondam Romanorum opere exstructum? A tradition, of no value, asserts this to be the well in the north wall of the keep of Carlisle Castle, but it is quite as likely to be the larger one in the outer court of the castle. Messrs. Lysons, p. ccvii., con- jecture that it may have been a singular chamber which once existed in the city walls, between the citadel and the Deanery. This singular chamber is, however, no other than the cesspool of the Black Friars of Carlisle. By far the most probable suggestion is that it is the old market well, now filled up and lost, which was in the roadway of English Street, near the shop of Messrs. C. Thurnam and Sons. Cumbria. 125 became disturbed in spirit, and leaning on his staff he bent down his face sadly to the ground, and again raising himself up, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and, groaning deeply, he muttered softly, " Perhaps at this very moment the hazard of the battle is over." When questioned by the bystanders, he would say no more than, " Do you not see how marvellously changed and disturbed the air is ? and who among mortals is sufficient to search out the judgments of God ?" Nevertheless, he privily warned the Queen, and on the following day a Sunday he preached to the brethren of the monastery, and " Watch and pray, watch and pray " was the burden of his discourse, which his hearers misapplied to the expected recurrence of a plague which had but recently ravaged the district. In a few days arrived a solitary fugitive, who announced that " the Picts had turned desperately to bay as the English army entered Fife, and that Ecgfrith and the flower of his nobles lay a ghastly ring of corpses, on the far-off moor- and of Nechtansmere." Inquiry revealed the fact that the King fell on the very day and at the very hour at which Cuthbert bent over the old Roman fountain. On the moorland of Nechtansmere there fell for ever with King Ecgfrith, in 685, the Northumbrian supremacy. Mercia at once struck for independence, while in the north Galloway threw off its allegiance, and cleared out Bishop Trumwine of Whithern, " which stands," says Baeda, "close by the arm of the sea which parts the lands of the English and the Scots " proof conclusive that the district now Cumberland had, in 685, if not long before, become English ground. On the moorland of Nechtansmere then fell for ever with King Ecgfrith, in 685, the Northumbrian supremacy. To Mercia first, and then to Wessex, went the English Overlordship after, and with struggles whose history per- tains to that of England rather than to those limited parts of modern England with which this book deals. i?6 History of Cumberland. Northumbria under Eadfrith and Coelwulf, the successors of Ecgfrith, set aside its glory in arms for the pursuits of peace, and it became in the eighth century the literary centre of the Christian world in Western Europe. No schools were more famous than those of Jarrow and York. The whole learn- ing of the age seemed to be summed up in a Northumbrian scholar, Basda, the Venerable Bede, as later times styled him.* Baeda was a statesman as well as a scholar, and he foresaw clearly the evils impending over Northumbria owing to a growing anarchy, which culminated after his death, in 755, in a wild story of lawlessness and bloodshed. King after King was swept away by treason and revolt, the country fell into the hands of its turbulent nobles, the very fields lay waste, and the land was swept by famine and plague, f One fact, and one alone, does Mr. Freeman, in his " Old English History," think it worth while to tell his readers of during this wild period, and it is an important one. One powerful King Eadberht by name there was in Northumbria during this time, and he defeated the Mercians, made an alliance with Unust, King of the Picts, and the two attacked the Welsh in Strathclyde, and took their chief town of Alclwyd. This was in 756, a date which marks the subjection of Strathclyde to North- umbria. We have already told how, in 685, if not before, the district round Carlisle the land of Carlisle had become English ground, though not part of the English kingdom. In 827 Ecgberht, King of Wessex, marched without a struggle over Mercia. The Northumbrian nobles met him at the Don with overtures of peace, and Ecgberht, thus Overlord from Forth to the British Channel, styled himself " King ot the English." But his power does not seem to have extended over the Picts, the Scots, or the Strathclyde and Cumbrian Welsh or Britons. The * Green's " History of the English People," p. 36. f Ibid., p. 39. Cumbria. 127 waning power of Northumbria had let slip the Strathclyde conquests of Eadberht, and Ecgberht declined to meddle with the northern Celts wisely enough, in all probability though he had had great success in campaigning against the West Welsh and the North Welsh i.e., the Cornish Welsh, or Britons, and the Welsh or Britons of the present principality of Wales. The northern Celts i.e., Picts, Scots, and Welsh, or Britons thus got a century in which they were left to themselves, except for the Danes. They probably fought among themselves, as we have an ill-supported story that in 878 a body of the harassed natives of Strathclyde cut their way through their enemies, and though their leader Constantine was killed at Lochmaben, succeeded, in considerable numbers, in reaching the shelter of their fellow-countrymen in Wales, where they continued to exist as a distinct and distinguished colony.* If we try to penetrate from the other side, the side of Strathclyde, the darkness that hangs at this period over the history of the petty states of the Cumbri, we are foiled equally as from the Northumbrian side. Mr. Burton has been able to collect little or nothing of the history of Strathclyde that can be relied upon, and of the country now part of Cumberland and Westmorland he writes : Of these territories it can only be said, that at this period, and for long afterwards, they formed the theatre of miscellaneous confused conflicts, in which the Saxons, the Scots, and the Norsemen in turn partake. Over and over again, we hear that the district is swept by the Saxon King's armies, but it did not become a part of England until after the Norman Conquest, f Meanwhile, to the King of the Scots it was not * Burton's " History of Scotland," vol. i., p. 309 ; Chalmers, vol. i., P- 335 5 Robertson's " Early Kings of Scotland," vol. i., p. 54 ; Palgrave's "Anglo-Saxons," p. 186. f Note the distinction between becoming " English ground," confer ante p. 123, and becoming " part of England." The first means settled by English settlers, who must have been plentiful round Carlisle, even 128 History of Cumberland. so much an object of acquisition as the more accessible territory of Northumberland.* One consequence of the anarchy growing up in North- umberland at the time of Baeda's death was the peaceful submission of the Northumbrian nobles to the Overlord- ship of Ecgberht in 827. So great had grown this anarchy, such had been the quarrellings and confusions among different kings and nobles, that Northumbria had speedily become, politically, of no account at all ; thus it lay an easy prey to a new race of sea-rovers, the North- men, or Danes (though they probably came from other countries than Denmark), who came first as mere plun- derers, and then returned as settlers. More than one historian has observed that the Danish invasion of this country was but a repetition, after the lapse of 300 years, of the English invasion thereof: as Mr. Green says, "it is as if the hand on the dial of history had gone back 300 years." Like the English invasion, the Danish invasion was marked by horrible cruelties, and, like it, it was an invasion of a Christian people by the heathen worshippers of Woden. But there was a difference, and a remarkable one, in the result of the two invasions. As the result of the first, great part of Britain became English ; as the result of the second, the English, the English institutions, the English religion that of Christianity swallowed up the Danes, the Danish institutions, and the Danish religion. The Danes became another tribe of English- men, like the Angles, the Saxons, and the Jutes a result due to the fact that Danes and English were both Teutonic people, the same in blood and speech. Three periods of Danish invasion of England are defined by Mr. Freeman.t First, the period of simple before that district was subdued by Ecgfrith, and who would remain even when the Northumbrian rule was shaken off. * Burton's " History of Scotland," vol. i., p. 363. f " The Norman Conquest," vol. i., p. 43. Cumbria. 129 plunder from 787 to 855, mere buccaneering, freebooting expeditions, when they land, harry the country, and go off again in the long black boats that brought them. Second, the period of settlement, during which parties of rovers effect permanent settlements in the country, and wax strong enough to engage in constant struggle with the West Saxon Overlords of Britain, 855-954. The third period, that of political conquest, when a King of Denmark set himself to achieve the conquest of all England, 980-1016. We first hear of the Danes harrying Dorsetshire in 787, and then of their inroads upon Northumberland. The first step towards a permanent settlement in the country was in 855, when a party wintered in the island of Sheppy, from which small beginnings their colonies grew fast. Between 867 and 869 they conquered the dis- tracted kingdom of Northumbria, and in about five years they tore from the Overlordship of Wessex all England north of the Thames. The gallant struggles of the great English King Alfred, King of Wessex, and the Peace of Wedmore, which he made in 878 with Guthrun the Danish King, belong rather to a general history of England than to a local one ; suffice it here to say that Watling Street became the boundary between the Danish and English kingdoms, and the Danish monarch acknow- ledged himself the vassal of ^Elfred, and was baptized a Christian by the name of ^Ethelstan. What power was left to Alfred was hardened by adversity ; a patriotic spirit was engendered among the English, and the Danish settlement, at first so ruinous, tended, in the end, to the consolidation of England and of all Britain under the West Saxon Kings. During the struggles that led to the Peace of Wedmore, the kingdom of Mercia disappeared, for its last native King, Burhred, was deposed by the Danes. Northumbria was treated by the Danes in a peculiar way; Deira was actually occupied by, and governed by, Danes. Bernicia still remained occupied by English- 9 130 History of Cumberland. men, and, though subject to the Danes, was still ruled by Englishmen, styled first Kings, and then Dukes. This difference of treatment, and the adhesion of the Lothians to Scotland, explains why the kingdom of Northumbria has shrivelled up, so to speak, to a part only of itself the county of Northumberland, which is not on the Humber at all. Halfdene was the Danish leader who, in 876, occupied Deira, or the modern Yorkshire. He or his followers extended their ravages into modern Cumberland. Lugubalia, or Carlisle, they destroyed completely, burning the town, throwing down the walls, and killing man, woman, and child, the inhabitants being then very numerous. In that state it was left for near two hundred years, without an inhabitant, but some few Irish who lodged themselves among the ruins. The very founda- tions of the city were so buried in the earth, that it is said large oak- trees grew upon them ; and this is not only attested by our historians, but also made out by some discoveries that have been lately made of large unhewn oak-trees buried ten or twelve feet below ground, one of which was found by Mr. Robert Jackson, Alderman, in digging for a well, which round timber can be no other but some of the old monu- mental oaks that stood upon the walls, as marks and witnesses of their utter ruin and destruction. From Dr. Todd's MS. account of Carlisle, written circa 1700. In default of further information as to position, the dis- covery of these oak-trees in the latter part of the seven- teenth century is not so conclusive evidence as Dr. Todd seems to assume; but the destruction of Carlisle by the Danes rests on other authority, that of Florence of Worcester, who, under date 1092, writes of Carlisle : "This city, like most others in that quarter, had been laid in ruins by the northern Danes 200 years before, and had been uninhabited up to this time " a statement which is followed by Matthew of Westminster. At the time of this destruction Eadred, surnamed Lulisc, from Luel, the ancient name of his city, was Abbot of Carlisle. He was consulted by Eardulf, Bishop of Lindisfarne, as to the best course to be pursued under the circumstances of Cumbria. 131 peril in which Eardulf's monastery was placed. The result of their consultations was that the monks should seek safety in flight ; this they did, accompanied by Eadred Lulisc, and carrying with them the corpse of St. Cuthbert, which thus commenced its famous seven long years' rambles through the six northern counties of Eng- land, and a portion of the South of Scotland. Wessington, Prior of Durham 1416-1446 (cited by Monsignor Eyre in his " History of St. Cuthbert "), confirms the truth of a tradition which points out the churches of ancient Northumbria, dedicated in honour of St. Cuthbert, as being spots where the monks of Lindisfarne rested for a time with their precious burden. He names, in Cum- berland, Carlisle, Edenhall, Salkeld, Plumbland, Bew- castle, Embleton, and Lorton (which last two he places in Lancashire) ; and in Westmorland, Clifton, Cliburn, and Dufton. Kirklinton, Nether Denton, and Milburn he omits. The sway of Guthrun the Dane, who succeeded Half- dene, was confined, like his predecessor's, to the south of the Tyne. Above that river was a petty Saxon state, which 1 contrived, or was allowed, to exist, no doubt under some degree of subjection to Guthrun, but nominally under native rulers first called Kings, and then Dukes who were seated at Bamborough. Carlisle and the adjacent districts, though included in Northumbria prior to its dismemberment, formed no part of either the Danish or the Saxon states. They turn up as incorporated with Galloway and Strathclyde under the name of Cum- bria. For how this was brought about Mr. Hodgson- Hinde relies greatly on the Scottish chronicles of Fordun, a writer whom Mr. Burton in his " History of Scotland " treats with contempt and disbelief, reducing his hero, Gregorius Magnus, to one Grig. Gregory the Great, or Grig, is fondly stated by Scottish chronicles to have driven out the Danes, subdued all Ireland, and nearly all England palpable, exaggerations, which, however, prove 92 132 History of Cumberland. Grig to have been a mighty man of war. Whether he was King of Scotland i.e., of the united Scots and Picts or merely the guardian of one Eacha, son of Kun, King of Strathclyde, nephew and heir of Constantine II., King of Scotland, or what, is uncertain, but he was a man of great vigour and enterprise, the real ruler, and to him the Cumbrian members of the dismembered Northumbria turned for assistance. Fordun says : The indigenous inhabitants of certain provinces voluntarily submitted themselves to Gregory, with their lands and possessions, offering to him an oath of homage and fealty, thinking it preferable to be subject to the Scots, who, although enemies, were Christians, than to infidel pagans. Gregory, or Grig, was succeeded in 893, on the Scottish throne, by Donal IV., contemporary with whom was another Donal, of Strathclyde. Donal IV. died in 904, and was succeeded by Constantine III., who again, on the death of Donal of Strathclyde, got his own brother Donal put on that throne. This Donal, the second of Strathclyde, was succeeded by Eugenius, or Owen, his son, who invariably is called by English and Scottish historians King of Cumbria. Thus the kingdom of Cum- bria was formed by the union of Strathclyde, Galloway, and the land of Carlisle. The great Alfred had been succeeded in 901 by his son Eadward the Elder, and his daughter ^Ethelflseda, lady of the Mercians, and conqueror of Danish Mercia. She died in 918, and Eadward the Elder added her dominions to his own, and undertook the systematic reduction of the Danislagh, as the district occupied by the Danes was called. After great success he had seized Manchester, when suddenly the whole of the North laid itself at his feet. Not merely Northumbria, but the Scots and the Britons of Strathclyde, chose him to father and lord the words are "Fsedor" and "Hlaforde" a national transac- tion which Mr. Freeman calls " The Commendation of Cumbria. 133 Scotland and Strathclyde," using Strathclyde in the larger sense. The Welsh had done so a little before. By this act of Commendation Northumberland, Wales, Scot- land, and Strathclyde became vassals to the West Saxon monarch, and to this act Mr. Freeman traces, and by it defends, the right, after the Norman Conquest, of Edward I. to demand homage from the Scots and Welsh. He writes : From this time the King of the English was the Overlord of the Welsh and the Scots, just as much as the Emperor and the King of the West Franks were Overlords of the Princes within their dominions, who held their duchies and counties of them.* To this view Mr. Burton by no means inclines.f Like a patriotic Scotchman, he considers the exploits of Eadward the Elder as fabulous as those of Grig the Great, and further that brief notices were at a later day, and for political reasons, expanded into legal phraseology. Prac- tically, at the time, the Commendation was valueless ; it was made in 924, and Eadward died in the following * year, when the North at once broke out. ^Ethelstan, his son, the new West Saxon monarch, expelled from Northumberland Guthred, son of Sitric, the Danish King. Guthred fled to the Court of Constantine of Scotland, and from him and from Donal of Strathclyde he received assistance, ^thelstan marched against these two, who met him at Dacre, over Ullswater, and there agreed to his terms. For breaking the Peace of Dacre ^Ethelstan severely punished Constantine and his kingdom in 933-34. Three years later a huge confederacy was formed against yEthelstan by the Danes, both of Northumberland and of Ireland, by Constantine, and by Eugenius, or Owen, the King of Cumbria, and their Scots and Welsh. At the great Battle of Bruanburgh, whose site is unknown, ^Ethelstan was victorious, and Constantine lost his son. * " Old English History," p. 145. f " History of Scotland," vol. i., p. 359. 134 History of Cumberland. Five Kings and five Earls are said to have fallen on the side of the confederates, and among them probably was Eugenius, or Owen, as we hear no more of him. This was in 937. In 945 we find Dunmail King of Cumbria. He had, by some means or other, fallen under the displeasure of Eadmund the Magnificent, the successor of ^Ethelstan, who, in the words of the Saxon chronicle, " wasted all Cumbria, and gave it to Malcolm I., King of Scots, and successor of Constantine, on the condition that he should be his ally by land and sea." The decisive combat between the forces of Eadmund and the Cum- brians is said by tradition to have taken place near a well-known site, which still preserves the name of Dunmail Raise ; and it is further added, that Dunmail fell on this occasion, in confirmation of which a cairn is pointed out which is said to have been erected to his memory. The tradition receives no confirmation from Wendover, and on other grounds it is probable that Dunmail escaped. Thirty years afterwards a notice occurs in the Cambrian annals of a British prince called Dunwallen, who, having gone on a pilgrimage, died at Rome. He is there described as Prince of Strathclyde, the term still applied in these annals to Cumberland, after the annexation of Galloway and Carlisle. Now, Donal, Dunmail, and Dunwallen, are all different forms of the same name, and it is difficult to find a place for this Dunwallen in the Cumbrian dynasty, unless we identify him with Dunmail, whose kingdom was seized and his sons mutilated in 945. In giving Cumberland to Malcolm I., Eadmund merely restored to Scotland a dependency which had belonged to it in the reign of Gregory. Edward the Elder, indeed, and afterwards ^Ethelstan, had compelled the Cumbrian Prince to acknowledge the supremacy of the English Crown ; but this was only what, by the right of the stronger, they had insisted on from Scotland also. As a component part of Northumberland, whose King, Eanred, admitted the superiority of Egbert, Cumbria might owe a nominal subjection, but no Anglo-Saxon King had ever exercised any substantial act of authority within its limits.* Mr. Burton endeavours to limit the country thus handed over to Malcolm as a fief from the English Crown * Mr. Hodgson-Hinde, "Early History of Cumberland," Archaeo- logical Journal, vol. xvi., p. 225. Cumbria. 135 to modern Cumberland and Westmorland, but Mr. Free- man makes it include all to the Firth of Clyde. The latter is more likely, but in a history only of Cumberland, we need hardly argue the point. By virtue of the Com- mendation of 925 King Dunmail was vassal to King Eadmund ; he revolted against his Overlord, who took his kingdom from him, and granted it, in 945, on tenure of military service to Malcolm I., King of Scots, as a feudal benefice in the strictest sense. Cumbria thus became a fief of the Crown of England, but not a fief held within the kingdom of England. Cumbria was not an integral part of England ; it was without that kingdom, and had always been so. This was done by the advice of Dunstan, Eadmund's minister, who wished to make the Scots allies against the Danes. In the succeeding reign, that of Eadgar, Dunstan induced that monarch to give to Kenneth, King of Scot- land, Northern Northumberland, or the Lothians, a fief within England, which Kenneth held like any other English Earl did his fief. Thus the boundary between England and Scotland along the East Marches (from the German Ocean half-way across the island) assumed, or nearly so, its present position. From this period Cumberland continued in the possession of the royal line of Scotland, sometimes retained by the King himself, at others by a member of his family ; usually, if we may credit the national historians, by the proximate heir. The only circumstance which is recorded of it for many years is its total desolation by Ethelred, King of England, in A.D. 1000, at which time it is represented as the chief rendezvous of the Danes in Britain. This is the only mention of a Danish colonization by any historian, but their occupation has not passed away without leaving traces behind, both in the language of the people and in the nomenclature of the district. Fordun gives a different account of the expedition, which he represents as directed, not against the Danes, but the native Cumbrians, as a punishment for their refusal to contribute to a fund raised for the inglorious purpose of purchasing the forbearance of the common enemy. Such is, indeed, said to have been raised about this time under the name of the Danegeld ; and if it was really applied to buying off the enemy, instead of providing means 136 History of Cumberland. to repel them, resistance to such an impost would have been highly honourable to the Cumbrians ; but, unfortunately, the whole story, un- supported as it is by any other testimony, rests on very questionable authority.* To this story Mr. Freeman attaches more truth than does Mr. Hodgson-Hinde, and he takes it that ./Ethelred, Overlord of the vassal kingdom of Cumbria, was endea- vouring to impose on the vassal kingdom a money payment instead of the military service by land and sea which it was bound to perform. He suggests that the real cause of the quarrel was that Malcolmj- had allowed the Danes to settle in his dominions, and adds that it is possible that we may here have lighted on the clue to the great puzzle of Cumbrian ethnology. That Cumberland and Westmorland are to this day largely Scandinavian needs no proof ; but we have no record of the process by which they became so. In Northumberland and East Anglia we know when the Danes settled, and we know something of the dynasties which they founded ; but the Scandinavian settlement in Cumberland Norwegian, no doubt, rather than Danish we know only by its results. We have no statement as to its date, and we know that no Scandinavian dynasty was founded there. The settlement must, therefore, have been more peaceful and gradual than the settlements in Northumberland and East Anglia, and it is possible that the reign of Malcolm (Malcolm II.) may have been the time when it happened.J Henry of Huntingdon says this campaign was directed, not against the Cumbrians, but against the Northmen there. The Anglo-Saxon chronicle says that ^Ethelred's fleet was directed to sail round and meet him off the coast of Cumberland, but that the wind being unfavourable, they contented themselves with ravaging the Isle of Man. * Mr. Hodgson-Hinde, "Early History of Cumberland," Archceo- logical Journal, vol. xvi., p. 225. f Malcolm II. of Scotland, son of Kenneth, King of Scotland. This Malcolm did not at first succeed his father, but held the lower part of Cumbria against Constantine and one Grim, until at last Malcolm ascended the throne of Scotland. J " The Norman Conquest," vol. i., p. 634. Cumbria. 137 If we suppose ^thelred's campaign had a double aspect, to punish the Cumbrians for not rendering military assist- ance against the Northmen, and for permitting the Northmen to settle there, and also against the northern encroachers themselves, we may reconcile Henry of Huntingdon's account with the chronicle. The attack on Man favours Henry's account, for Man was a chief depot of the Scandinavian settlers in modern Cumberland and Westmorland. Our next task is to show how from the kingdom of Cumbria, which some writers of repute loosely call on occasions the kingdom of Cumberland, the southern portion, the lordship, or land, of Carlisle, or earldom of Carleolum, was cut off; but first we must mention a very important and authentic document, which sets forth the exact limits of the kingdom of Cumbria previous to the dismemberment. When Edward I. put forth his claim to a paramount superiority over the realm of Scotland, he directed the various religious houses throughout the king- dom to furnish him with all the information, historical or documentary, bearing on the ancient relations between England and Scotland which they had in their possession. Amongst the returns from the monastery of Carlisle is the following important statement as to the boundaries of Cumbria at the period in question: "That district was called Cumbria which is now included in the bishoprics of Carlisle, Glasgow, and Whithern, together with the country lying between the bishopric of Carlisle and the river Duddon." At an earlier period Mr. Hodgson- Hinde considers it probable that the southern limit included Furness and Amounderness, nearly the whole of which is recorded in Doomsday to have been in the pos- session of Tosti, Earl of Northumberland. About the middle of the tenth century the same King Eadgar who gave the Lothians to the Scots put an end to the kingdom of Northumbria, and entrusted its govern- 138 History of Climber land. merit to a series of Earls, of whom Siward is perhaps the best known. Siward was appointed to the earldom in 1041, and was sent by Edward the Confessor on his memorable expedition into Scotland, whose King was Macbeth, while Malcolm, son of the murdered Duncan, the predecessor of Macbeth, was Underking, or Prince, of Cumbria. Siward defeated and slew Macbeth, and placed on the throne Malcolm, or his son of the same name. This was Malcolm III., or Malcolm Caenmore, who during his long reign retained both Cumbria and Scotland in his own hands. Under his government, however, the district, or land, of Carlisle that is, all the Cumbrian territory south of the Solway (which our readers will not forget includes a great lump of Westmorland) was severed from the rest of Malcolm's dominions. The date of this is uncer- tain, but it would appear to be 1070, in which year, as we learn from Symeon of Durham, Gospatric, Earl of North- umberland, overran that district in revenge for the devas- tation of Teesdale by the Scots. The Earl, though very shortly afterwards dispossessed of his earldom, and a fugitive at Malcolm's Court, seems to have been able to put his son Dolfin in possession of the district wrenched from Malcolm, and we find Dolfin there twenty-two years later in 1092. The suggestion has been made that Malcolm, for some purpose of his own, put Dolfin in pos- session of this district. " Nothing," writes Mr. Hodgson- Hinde, " can be more discordant than the statements of historians as to the condition of the southern portion of Cumberland (i.e., Cumbria) during the reign of William the Conqueror, or more uncertain than the date of its transference from Scotland to England." CHAPTER IX. THE LAND OF CARLISLE. THE Saxon chronicle under the date of A.D. 1092 says : The King (i.e., William Rufus) went northward with a large army to Caerluel and repaired the city, built the castle, and drove out Dolfin, who had before governed that country ; and having placed a garrison in the castle, returned south, and sent a great number of churlish folk thither with wives and cattle, that they might settle there and till the land. To this Florence of Worcester adds : This city, like most others in that quarter, had been laid in ruins by the Northern Danes two hundred years before, and had been unin- habited to this time. Thus the present boundaries between England and Scotland were established, and the district (the land of Carlisle) whose history we are writing became for the first time part of the English kingdom, and England became geographically what it is now. It is doubtful whether Roman Lugubalium, British Caer Luel, Caerluel (the city of Luel, a truncated form of Lugubalium or Luguvallium), ever stood a mere "waste Chester," like Deva and Anderida. The fact that its British name Luel, Caer Luel, Caerluel, Carlile, and, by introduction of the French or silent s, Carlisle, survived on through the period of the city's lying waste, is proof that the name must have been in common use, and some 140 History of Cumberland. proof that the city must have had some continuous exist- ence, and been more than the refuge of Dr. Todd's "some few Irish who lodged themselves among the ruins." The city had for a brief period an English name ; Luercestre evidently a corruption of Luelcestre appears twice in the two " Lives of St. Cuthbert " printed in the Surtees edition of Symeon of Durham.* Luelcestre, however, did not " catch on," or Carlisle might now be Lulchester, and its inhabitants Lulcestrians. Here may be the place to record the personal definition of Carlisle as given by a great historian the city which, having once become part of an English kingdom (Northumbria), again fell back under the rule of the Briton, the one city which became again part of the united English realm, when, by a strange process indeed, the son of the Norman Conqueror drove out the one man (Dolfin) of English blood who ruled as a prince in any corner of Britain, f The first care of William Rufus and his advisers, after adding the land of Carlisle to the English kingdom, was to make this new accession of territory available for the defence of the realm. The turris fortissimo, he caused to be built at Carlisle commanded the passage of the Eden, and one of the two only roads, both old Roman roads, by which wheeled carriages could enter this district from Scotland, while the castle of Bewcastle, built on and out of the ruins of the Roman station there, stopped the other road the Maiden Way if, indeed, that road was avail- able for wheeled carriages, for the gradients on some of its stages are certainly too severe. Between these two castles that at Carlisle and that at Bewcastle the country, save for bogs and morasses, lay open to the Scots, who came through Nichol Forest, each man on a little nag, with a bag of meal and an iron girdle hanging from his * Surtees Society, vol. li., pp. 143, 231. t See " The Place of Carlisle in English History," by E. A. Free- man, Archaeological Journal, vol. xxxix., where he also deals with the name of the city. The Land of Carlisle. 141 saddle. Light horse like these, wholly independent of carriages, and nearly so of roads, apt at threading the tracks through the bogs and morasses, made necessary an inner line of fortification which the Red King arranged to supply. South of Carlisle extensive plains, formerly known as Inglewood Forest, reach down to the town of Penrith. By referring to any map, it will be seen that the mountains of the lake country, on the one hand, and the long range of the Pennine hills on the other, so converge as to make the town of Penrith the centre of a line of about ten miles in length, in the direction of east and west, which must be crossed by invaders advancing from the Western Marches. It will be seen, also, that the natural passage from thence into the heart of England is by the ascent of the Valley of the Eden and over the pass of Stanemoor the route, in fact, traversed by the old Roman road, which continued for ages to be the great thoroughfare between Carlisle, the North, and the great plain of York. To secure this thoroughfare William Rufus gave orders for the building of a chain of castles. The first of these is Brougham Castle, occupying the point where the Roman road abutted on the camp of Brocavium, at the confluence of the rivers Lowther and Eamont, and commanding the waths. Ten miles higher up is Appleby Castle, situated in a strong position, and protected on three sides by the deep waters of the Eden ; ten miles further up the vale is Brough Castle, to defend the pass over Stanemoor; and still further up is Pendragon Castle, closing the passage up the vale of Mallerstang. The Maiden Way joined this road between Brougham and Appleby, and thus this chain of castles guarded the only road open for wheels from Carlisle and the West of Scotland into the heart of England, the great plain of York. The mountains of Shap were full of impervious defiles, and roadless, while the Roman coast road was barred by the castles of Cockermouth and Egremont, 142 History of Cumberland. which, though probably somewhat later in date, were all part of a well-conceived system of defence. Having thus fixed an iron grasp on the district added to his kingdom, William Rufus colonized it with Saxon families brought from the south, and also imported a number of Flemish masons to work on the fortifications he had designed, most of whom probably remained as settlers. We thus get the ethnological strata in the land of Carlisle as Briton (Welsh), Angle, Pict, Dane, Northman, Saxon, with a few Flemings, and a Jew or two at Carlisle. In the succeeding reign we find from several monastic charters that the land of Carlisle was in possession of Ranulf Meschyn. The real* foundation charter of the priory of Wetheral, as given by Dugdale, expresses that it was endowed by Ranulf Meschyn for the soul of King Henry, in addition to the members of his own family. " To that sovereign, therefore,'' says Mr. Hodgson-Hinde, " we may conclude he was indebted for the territory a portion of which is thus devoted in pious uses."t But Archdeacon Prescott has recently pointed outj that the MS. transcripts of the chartulary of Wetheral in the Harleian collection, and in the library of the Dean and Chapter of Carlisle, give the foundation charter of Wetheral as made pro anima Domini mei Regis Willielmi, and not Regis Henrici. It is possible Dugdale may be right after all, for he may have copied rightly from the original chartulary of Wetheral, which was once in possession of the Dean and Chapter of Carlisle. Meanwhile the point remains undetermined whether Ranulf Meschyn obtained the land of Carlisle during the last eight years of William II.'s life or in the reign of Henry I. * A spurious one by William the Conqueror is often quoted. f In the introduction to "The Pipe Rolls of the Counties of Cumberland, Westmorland, and Durham," p. xviii., published for the Newcastle Society of Antiquaries. J "Visitations in the Ancient Diocese of Carlisle," by J. E. Prescott, D.D., Archdeacon of Carlisle. Carlisle : Thurnams and Sons. The Land of Carlisle. 143 Ranulf Meschyn, or le Meschyn, otherwise Ranulph, or Randle, de Meschines, de Micenis, or de Mesel, was not one of those whose family came over with the Conqueror; nor was " De Meschines " the name of either his family, his 'estate, or his place of origin. His real or original name was " De Brichsard," or " De Briquessart," and he was, or his father, also a Ranulph de Brichsard, Viscount or Sheriff of the Bessin in Normandy, and one or the other of them is stated to have rendered important services to Henry I. during a rebellion in that country. The Ranulph with whom we have to deal appears to have been styled Ranulph le Meschyn, or the cadet, or the junior, that being the meaning of the term Meschyn. In his grant to the monks of Wetheral he is correctly denominated Ranulf Meschyn, which was Latinized into Ranulphus Meschinus, and retranslated into Ranulph de Meschines, the name he is best known by. His mother was Maud, or Matilda, sister of Hugh d'Avranches, surnamed Lupus, Earl of Chester, and he married Lucia, daughter of Yvo Talboise, and widow of Roger de Romara. Yvo Talboise was an Angevin, who had married a Lucia, heiress of an Englishman named Torold, who was lord of Spalding in Lincolnshire. Yvo had also a grant of the great pos- sessions known as Amounderness, which included the barony of Kendal, the south-west corner of what is now Cumberland, all Lancashire north of the Ribble, and the wapentake of Ewecross in Yorkshire. These possessions passed with Lucia de Romara, daughter of Yvo Talboise, to her second husband, Ranulf Meschyn. The land of Carlisle Ranulf Meschyn thus held is denned by the bishopric of Carlisle as it existed up to the changes of 1856 namely, modern Cumberland (the parish of Alston excepted) from the Solway to the Derwent, and the north part, or bottom, of modern Westmorland, being the barony of Appleby, sometimes called Applebyshire, and now the East and West Wards of that county. The 144 History of Cumberland. cadet's possessions, under royal grant, and in right of his wife, thus embraced a very large area in the north-west of England, as well as estates in Lincolnshire. The land of Carlisle was (we are inclined, though with diffidence, to fancy) a palatine jurisdiction, like the other march earldoms of Chester, Durham, Kent, and Shropshire, earldoms in which the Earls were endowed with the superiority of whole counties, so that all the landowners held feudally of them, in which they received the whole profits of the courts and exercised all the jura regalia, or royal rights, nominated the Sheriffs, held their own councils, and acted as independent Princes, except in the owing of homage and fealty to the King.* These earldoms were also part of the national defence of the realm, keeping the marches and borders exposed to attack. Ranulf Meschyn portioned off the border part of the land of Carlisle into three baronies, Gilsland and Lyddale, to guard the passes from Scotland by land, and Burgh, to guard the approaches by sea reserving to him- self the districts less liable to irruption, thus, on a smaller scale, imitating the policy of the Crown in defending the kingdom by the creation of these great palatine jurisdic- tions. The barony of Gilsland he gave to his brother William de Meschines, Lyddale to Turgis Brundis, a Fleming, and Burgh to Robert de Trivers, to whom he also gave the custody of the Forest of Cumberland. In 1120 Ranulf's nephew Richard, Earl of Chester, with numerous other youthful Norman nobles, perished in the White Ship with the unlucky Prince William, the only son of Henry I., and his possessions and earldom fell to the Crown. Ranulf Meschyn succeeded to the earldom of Chester, and surrendered to the Crown the land of Carlisle and the possessions in the north he had acquired in right of his wife Lucia. Now, the Crown had dis- covered that the policy of entrusting the defence of its borders and marches to great Earls, who enjoyed jura * Stubbs' "Constitutional History," vol. i., p. 271. The Land of Carlisle. 145 regalia, was a very bad policy for the Crown, because these great earls were hard to control. Thus it came to pass that no new earl of Carlisle, or Carleolum, was appointed, and so no county palatine of Carleolum has come down to us, an imperium in imperio, with its own barons and courts like those of Durham and Cheshire. The land of Carlisle, the barony of Kendal, and the strip of land intervening between them, were handed to sheriffs, and were divided into the two counties of Carliol and Westmaireland, and these counties were accounted for by their Sheriffs in the Pipe Roll of 31 Henry I., 1130, under these names. For effecting this division the land of Carlisle was torn into two, and the barony of Appleby was taken from it and added to the barony of Kendal to make the county of Westmaireland ; the remaining portion of the land of Carlisle, with the addition of the piece of Yorkshire between the Derwent and the Duddon, and the further addition of the parish of Alston, became the county of Carliol, which in the Pipe Roll of 23 Henry II., 1177, appears under the name of the county of Cumber- land ; this our readers we hope understand is not the same as the land, earldom, or district of Carlisle. The county of Cumberland is part of the land of Carlisle plus a piece of Yorkshire (now the Ward of Allerdale above Derwent), and plus the Northumbrian parish of Alston. The case of this parish presents some peculiarities. It was never part of the British kingdom of Cumbria as defined by the returns from the monastery of Carlisle to Edward I., viz., that district was called Cumbria which is now included in the bishoprics of Carlisle, Glasgow, and Whit- hern, together with the country between the bishopric of Carlisle and the river Duddon. As there is no pretence for saying Alston was ever part of the diocese of Carlisle, we have here positive proof that it never was part of the British kingdom of Cumbria, which was dismembered circa 1070. In 1130, or sixty years later, we find the Sheriff of Carleol 10 146 History of Cumberland. dealing with its revenues, and it has ever since been part of the county of Carleol or Cumberland. The reason of the anomaly is this : In 1130 there intervened between the counties of Cumberland and Northumberland, on the east side of the great watershed, firstly, the great franchise of Tyndale, which owned the King of Scotland for its chief lord ; secondly, more to the east, the great franchise of Hexham, which owned the Archbishop of York for its chief lord. These franchises were part of the English kingdom, held of the English Crown, who had jura regalia therein, but whose writs did not run therein. The parish of Alston is in the franchise of Tyndale, and is imme- diately contiguous to the county of Carleol or Cumber- land. It also contained a valuable silver mining district, and the Crown of England found it more convenient to collect its jura regalia therefrom by the hands of the Sheriff of Cumberland than by those of the Sheriff of Northumberland, and so Alston became, and now is, part of the county of Cumberland.* So much for the military, civil, and fiscal organization established by the Red King and his brother, Henry the Scholar. The ecclesiastical organization now demands our attention. When the Red King added the land of Carlisle to the English kingdom, there was no religious house in existence within its limits, and the Sees of Durham and of Glasgow put forth conflicting claims to jurisdiction over it, while that of Durham was more or less in possession of it. Henry I. founded a house of Augustinian canons at Carlisle in 1102, and appointed his chaplain, Adulf, Athelwulf, or ^Ethelwulf, prior thereof. His name proves him to have been an Englishman, and he was Prior of St. Oswald's, at Nostell, in Yorkshire. In 1133 Henry I. constituted the land of Carlisle into a bishopric, and appointed Athelwulf the first bishop. * See "Why Alston is in the Diocese of Durham and in the County of Cumberland," Transactions, Cumberland and Westmorland Anti- quarian and Archaological Society, vol. viii., p. 21. The Land of Carlisle. 147 To sum up. In 1032 the Red King came north with a large army, drove out Dolfin, and made the land of Carlisle part of the English kingdom. He, or Henry I., made it into an English earldom, and Henry I. made it into an English bishopric. Henry I. resumed the earldom, and then split the earldom of Carlisle, the barony of Kendal, and the strip of Yorkshire that intervened between those two honours into two counties, Westmaireland and Carliol. To the last of these the Northumbrian parish of Alston became united. In 1177 the county of Carliol became the county of Cumberland, a designation it has ever since retained. This accounts for the boundaries of the county of Cumberland and of the bishopric of Carlisle running across one another in the confusing way in which English boundaries generally do run. Ranulf Meschyn resigned the earldom of Carlisle in 1 120, but at some period before that date he gave to the Abbey of St. Mary at York, of which the priory of Wetheral was a cell, the manor of Wetheral on the river Eden, and considerable property, the churches of St. Michael and St. Lawrence, Appleby, and part of the tithes of Maiburn (Meaburn), and Salchild (Salkeld), and also the churches of Wederhal (Wetheral), and the chapel of Wartheuric (Warwick,), possessions which the Dean and Chapter of Carlisle enjoy to this day. 10 2 CHAPTER X. CUMBERLAND. WE set out in our first chapter the boundaries of the county of Cumberland, whose evolution we have since been endeavouring to describe. We have denned the ethnological strata in Cumberland as Briton (Welsh), Angle, Pict, Dane, Northman, Saxon, with a few Flemings, and a Jew or two at Carlisle. In our first chapter we discussed the various divisions of the Britons, their dis- tribution, and how far their language survives in the dialect and place-names of the present day. In a sub- sequent chapter the fifth we have expressed our opinion that the ethnologist fails to trace any influence made on the modern Cumbrian peasant by the Roman who so long ruled here, and the Roman we have therefore omitted from the list of ethnological strata. With the Angle the case is different. The Angles filled the country to that extent that they imposed their name upon a portion of the forest of Cumberland, namely, Inglewood, or Englewood, which is neither more nor less than the " English Wood." The colonies formed by these people are to be distinguished by the ending ton or tun, which originally meant the enclosure, or hedge, either of a single farm or of a village, and survives to this day in the word township (tunscipi).* The termination ton * Stubbs' " Constitutional History," vol. i., p. 82. Cumberland. 1 49 is rare in the mountain districts of Cumberland (and of Westmorland), but is of common occurrence in the great plain of Cumberland, and is generally found in the vicinity of a Roman road this the history we have related would induce us to expect ; the Angles, the conquering race, expelled the Britons from the best and most conveniently situated localities. Coming from Northumbria, by the Roman Wall and the good hard road along it, they quartered themselves at Denton, Walton, Brampton, Irthington, and Houghton all close to the Great Barrier. From Carlisle the great Roman road took them to Wigton. On the cross-roads between this trunk road and the Roman Wall they settled at Orton, Aikton, Oulton, Bampton and Easton, while the trunk-road itself passes Waverton, Brayton, and Hayton, to lead to Camerton, Seaton, Broughton, Workington, Harrington, Distington, Whitton (Whitehaven), Rottington, Frisington, and Irton. These settlements thus sweep round, but do not penetrate the mountainous district known as the Lake District. The Roman road from Carlisle to Penrith gave the Angles access to the English Forest (Inglewood), which they named, and in it we find Carleton, Morton, Hutton, Skelton, Newton, and Plumpton. By the Maiden Way the Angles got, south of the Wall, to Alston, and to Dufton, Marton, Bolton and Orton, all in Westmorland, and by the High Street to Clifton, Helton, and Bampton, in that county. North of the Wall, in Cumberland, they penetrated by the Maiden Way to Askerton and Stapleton, and by the Roman road, north from Carlisle, to Stainton, Westlinton, and Kirklinton, and Easton, or Eston.* In this last vicinity are many places ending in town, as Long- town, Englishtown, Frankstown, Joestown, etc. ; but these are all of later date, and most of them go no further back, if so far, than the settlement of the Debateable * Sullivan's "Cumberland and Westmorland, Ancient and Modern," P- 43- 150 History of Cumberland. Lands, when the Scotsdike was made. Some of the places which end in ton or tun were probably named at a later period by the people brought north by the Red King to teach the inhabitants agriculture. Carleton and others in the Forest may owe their names to this. But the way in which the tons lie near the Roman roads shows the settlement to have come from Northumbria, and it is certain that while the district was part of that great king- dom, numbers of Angles would settle in it. Many of these names in ton are those of tribal settle- ments, thus : Camerton is the ton or tfin of the Cameningas. Distington , Distingas. Frisington Harrington Irthington Rottington Workimrton Frisingas. Hearingas. IrSingas. Rotingas. Weorcingas. The Saxon equivalent of ton, or tun, is heim and ham, but, as history would lead us to expect, we find only few instances in Cumberland ; Whicham, Brigham, and Dear- ham would appear to prove that the Saxons strayed up from Lancashire and Westmorland, where, near the lakes and rivers, they are not uncommon ; they penetrated as far as Sebergham.* The corresponding Danish term is by, a word from which we get " bye-laws " i.e., " town laws." This ter- mination is generally to be found in the plain of Cumber- land, thick round Carlisle, and sweeping round the same country as the tons, thus showing that Danes, as well as Angles, could pick the most fertile and best localities. There are in the two counties of Cumberland and West- morland about sixty names which end in by. Like the tons, they are limited by the open country, extending in a * Sullivan's "Cumberland and Westmorland, Ancient and Modern," P- 43- Cumberland. 151 circular sweep from Appleby on the south-east, over the Cumbrian plain, to Allonby on the Solway ; thence skirt- ing the sea-coast to Moresby, near Whitehaven, and cropping out again as far down south-west as Pon- sonby. The same meaning belongs to the Norse word gardr, which we find under the form garth and guards, as at Dalegarth, Mellguards, and Garlands. But the most characteristic termination in the district is thwaite, the Norse thveit, Danish tved ; it signifies a clearing in the fells. More than one hundred instances of it can be found in Cumberland, situated mainly in the high ground avoided by the bys and the tons, while the garths seem to occur on its verge. If we take thwaite to be Danish, it would prove the Danes to have overrun the country, plains and mountains alike ; if it be Norse it points to a Norse invasion and settlement of the country unrecorded in history, but written in its place-names. This view is strongly supported by Mr. Robert Ferguson, F.S.A., in his " Northmen in Cumberland and Westmorland " ; he accounts for the presence of this and other Norse names by the supposition that at the end of the tenth century bands of Norsemen, descending from the Isle of Man, where in the course of their rovings they had at that time fixed their headquarters, effected a landing on the opposite coasts of Cumberland, and permanently settled in a dis- trict which would present so many natural features to remind them of their native land. Two very common terminations in Cumberland are the words scale and shield. Both mean the same thing a temporary shelter, or log hut, used for protecting cattle and their keepers on the fells during the summer. Now, it is curious that shield is confined almost entirely to the east of the county, its most western point being Wetheral Shields. It is very common in Northumberland. Scale is entirely confined to the west of Cumberland. The 152 History of Cumberland. latter word represents the old Norse skale, and the former the Danish word skial. The positions on the map of Cum- berland in which these terminations are found point to a Danish colonization from the east and a Norse one from the west. The distribution on the map of the Danish bys and the Norse thwaites also points to the same conclusion. Scale is frequently found in West Cumberland joined to the Old Norse Bol, a dwelling, making Bol-scale, or Bow- scale. We have before quoted from Mr. Robert Ferguson's " Dialect of Cumberland " a passage in which he proves the local rivers to retain their original Celtic names. From that valuable work we again quote : So far as the words descriptive of the physical characteristics of the country may serve to indicate the ownership of the soil, a nomencla- ture distinctly Scandinavian would seem to prove that it had passed away from its original owners to their northern invaders. The words by and thorp, a village ;fell, a mountain ; how, a hill ; force, a water- fall ; tarn, a small lake ivath, a ford ; dowp and wick, a bay ; gill, a small ravine ; with, a wood ; hind, a grove ; thuiaite, a clearing ; carr, a low damp grove ; flow, a bog characteristic Scandinavian words, most of them living terms of the dialect, and all of them of constant occurrence in the names of places, distinctly assert the occupation of the district by the Northmen.* Many words now in use in the Cumberland dialect referring to property of another kind are Norse : thus, twinter, a two-year-old sheep, and trinter, a three-year-old, are used alike in Cumberland and in Iceland ; so in Cum- berland a female lamb is a gimmer-lamb ; in Icelandic, lamb-gymber, and in Danish, gimmerlam. The hig-mark a bit cut out of a sheep's ear that it may be recognised by its owner is in Iceland the logg-mark ; log is law, and the lug-mark of Cumberland and the logg-mark of Iceland is the lawful or legal mark by which the sheep of one farm can be distinguished from those of another. The smit, or * "The Dialect of Cumberland," by Robert Ferguson, F.S.A^ p. 215. Cumberland. 153 smear, of colour, generally red, by which sheep are marked, occurs in the Bible of Ulphilas in the same sense of a smear.* Another proof may be found in the carving on the knitting-sheaths made and used by the Cumberland peasantry at the present day ; the traditional patterns are decidedly Scandinavian. f There can, then, be no doubt that there was a most extensive colonization of Cumberland by Norsemen utterly unrecorded by historians, except in an obscure passage in Henry of Huntingdon {ante, p. 136), but which has left abiding traces behind it in the place-names and the language of the district. The evidences have been carefully collected, and their value carefully weighed, by Mr. Robert Ferguson in his two works, " The Northmen in Cumberland and Westmorland," and " The Dialect of Cumberland." To sum up, then. The pre- Aryan dolicho- cephalic men that once inhabited this region were superseded by Aryan races first, by Hiberno-Celts, who spoke Gadhelic, or Gaelic, the Goidels, who landed in the north and east of Britain, and then by Cambro-Celts, or Brythons, who landed on the south or south-west, and who spoke Cymric or Welsh. Both these people settled in this district, and the previous possessors a Lapp- or Finn-like race would soon be conquered by these Celts, whom Max Miiller describes as the equals in physical beauty and in intellec- tual vigour of the Saxons, Romans, and Greeks.J To the Celts (Britons, or Welsh, as they are generally called) in Cumberland came, as conquerors, the Romans, and for 400 years held the land in thrall by means of a powerful * " Lakeland and Iceland," by Rev. T. Ell wood, Transactions^ Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, vol. ix., p. 383. f Knitting-sheaths, Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmor- land Antiquarian and Archaological Society, vol. vi., p. 91. J " Chips from a German Workshop," vol. iii., p. 249. 154 History of Cumberland. and motley garrison drawn from almost every nation known to the ancients, but which has left no traces that the ethnologist or philologist can seize ; the works of the Roman alone defy the obliterating influence of Time. Then followed another Aryan invasion, a Teutonic one, this the English invasion Angles from the east and Saxons (but a few) from the south ; then came the Danes from the east and the Norsemen from the west. To all these elements of population there was added, in the days of the sons of William the Conqueror, a Low Dutch element, English and Flemish settlers, and a few great Norman barons. We quote from the " Crania Britannica," vol. i., p. 215 et seq., Dr. Thurnam's account of the Cumberland peasants, which will be found to agree with their his- tory : The populations of Cumberland and Westmorland, of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, exhibit unequivocal signs of a Scandinavian strain. Those of the first county are a tall, light-complexioned, long-faced, handsome, and, in every sense, powerful people, whether they claim Danish or Noise descent most probably the latter. The Cumber- land peasantry, like their neighbours of Westmorland, are remarkable for their stature. The average has been estimated without measure- ment by a close observer to be 5 feet 9 inches for the men, and 5 feet 5 inches for the women. The average stature of the rural police is 5 feet ii inches, whilst that of the Westmorland portion exceeds 6 feet. The bones of the Cumbrian people are large, the skeleton strong, and the limbs decidedly long. They are not a very bulky people, nor yet very fleshy ; still they are athletic, and they are free in their movements. They are famous for feats of wrestling, or "rustling" ; and men noted for their dexterity in this sport have been observed to have long ape-like arms. The countenance is fair and handsome ; the face is long and orthognathous ; the forehead of good height and breadth, indicating fully developed anterior lobes of the cerebrum ; the nose is straight on the dorsum or slightly sinuous, long, rather slender and prominent, often rising high at the root between the eyes, and having the tip standing out over the lip ; the chin is not narrow or receding, but rather the contrary ; the hair is generally of a light shade of brown, or fair, very seldom red, rarely Cumberland. 155 dark, with an absence of black, and not curly ; the body is marked by an inferior degree of hairiness. Grey and blue eyes vastly pre- ponderate, the darker colour being rare. . . . The inhabitants of Cumberland are an acute, shrewd people ; active, industrious, vigorous, enterprising, trustworthy whether in a virtuous or vicious cause manifesting unusual energy and determination. Everything about them is clean and respectable, not squalid, mean or paltry. In all these elements they are most unlike the Celtic races. Their native pastime, wrestling, is a fitting sport for such a fine, bold, athletic population. In a foot-note Dr. Thurnam says : A more minute delineation of the Cumbrian features, character and tastes describes them thus : Countenance not very expressive ; intel- lect shrewd and wary, but rather slow, not bright but safe, true and persevering, long in maturing. The mathematical sciences have often been efficiently cultivated ; but in all those embraced in the division of belles lettres there is mostly a betrayal of defective aptitude. [This agrees with what was observed of the Norse people of Ness.] Little communicative, not excitable, yet when roused by a sense of unfair- ness, resolute. Of great integrity and honesty of purpose, but not very candid or open ; far-seeing and acquisitive, but at the same time warm-hearted, kind, and " clannish." In the enjoyment of fun, they may be rude, but are not cruel. Severe bodily exertion marks their pastime, which constitutes a Herculean strife, conducted with faultless honour the manifestation of strength of body and mind. Traces of the Teutonic land system introduced into Cumberland by the Angles can readily be found. The boundaries of some of the tons, or tfins, and the marks around them can clearly be traced at the present day. The neighbouring villages of Dalston and Orton are typical instances : in both cases by old hedges, and by a little help from the inclosure maps, the stout thorn hedge and bank that surrounded the township lands can clearly be traced ; the "bars," or gates, where the roads through the township lands left them and entered upon the mark, or unenclosed common, which surrounded the lands, are still to be found. It would be no impossible thing to trace out from old maps and old hedges the marks between all the townships of Dalston parish. The inclosure map 156 History of Cumberland. of Dalston is an epitome of English history. Looking at it, one can imagine the original assarts, the tons swelling out until the lessening marks between them become mere strips of common ; then the tons coalesce and become a parish ; parishes coalesce into higher organizations ; the intermediate commons are enclosed, and the marks once reckoned " accursed " gleam with golden harvest. The map of the village of Orton well merits the attention of anyone who is curious about Teutonic settlements. The long, narrow fields point to the land having been in rig and reann, and that itself points to a time when the Teutonic inhabitants of Orton cultivated their land in common when it was, in fact, the property of the village community, and not of individuals. CHAPTER XI. THE NORMAN SETTLEMENT : I. THE BARONIES. RANULF MESCHYN, or Ranulph de Meschines, to take the ^ name he is best known by, on becoming possessed of the land of Carlisle, imitated the policy of his superiors, who maintained the earldoms of Northumbria and Carleol as barriers against the Scots. He parcelled out the most exposed part of the land of Carlisle into three baronies, viz., Gilsland, Lyddale or Liddell, and Burgh-by-Sands. Of these the last, Burgh-by-Sands, extended, along the shore of the Solway and the left bank of the river Eden, from Carlisle to the northern Morecambe Bay ; it thus blocked the waths over Eden which exist between that city and the sea. Liddell lay along the river of that name and the Esk, thus blocking the waths over those rivers and the main road into the south-west of Scotland. Gils- land, further to the east, blocked the Maiden Way and the land-tracks from Scotland, and also, extending from the right bank of the Eden to the eastern fells, stopped an enemy from advancing into England up that side of the river. When Henry I. had resumed possession of the land of Carlisle and invented the counties of Carleol, or Cumberland, and of Westmorland, he carved five additional baronies out of the county of Cumberland, viz., Copeland, Allerdale, Wigton, Graystock, and Leving- ton, reserving to the Crown the city of Carlisle and the 158 History of Cumberland. Forest of Cumberland. Within the limits of the Forest, besides the forest lands, were many manors, some of royal demesne, others held by individuals under grants from the Crown. Two manors held by the Church, Dalston and Linstock, otherwise called Crosby, are fre- quently reckoned as baronies, and several manors in the Forest held by Adam FitzSwein are sometimes also reckoned as a barony, without a name. The influence which the owners of these great estates have had, and still continue to have, on the political fortunes of Cumberland, ay, and even, at times, upon those of England, is so important that we must presently trace seriatim, but briefly, the devolution of these eight baronies and of the Forest down to the present time, even at the risk of postponing a more chronological history of local events ; and in so doing we shall avail ourselves fully of Mr. Hodgson-Hinde's able introduction to "The Pipe Rolls, or Sheriff's Annual Accounts for the Counties of Cumberland, Westmorland, and Durham " during the reigns of Henry II., Richard I., and John, published in 1848 by the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-on-Tyne. Doomsday Book gives, for reasons which it ought not to be necessary to explain to those who have read this volume so far, no information as to Cumberland with the exception of a small piece at its south-west angle. The earliest national document that does is an isolated Pipe Roll of 31 Henry I., printed by the Record Com- missioners. It has more than once been quoted already in this volume. No other Pipe Rolls are in existence until the accession of Henry II., and from that time they come down in an almost unbroken series. A volume called the "Testa de Neville," compiled in the reign of King John, is the next record of the nature of a general survey. It is founded on inquisitions taken in each county, and gives the name of the existing possessor of each barony, and of the original grantee from whom he The Norman Settlement: /. The Baronies. 159 derived his title, and the source of the grant. It forms the foundation of the territorial history of Cumberland, and it is especially valuable as a means of correcting the gross errors contained in the fabricated " Chronicon Cumbrias," printed by Dugdale, on the authority of which undue reliance has been placed by the modern historians of Cumberland. Following this erroneous " Chronicon Cumbriae," all existing histories of Cumberland have fallen into the mistake of deducing the titles of all the estates in Cumberland from Ranulf de Micenis, whereas this is the case with two only. The bulk of the remainder were granted directly by the Crown in the reign of Henry I. ; Gilsland and two or three others by Henry II. ; and the remainder to one individual by Richard I.* Richard I. is a misprint, we venture to suggest, for Richard II., who granted lands in Cumberland forfeited by John Balliol unto Ranulf Nevil, Earl of Westmor- 1 land. The course of the settlement of Cumberland met with an interruption, which we must here record. On the death of Henry I. a question arose as to the succession to the throne of England, and Stephen of Blois, by his bold-J/ ness and readiness, succeeded in mounting the throne almost before the rival claimant, the Empress Matilda, could move ; the usurpation was submitted to. " Only the old King of Scots took up arms on behalf of his niece, and he was pacified by the surrender of Carlisle, although he declined to do homage in consideration of his oath to the Empress. "t Cumberland, and apparently Westmorland, were both given to David, King of Scots, as the price of his acquiescence in the usurpation of Stephen, and to them, or great part thereof (the land of Carlisle), the readers of * " Early History of Cumberland," Archceological Journal, vol. xvi., p. 234. t Stubbs' "Constitutional History," vol. i., p. 321. 160 History of Cumberland. \f their previous history will see David had, from a Scottish point of view, a strong claim. At Carlisle David held court. Many of his charters are dated at that place, and his son Henry assumed the title of Prince of Cumberland, did homage instead of his father, and granted large estates in Cumberland to the abbey of Holm Cultram. In 3 Henry II. Cumberland was finally reannexed to the Crown of England, though not without many efforts on the part of the Scotch, both by arms and diplomacy, to recover so valuable a possession. At length the claims of Scotland were compromised by the mediation of Cardinal Otho, the Papal Legate in 1242, in the reign of Henry III. For some years the Kings of Scotland had held the franchise of Tyndale, contiguous to the extreme eastern boundary of Cumberland, and they had awarded to them in addition the manors of Penrith, Sowerby, Langwathby, Salkeld, Carlattan, and Scotby, being all the Crown demesnes in Cumberland with the exception of the city of Carlisle. We must now take the baronies seriatim. Gilsland. This barony was given by Ranulph de Meschines to his brother, William de Meschines, who was unable to reduce it into possession. Gilsland evidently, from an early period, formed the estate of some great thane or chieftain, whose residence was at the mote of Irthington, and who in the reign of Henry I. was one Gill, or Gilles, the son of Bueth. Gilles managed to retain his estates so long as he lived, but Henry II. granted them to Hubert de Vallibus by the description of totam tcrram quam Gilbertus filius Boet tenuit die quo fuit vivus et mortuus, de quocumque illam tenuisset. Corby and Catterlen, though apparently not belonging to the estates held by Gilles, the son of Bueth, were also granted de incremento, and thus became part of the barony, or, at any rate, held with it ; the whole The Norman Settlement : I. The Baronies. 161 was to be held per serviciam duorum militum. The charter is dated at Newcastle-on-Tyne, and is witnessed by the Archbishop of York, the Bishops of Lincoln and Durham, the Earl of Norfolk, and many others, all Normans by their names, except Turg' de Russedal, who is the same as Turgis Brundis, the Fleming who had received the barony of Lyddale.* The boundaries of this great franchise were last ridden in 1840. Starting from the point where the Northsceugh, or Broad, Beck runs into the river Eden, near Holm- wrangle, the southern boundary of the barony is the southern boundary of the parishes of Cumwhitton and Croglin, until the boundary of Croglin reaches the divide between Cumberland and Northumberland ; that divide forms the eastern boundary of the barony until the parish of Bewcastle is reached at Irthing Head ; the southern boundary of that parish forms the northern boundary of the barony, running down the Kirkbeck into the White Line, and down the White Line into the Black Line, and down the united rivers, the Line, to a point near Shank Castle, thus dividing the parish of Stapleton into two parts, or manors, one of which is within, the other with- out the barony. From the point near Shank Castle the boundary line forms a most extraordinary loop to the east, so as to exclude from the ambit of the barony the parishes of Kirklinton, Scaleby, and Walton ; it next runs between the parishes of Irthington and Crosby, denned by an earthwork, known indifferently as the Baron's Dyke, and the Bishop's Dyke, to the river Eden, and up that river to Holmwrangle. From a survey of the barony made by order of Lord William Howard in 1603, it is clear that the whole of the parish of Walton, and portions of the parishes of Kirklinton and Scaleby, were then considered to be within the barony. In all proba- * See Inq. Ad. q. d., 2 Edward III., cited Lysons' "Cumberland," p. n, n. II 1 62 History of Cumberland. bility the present boundaries of the barony, except where it abuts on the river Eden, the county of Northumber- land, and the parish of Bewcastle, are not the same as in the days of the first baron, Hubert de Vallibus. To closely investigate the changes and their reasons would be to go into manorial history on a scale only possible in a county history of the good old-fashioned style and size. Hubert de Vallibus, the first baron of Gilsland, was a Norman, fourth son of Robert de Vallibus, or de Vaux> who, in 1086, held property in Norfolk, at Pentney. Hubert de Vallibus followed the fortunes of the young Prince Henry in his long struggle with Stephen. He was probably an old man when he received the reward of his services in a grant of Gilsland. His son, Robert de Vallibus, second baron, fills a large space in history and legend ; but we dismiss as fabulous that legend which credits him with the treacherous murder, during a truce, of Gilles, the son of Bueth. This Robert de Vallibus defended the city and castle of Carlisle, in the war of 1173 and 1174, against William the Lion of Scotland, and the determined front he showed, impervious alike to threats or bribes, checked the progress of the King of Scotland. The parley between De Vallibus, or De Vaux, and the Scottish leaders, as told in rhyming Norman- French by Jordan Fantosme, would make a fine subject for a picture. In all, five Barons de Vallibus, or de Vaux, ruled over Gilsland, of whom the last, Hubert, left one sole daughter and heiress, Maud or Matilda. These Barons de Vallibus were among the greater barons of England, and as such Robert de Vallibus, 4th Baron, was summoned personally to Parliament, sigillatim per litteras nostras, in pursuance of the I4th clause of the Great Charter, Gils- land being a barony by writ. The heiress, Maud de Vallibus, married Thomas de Multon, son of Thomas de Multon, of Multon, or Moulton, The Norman Settlement: /. The Baronies. 163 near Spalding, in Lincolnshire. Whether the De Multons were Englishmen or Normans does not appear, but the fact that they derived their name from an English estate is against their having been persons of consequence on the Continent. They may have been retainers or connec- * tions of the Angevin Ivo Tailboise in right of his English wife Lucia, mother of the Lucia who married Ranulf Meschin. The connection is suggestive, and probably accounts for the appearance of the De Multons in Cum- berland. Thomas de Multon the elder was sheriff of Lincolnshire in the Qth and loth of King John. He had a grant of the custody of Amabil and Alice de Lucy, co- heiresses of Richard de Lucy, Baron of Egremont in Cumberland. These ladies he married to his sons Lam- bert and Alan de Multon, and from them sprang the families of Multon of Egremont and Lucy of Cocker- mouth, whose fortunes we need not at present further to pursue. Thomas de Multon the elder followed up this great matrimonial coup by another ; he himself married Ada de Lucy, the widowed mother of the two young ladies, and herself the coheiress of Hugh de Morville. Thomas de Multon the elder thus became forester of Cumberland, and seised of a moiety of the barony of Burgh-by-Sands in that county, and other estates. By his second wife, Ada, he had a son, Thomas de Multon the younger, who inherited a full share of the Multon matrimonial sagacity. He married Maud de Vallibus, and so became Thomas de Multon de Gilsland ; but beyond that he makes little mark. His wife, Maud or Matilda, was domina de Gilsland ; she outlived her hus- band, her son, and her grandson, and continued domina de Gilsland to the day of her death, in 1295, sitting on the bench at Assizes at Penrith as domina de Gilsland a " grand old woman," if indeed she should not rather be called a " grand old man," for, in 19 Edward I. she was summoned to Parliament as MatilV de Multon d'n's de II 2 164 History of Cumberland. Gillesland. She was succeeded in her estates by her great- grandson, Thomas de Multon de Gilsland, who was sum- moned to Parliament as such, thus maintaining the posi- tion of the barony as a barony by writ, and of the lords thereof among the greater barons. He died in 1313, leaving an heiress, Margaret de Multon, a child just entering on her teens, between whom and Ranulph de Dacre a marriage had been arranged by their parents when both were very young indeed. This arrangement had, however, been superseded, prior to the death of Thomas de Multon de Gilsland, by another, a much more brilliant alliance, under which Margaret de Multon was betrothed to Robert de Clifford, the seven-year-old heir of the Robert Clifford who had inherited the great estates of the Vipounts in Westmorland, and who fell at Bannock- burn in 1314. Edward II. committed the estates of the Cliffords and the heiress of Gilsland to the guardianship >x of Guy Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick. But when the lady was " sweet seventeen," she asserted her own right to a say in the matter, and eloped by night from Warwick Castle with Ranulph de Dacre. Ranulph got into a scrape for this exploit, and Lord William Howard records it thus : Pat 28 Oct A ii Ed. III. (should be II.). Ranulph de Dacre pardoned for stealing awai in the nighte out of the king's custody from his Castell of Warwick of Margaret, daughter and heir of Thomas of Molton of Gilsland, who helde of y e kinge in capite, and was within age, whearof the sayd Ranulphe standeth indighted in curia regis. Let us hope the stealing away was mutual, and one of hearts, and that Ranulph did not steal awai the young lady solely quia jus habuit ad illam, as the chronicle of Lanercost says. The barony of Gilsland thus came into possession of the family of De Dacre, or De Dacor, who took their name from Dacre, or Dacor, a manor in Cum- berland of which they were lords under the Baron of The Norman Settlement: /. The Baronies. 165 Greystoke. Among the great families of Cumberland the martial house of Dacre stands out the most prominent. So far back as ever they can be traced they are avroydoves of the soil, De Dacres of Dacre. The first that is known is William de Dacre of Dacre, sheriff of Cumberland in 20 Henry III., and great-grandfather of the daring and lucky wooer who carried off the young " lady of Gilsland." The Dacres, So daring in love, and so dauntless in war, are ever inseparably connected in history and legend with memories of Flodden, of border warfare and border raids, while their wild slogan of " a Daker, a Daker, a read bull, a read bull," was ever a terror to the Scotch, as their banner of martial red, with its silver escallops, was ever a rallying-point for the English bordermen. Ranulph de Dacre was succeeded in the estates and honours by three sons, a grandson and a great grandson. The death, in 36 Henry VI., of the last of these, Thomas Dacre by name, brought about a remarkable severance of the estates and honours. The old Multon Lincolnshire property and the dignity of Lord Dacre devolved upon the heir general, Joan, wife of Sir Richard Fenys, and daughter of Thomas Dacre's eldest son, who had died vita parentis. From her descend the Dacres of the South, who still enjoy that title. The bulk of the property fell to the heir male, the second son of Thomas Dacre, namely, Ranulph de Dacre, who received a writ of summons to Parliament as Ranulph Dacre of Gilsland. But he was presently knocked on the head at Towtonfield ; his blood was attainted, as was that of his brother Humphrey, who succeeded. The estates were forfeited, and the bulk of them granted to Lady Joan. Humphrey, however, re- covered them, and was summoned to Parliament as Lord Dacre de Gilsland, and he and his descendants enjoyed the dignity of " Lord Dacre of the North." In 1 66 History of Cumberland. 2 Richard III. this Humphrey Dacre became Lord Warden of the Marches the first of his family to hold that famous office, which has become almost identified with the lords of Gilsland. He died in i Henry VII., leaving a numerous family by his wife, Mabel Parr, daughter of Sir Thomas Parr, and great-aunt to Queen Katherine. He and his wife lie buried under a fine tomb adjoining the north side of the choir at Lanercost, on which their names and arms are carved in relief. To Humphrey succeeded his son and heir, Thomas Dacre, probably the best known of his race. He, like his ancestor, Ranulph de Dacre, stole away his wife in the night. In this case the lady was Elizabeth de Greystoke, ultimately the heiress of the entire baronies of Greystoke and Fitzwilliam, of a moiety of the baronies of Bolbeck and Wemme, a fourth part of that of Montfichet, and a third of a moiety of that of Morley or Morpeth, and also of the manor of Hinderskelfe. The lady was at Brougham Castle, in care of the Cliffords, when Thomas Dacre stole her away by night. No doubt she was destined for one of that family, and thus a second time did a Dacre dis- appoint a Clifford of a well " tochered " bride. And it is not too much to say that the midnight Sittings of Mar- garet de Multon and Elizabeth de Greystoke, two girls in their teens, have largely coloured the political complexion of the county of Cumberland nay, have almost affected the fortunes of this kingdom. Thomas Dacre served at the siege of Norham Castle with Lord Surrey. Under that nobleman he commanded the reserve at Flodden Field, and greatly contributed to the victory. He was made a Knight of the Garter, and was Lord Warden of the Marches from i Henry VIII. until his death in 17 Henry VIII. In that office he acted with vigour and severity. As an instance we may cite the "jornay " he devised in 1525, the year of his death, That the whole garrison with the inhabitants of the country were to meet at Howtell Swyre upon Mondaye, at iiij of the clock, aft'nons the The Norman Settlement: /. The Baronies. 167 xxix of Junij, and the said company by the suffrance of God to ride into Scotland, and to cast down the towr of Kelso Abbaye and to burne the towne ; the town of Sm'lawes, the town of Ormyston, and the Mossehouse. Severe abroad, Sir Thomas Dacre, or Lord Thomas Dacre, as he was called, was careful at home. He took strict care that the Scots should have little chance of making reprisals in England. He built Askerton Castle, as his initials show, to guard against inroads from Scot- land by Bewcastle arid the Maiden Way. He built Drum- burgh Castle, out of materials from the Roman Wall, to stop invasions across the Solway, and his arms, with the garter round them, are still over the door of the farmhouse into which the castle has been converted. He also built the outworks and much of the upper part of Naworth Castle. Lord Thomas Dacre died in 1525, and he and his wife, Elizabeth de Greystoke, are buried at Lanercost, under a tomb on the south side of the choir. His eldest son succeeded as William, Lord Dacre of Gilisland and Greystoke, and as Lord Warden of the Marches, in which capacity he is admitted to have been rough upon the Scots, for, being indicted for treason at Westminster, he was acquitted by his peers, as Dugdale says : By reason that the witnesses were Scotchmen of mean condition, who were thought to be suborned, and to speak maliciously against him, in regard of his severity towards them as Warden of the Marches. Lord William stood aloof from Aske's rebellion. He was Governor of Carlisle in the reigns of Edward VI., Elizabeth, and Mary, though not continuously. He died in 1563, and was buried in Carlisle Cathedral, leaving five sons Thomas, Leonard, Francis, George, and Edward and five daughters. Thomas succeeded his father as Lord Dacre, but died in 1566, leaving one son, George, a lad not five years old, and three daughters, Ann, Elizabeth, and Mary, of whom the eldest, Ann, was little over twelve 1 68 History of Cumberland. years of age at her father's death. The mother of these children was Elizabeth Leybourne, daughter to Sir James Leybourne, of Cunswick, co. Westmorland. She married, shortly after her first husband's death, Thomas, Duke of Norfolk, as third wife, but she did not long survive. Shortly after his mother's death the little Lord George was killed by a fall from a wooden horse, and thus his three sisters became his coheirs, who all being minors, the Duke, their stepfather, obtained a grant of their wardship and marriage, and disposed of them to his three sons : Ann marrying the Earl of Arundel; Mary, Thomas, Lord Howard of Walden, afterwards Earl of Suffolk ; and Elizabeth, Lord William Howard, the Duke's third son. A great controversy arose about the dignities and possessions of the young lord so unfortunately killed, and the controversy divided into two separate questions that of the dignities and that of the possessions. A Commis- sion appointed for that purpose decided that the dignities did not go to the heir male, Leonard Dacre, but to the heirs general. High authorities have doubted the correct- ness of this decision, but it prevailed. Thus the barony of Dacre of Gilsland, or of the North, fell into abeyance between the three coheirs, and has ever since remained in abeyance, for the dignity of Baron Dacre of Gilsland, now held by the Earl of Carlisle, is a new creation by patent, in the year 1660, with precedence from that date. The controversy as to the possessions of the little Lord Dacre was more important and more protracted, and is too long for these pages. It has been most ably and clearly gone into by the Rev. G. Ornsby, F.S.A., in the preface to his valuable edition of Lord William Howard's Household Books.* Three of the Dacre uncles in succes- sion tried to wrest the estates from their young nieces, * Surtees Society, vol. Ixviii. The Norman Settlement: I. The Baronies. 169 and Queen Elizabeth put in her claim to them, but the ladies ultimately prevailed, though they had to redeem their possessions as mere strangers at a very high rate about 10,000 a piece. Lady Elizabeth Dacre thus brought to her husband, Lord William Howard, great share of the Dacres' estates, including the barony of Gils- land, which has ever since remained with the Howards, and is now the property of the Earl of Carlisle.* Around Lord William Howard there has accrued a number of wild and picturesque legends, upon which it has been Mr. Ornsby's ungrateful task to have to throw the light of historical research. Lord William Howard never was Lord Warden, nor did he keep a garrison at Naworth. The stories of his sharp and summary severity are accretions round his name of the doings of his pre- decessors, Lords Thomas and William Dacre ; he was indeed active and energetic in bringing offenders to justice, but it was to justice administered by the law of the land. Lord William Howard was a scholar, deeply imbued with a love of literature, and of the society of learned men, a keen antiquary, and yet an able adminis- trator of both public and private affairs. Mr. Ornsby says of him : The strength and resolution of Lord William's character, his stern determination to uphold, at all hazards, the majesty of the law, his high-minded integrity of purpose, and his abhorrence of all that was base and ignoble, left unquestionably an impress, strong and lasting, upon the country over which his influence extended. The original caput baronicz of the barony of Gilsland was at Irthington ; the barons of the lines of De Vaux and Multon never lived at Naworth Castle. It did not exist as a residence in their days. Though the Vaux * For a fuller account of the descent of this barony, see "The Barony of Gilsland and its Owners," by the author, Transactions^ Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archtzological Society, vol. iv., p. 446. 170 History of Cumberland. seem to have dearly loved the north, the Multons preferred Holbeache in Lincolnshire, and even the Dacres, who created Naworth, seemed to have resided at Kirkoswald. Lord William Howard made Naworth Castle into an English home. Lyddale. The barony of Lyddale, Lyddall, or Liddell, was granted by Ranulph de Meschines to one Turgis Brundis, or Turgis Brundus, or Turgent Brundy, otherwise Turgis de Russedal, a Fleming, of whom nothing is on record save that he had a son Guy and a grandson Ranulph. The barony passed with an heiress of the family to Nicholas de Stuteville, or Estoteville, who is recorded in the "Testa de Neville " as the proprietor of the barony in the reign of King John. By one or more heiresses it came to the Wakes. John, Lord Wake, died without issue in 1343, and the barony went with his sister to her husband, Edmund Plantagenet, Earl of Kent, and to her daughter Joan, " the Fair Maid of Kent," and wife of Edward the Black Prince. Edward III. appears to have purchased it, and to have settled it upon his third son, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and the barony was long held as parcel of the duchy of Lancaster. The barony consisted of the two parishes of Arthuret and Kirkandrews-on-Esk, which last included the wild district known as Nichol Forest, from its whilom owner Nicholas de Stuteville. In 1604 James I. sold to George, Earl of Cumberland, the lands of the barony, namely, Nichol Forest, the manors of Arthuret, Liddell and Randalinton, the Fishery of Esk, and the Debateable Ground about 5,400 acres. The next Earl, Francis, sold this vast estate to Richard Graham, son of Fergus Graham, of the Plump. From this Richard descend the Grahams of Esk, and of Netherby, in Cumberland, and of Norton Conyers, in Yorkshire. Richard Graham was in the service of the The Norman Settlement: I. The Baronies. 171 Duke of Buckingham, and rose, through the Duke's interest, to high favour with James I. and Prince Charles, whom he accompanied on his journey into Spain. He was created a baronet, fought hard for his royal patrons at Edgehill, where he was left for dead, but survived, and died in 1653. His grandson, Sir Richard Graham, of Esk, was created by James II. Viscount Preston, in the Peerage of Scotland, a title now extinct. The history of this barony lacks the strong personal interest that attaches to that of the barony of Gilsland. George, Earl of Cum- berland, Richard Graham, and Lord Preston, are most interesting personages, but they do not smack of the history of the county as do the Dacres and Lord William Howard. Like the Dacres, the Grahams are, we think, avToxdoves of the county, at any rate of the borders, though the tangled skein of the pedigree of Fergus Graham of the Plump is a puzzle whose unravelling we prefer to leave to others. Sir J. R. G. Graham will ever hold an elevated position among modern Cumberland worthies. To his sagacity and energy are due the im- provements which have brought this once wild district to a high rank among landed estates. No castle or house on the barony holds the position or the prestige that Naworth does in the barony of Gilsland, but the barons appear not to have been resident. Liddell Moat was probably the original caput baronice, and its vast earthworks are remarkable for size and preservation. Bur gh-by -Sands. ^ The barony of Burgh-by-Sands is bounded towards its south-east by the high road from Carlisle to Wigton by Thursby, until that high road cuts the river Wampool : the Wampool then forms the south-east boundary until it falls into the sea; the sea forms the boundary on the west and north-west, and the river Eden on the north and north-east, as far as the city of Carlisle that is, up to the 172 History of Cumberland. boundary of the parish of St. Mary's-without-the-Walls. It thus includes in its ambit the various manors forming the parishes of Bowness, Burgh-by-Sands, Beaumont, Kirkandrews-on-Eden, Grinsdale, Kirkbampton, Orton, Aikton, and Thursby ; but one or two of these manors, though within the ambit of the barony, are not held of it, as Orton and Gamelsby. The parish and manor of Rock- cliffe, on the north side of the river Eden, and the manor of West Levinton, part of the parish of Kirklinton, are reputed parcel of the barony of Burgh, and have long been held of it. This brings an angle of the barony nearly up to the parish of Bewcastle, which the lords of the barony of Burgh appear to have annexed as summer pasture for their cattle. This barony was given by Ranulph de Meschines to his brother-in-law, D'Estrivers, or De Trivers. His daughter and heiress, Ibria, married Ranulph Engaigne, of Isell, and thus transferred the barony to the Engaignes, from whom, after two generations, an heiress Ada Engaigne carried it to her husband, Simon de Morville. Her tX grandson, Hugh de Morville, inherited the barony, and left two daughters, coheiresses Ada, wife of Richard de Lucy, and Johanna, wife of Richard Gernon. Ada de Lucy married for her second husband the Thomas de Multon whose matrimonial coups on behalf of himself and sons have been told under the account of the barony of Gilsland. Thomas de Multon thus got one moiety of the barony of Burgh, while the other moiety, by failure of the issue of Johanna Gernon, fell in to Thomas de Multon's son, or grandson, of the same name. The history of the barony of Burgh becomes thus for some time the same as that of the barony of Gilsland, passing from the Multons to the Dacres, and from the Dacres to the Howards. On the partition between the three Howard coheiresses, the barony of Burgh fell to the share of Mary, who married Thomas, Lord Howard of Walden, afterwards Earl of The Norman Settlement: I. The Baronies. 173 Suffolk, but dying childless her barony of Burgh went to her sister Ann, who married the Earl of Arundel, by whose great-great-grandson Henry, Duke of Norfolk, it was, about the end of the seventeenth century, sold to Sir John Lowther, Bart., who, in 1696, was created Baron Lowther and Viscount Lonsdale, and died in 1700. In that family it has since remained, and now belongs to the Earl of Lonsdale. The caput baronice appears to have been at the village or town of Burgh-on-Sands, but Thomas, Lord Dacre, built a castle at Drumburgh. It may be well to mention, because the error is widely prevalent, that Hugh de Morville, lord of the barony of Burgh, is not the Hugh de Morville who was one of the murderers of Thomas a Becket. There were many Hughs in the De Morville family, and the murderer was Hugh de Morville, Lord of Westmorland and Knares- borough and great-uncle to Hugh de Morville, Lord of Burgh. Thus much for the baronies carved out of Cumberland by Ranulph de Meschines ; we now come to those carved out by Henry I. five in all, namely, Copeland, Egremont, or Allerdale-above-Derwent, for it has gone by all three names, Allerdale, afterwards known as Allerdale-below- Derwent, Wigton, Greystoke, and Levington. Of these the first three cover the west of the county Copeland, extending from the Duddon to the Derwent ; Allerdale, from the Derwent to the Waver, while Wigton lies between Waver and Wampool. Copeland, Egremont, or Allerdale-above-Derwent. Allerdale, or Allerdale-below-Derwent. The Honour of Cocker- mouth. Wigton. Henry I. granted the barony of Copeland to William de Meschines, who had been unable to reduce into pos- 174 History of Cumberland. session the barony of Gilsland, which his brother, Ranulph de Meschines, had granted to him. This barony of Cope- land lies between the rivers Duddon and Derwent and Bassenthwaite and Derwentwater Lakes, taking in part of the parish of Crosthwaite and the manors included therein, and all the other parishes and manors within the rivers and lakes mentioned. Henry I. granted the barony of Allerdale to Waldeoff, son of Gospatrick, who, having been appointed Earl of Northumberland by the Conqueror, was shortly after- wards expelled by him from that office, and, on his flight into Scotland, was created by King Malcolm Earl of Dunbar. This great barony extended originally from the Derwent on the south to the Wampool on the north ; on its eastern boundary the brook Shawk separates it from Dalston barony and from the Forest, and the river Caldew from the barony of Greystoke. This boundary was after- wards curtailed by the lands between Waver and Wam- pool, being formed into the barony of Wigton. This barony of Wigton included the manors of Wigton, Waverton, Blencogo, Dundraw, and Kirkbride, and was granted by the Baron of Allerdale to Odard de Logis, on failure of whose issue the barony lapsed to the Lucys, then lords of Allerdale. William de Meschines, Baron of Copeland, made over to his neighbour Waldeoff, Baron of Allerdale, the land between Cocker and Derwent, and the five towns of Brig- ham, Egglesfield, Dean, Greysouthen, and Clifton, which latter donation gave to Waldeoff the whole valley of the Derwent except the district round its embouchure at Workington. Waldeoff shifted his residence from Pap- castle, where he had at first placed it, to Cockermouth, and the lands handed over to him by William de Meschines became known as the Honour of Cockermouth, and also as Allerdale-above-Derwent in contradistinction to Allerdale-below-Derwent or Waldeoff's grant from The Norman Settlement: I. The Baronies. 175 Henry I. William de Meschines, Baron of Copeland, fixed his residence at Egremont, and that name super- seded Copeland. The name of Allerdale-above-Derwent also became extended to cover all the country down to the Duddon. In a space of about fifty years the barony of Allerdale- below-Derwent passed through the hands of Alan, son 01 Waldeoff, of his son and successor, another Waldeoff, and of his sister Octreda, who carried the inheritance to her husband, Duncan, Earl of Murray, from whom it passed to their son William FitzDuncan. Meanwhile, the neighbouring barony of Copeland had fallen, first, into the hands of Cicely, the heiress of De Meschines; Cicely's only daughter Alice, by her husband Robert de Romilly, Lord of Skipton, had a daughter, Alice, who became the wife of William FitzDuncan, and so for a short time these two baronies were joined. A well-informed and accurate writer, of whose valuable papers we have been making free use, says :* And now it might have been supposed that a powerful family was likely to bear rule over a district which extended, in Cumberland, in length from the Duddon to the Waver, and in breadth from Dunmail Raise to St. Bees Head, possessing as they also did the territory of Craven in Yorkshire, whose fertility more than counterbalanced its deficiency in extent ; whilst in Scotland, the great earldom of Murray gave to FitzDuncan a status inferior to no other subject of that kingdom. . . . FitzDuncan's only son, celebrated in tradition as the " Boy of Egremond," succeeded to these territorial demesnes, and his connections were regal, for he was (through his grandfather Duncan, younger brother to David), second cousin to Malcolm, King of Scot- land, and by the marriage of Duncan's sister, " Matilda the Good," with Henry I. he stood in the same relationship to Henry II. of Eng- land. ... I have often wondered why the sad fate of the " Boy of Egremond," miserable as it was, should have so dwelt in the popular recollection, till it has engaged in the present day the pens of our * " Cockmouth Castle," Transactions, Cumberland and Westmor- land Antiquarian Society, vol. iv., p, 109 ; " Egremont Castle," ibid., vol. vi., p. 150, by W. Jackson, F.S.A. These are full of information. 176 History of Cumberland. most celebrated poets : but when we learn that he was the child of such mighty hopes that he might have aspired to a kingdom, we cease to wonder at the wail which had made itself heard through the ages, and that of his mother Wordsworth should say : Long, long in darkness did she sit, And her first words, " Let there be In Bolton, on the Field of Wharfe A stately Priory." " The boy of Egremond " had three sisters, Cecily, Amabel, and Alice, among whom his great estates were divided. Cecily, the eldest sister, got the great barony of Skipton-in-Craven, and married William-le-gros, Earl of Albemarle. Amabel, the second sister, married Reginald de Lucy, and got the barony of Copeland. Alice, the youngest sister, got the barony of Allerdale - below- Derwent, and the honour of Cockermouth. She married firstly Gilbert Pipard, a justice itinerant, and secondly Robert de Courtenai, and died childless. Her posses- sions, therefore, were divided. The honour of Cocker- mouth, and part of the demesne lands in the barony of Allerdale-below-Derwent, went to William de Fortibus, Earl of Albemarle, and grandson of sister Cecily; while the rest of Allerdale-below-Derwent went to Richard de Lucy, son of Amabel, the second of the sisters co- heiresses, wife of Reginald de Lucy, and owner of Cope- land or Egremont. Richard de Lucy married Ada de Morville, one of the coheiresses of Hugh de Morville, lord of the barony of Burgh. By her he had two daughters, ^ Amabel, and Alice de Lucy, who married respectively Lambert and Alan de Multon, sons of Thomas de Multon, who himself married the widowed Ada de Morville after i/ the death of her first husband, Richard de Lucy. These three politic marriages have been mentioned in our accounts of the baronies of Gilsland and of Burgh. j/ From Lambert de Multon, and Amabel his wife, sprang the family of Multon of Egremont, inheriting that barony, The Norman Settlement: /. The Baronies. 177 while Alan de Multon, and Alice his wife, took the name of Lucy, settled at Cockermouth, and inherited that portion of Allerdale-below-Derwent, which had fallen to their aunt Amabel. Presently, by failure of sister Cecily's issue, the honour of Cockermouth, and the part of Aller- dale-below-Derwent that had gone with it, escheated to the Crown, who granted it to various 'favourites for their lives, including Piers Gaveston, and Andrew de Harcla. Ultimately Anthony Lord Lucy, of the family that had settled at Cockermouth, and who had arrested Andrew de Harcla on a charge of treason, was allowed to make good his claim thereto. The Lucys thus got the honour of Cockermouth, the whole of the barony of Allerdale- below-Derwent, and the barony of Wigton, which had lapsed to Allerdale-below-Derwent, out of which it was originally carved. The Lucys also acquired by an heiress of the Multons of Egremont one-third of that barony. The honour of Cockermouth, and the other estates held by the Lucys, were carried in 1386 by Maud, sister and heiress of Anthony, fourth Lord Lucy, to her husband Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, on condition that he should quarter her arms with his. The Percys pur- chased the outstanding two-thirds of the barony of Egre- mont, and thus became lords of Cumberland from Duddon to Wampool, and from Dunmail Raise to St. Bees Head. From the Percys these great estates descended, first to the Seymours, and then to the Wyndhams. They are now owned by the Earl of Leconfield, who keeps up Cockermouth Castle, but Egremont Castle is a ruin. Levington. The barony of Levington, Kirklevington or Kirklinton, was given by Henry I. to Richard de Boyville, who, and his issue, took the name of De Levington. It consisted of the parish of Kirklinton. A younger brother of Richard de Boyville got the manor of Westlinton, part thereof, 12 178 History of Cumberland. which an heiress carried to the Highmores, who sold it to the Dacres, and it thus came to be held with the barony of Burgh, as told before. The rest of this barony soon went to coheiresses, as many as nine, and fell into abey- ance. Greystoke. This barony includes the parishes of Greystoke and Dacre. Henry I. gave it to Forne, son of Lyulph, who took the name of De Greystoke. This family acquired by marriage with an heiress the barony of Morpeth in Northumberland, but, ending in an heiress, the estates went to collaterals, who also assumed the name of De Greystoke. The second family of that name again ended in an heiress, Elizabeth de Greystoke, lady of the baronies of Greystoke and Morpeth, and also of Wem, in Shrop- shire. She eloped, as told in the account of the barony of Gilsland, with Thomas Lord Dacre, and carried her estates to the Dacres. When the Dacres' possessions were divided among the coheiresses, Ann got Greystoke, which by her husband, Philip, Earl of Arundel, descended to the Dukes of Norfolk, and by them to its present possessor, Mr. Howard, of Greystoke. The space at our disposal prohibits any attempt to go into the history of the manors, of which the various baronies consist. Their history is complicated by the fact that some of the baronies contain within their ambits manors not holden of them, but holden directly of the Crown, or of other baronies. Again, the holders of some of the baronies are, or have been, holders of manors within the Forest of Cumberland. John Denton, of Cardew, in his " Accompt of the most considerable Estates and Families in the County of Cumberland, from the Conquest unto the Beginning of the Reign of The Norman Settlement: I. The Baronies. 179 King James," * has attempted to give the history of all the manors, and the standard county histories of Burn and Nicolson, Hutchinson, Lysons, and Whellan follow him ; but great discrimination must be exercised in accepting Denton's statements. * Printed by the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archceological Society in their tract series, 1887. 12 2 CHAPTER XII. THE NORMAN SETTLEMENT : II.- CUMBERLAND. -THE FOREST OF WHEN the various baronies detailed in the last chapter had been carved out of the county of Cumberland, there remained to the Crown the city of Carlisle, and the Forest of Cumberland. Under the latter term was in- cluded so much of the county as was not comprised in the baronies or in the city of Carlisle, except, perhaps, Bewcastle, which was severed by the intervening baronies of Liddell, Levington, and Gilsland, from the rest of the county, and was a sparsely inhabited waste. The term " The Forest of Cumberland," was gradually superseded by another, " The Forest of Inglewood," which had a more restricted signification. Thus the Forest of Ingle- wood never, we fancy, included the manors of Stanwix and Linstock on the north side of the river Eden, while the Forest of Cumberland did. Of these, Linstock, which includes the parish of Crosby and part of that of Stanwix, was sometimes reckoned a barony the barony of Lin- stock or Crosby and at an early date was given to the Bishop of Carlisle, and has ever since remained as one of the possessions of that see. Of the rest of the parish of Stanwix, part belongs to the socage manor of Carlisle Castle, part to the barony of Burgh, and part is held direct from the Crown. The Forest of Cumberland The Norman Settlement: II. The Forest. 181 included while the Forest of Inglewood did not several parishes or manors situate to the south of the barony of Gilsland, and between the river Eden and the parish of Alston. These were often reckoned a barony, but one which never had a name ; they were, in fact, rather a collection of manors belonging to Adam Fitz Swein and Henry Fitz Swein ; these manors soon severed in their descent, and went to different owners. The manor of Alston, in the far east of the county, was granted by King John to the Veteriponts or Viponts, and descended to the Hiltons, and to the Radcliffes, Earls of Derwentwater, from whom it escheated to the Crown, who settled it by Act of Parliament on Greenwich Hospital. The Forest of Cumberland was thus reduced to the Forest of Inglewood, situate between the rivers Shawk and Eden. It abuts upon the baronies of Burgh and Allerdale on the west, on the barony of Greystoke on the south, and upon the river Eden on the east and north. So much of the Forest of Inglewood as lies between the river Caldew and Burgh barony constitutes the reputed barony of Dalston. This originally was granted by Henry I. to a younger brother of Hubert de Vallibus, baron of Gilsland, but escheated for treason, and relapsed into the Forest. It was disafforested again by Henry III., and granted to Walter Malclerk, Bishop of Carlisle, as an endowment for his see. Within the limits of the Forest of Inglewood, besides the Forest lands, were many manors, some of royal demesne, others held by individuals under grants from the Crown. The descent of these manors must be looked for in the ordinary county histories, and, when found, received with caution. Ranulph de Meschines retained the Forest in his own hands, but when he exchanged his possessions in the North for the earldom of Chester, the Forest of Ingle- wood became royal demesne. In 1242 manors within it to the value of 200 per annum were granted to the 1 82 History of Cumberland. Kings of Scotland in satisfaction of their claims on the northern counties of England. These manors were re- sumed by Edward L, and Anthony Bee, Bishop of Durham, had them for a short time by a royal grant, which was revoked in consequence of the displeasure of Parliament. Richard II. granted the honour of Penrith and the Forest of Inglewood to the N evils, but on the death of Richard, Earl of Warwick, these estates reverted to the Crown, and were granted, together with the lordship of Carlisle Castle, to Richard, Duke of Gloucester, and they again reverted to the Crown when he became Richard III. They were used as the dower of the Queens of England ; and Charles II., on his marriage, settled on Queen Katherine as her dower all the lapsed possessions of Richard, Duke of Gloucester, in Cumberland, and other royal possessions in that county. The settlement on the Queen included the honour of Penrith, the Forest of Inglewood, the lordship of Carlisle Castle, something like one hundred manors, and the socage manor of Car- lisle. Of most of this property the Queen granted leases, probably for high premiums and at low rents, some of which did not expire until 1750, although the Queen died in 1705. In 1694 William III., who was lavish in showering pickings from the public purse upon his Dutch favourite, Bentinck, Earl of Portland, ordered the Treasury to make out a warrant granting to that nobleman a magnificent estate in Wales, worth over 100,000, at a reserved rent to the Crown of 6s. 8d. The indignation that was excited compelled the King to revoke the grant ; but he com- pensated Bentinck with a grant of estates in other parts of England, including " all that the honour of Penrith als Perith in our county of Cumberland with all rights, mem- bers, and appurtenances whatsoever." The honour of Penrith was then in possession of the Queen Dowager (Katherine of Braganza) under her marriage settlement, The Norman Settlement: II. The Forest. 183 which at great length set out the appurtenances to the honour of Penrith, while Bentinck's grant is silent thereon. The Bentincks, favoured by the obscurity, in which, for prudential reasons, this grant to the first of them would be kept, and favoured by the fact that their rights did not come into active operation until long after the date of the grant namely, on the expiration of Queen Katharine's leases assumed, or pretended to assume, and at any rate held themselves out as owners of the whole Forest of Inglewood and the socage manor of Carlisle, on the pretext that they were appurtenances of the honour of Penrith, and so had passed under the general words in the grant to Bentinck. As the Crown did not move in the matter, it would be no one's interest in particular to resist their claims, nor would copyholders and other payers of baronial and manorial dues, but small in their respective amounts, care to enter into litigation with a great ducal family. For about seventy years the Bentincks kept up unchallenged (so far as we know) this assumption. As the leases fell in, they took the property. The Queen's lease of the socage manor of Carlisle expired in 1729 ; but prior to that date the Bentincks bought up the tenants' interest, thus shutting out the Howards, Earls of Carlisle, who had a claim to the reversion of the socage manor, as passing to them by a grant from Queen Elizabeth. Another lease, which expired in 1750, was of a place called Hay Close, of which the Lowthers were tenants, and which they had to hand over to the Ben- tincks, instead of getting, on easy terms, a renewed lease from the Crown. Probably this was the origin of the war between the two families, but it did not burst out as yet. Those everlasting fountains of profit to the lawyers the Eden fisheries formed the first battle-field. In 1760, some of the Eden fisheries had been the subject of litiga- tion between the mayor, aldermen, bailiffs, and citizens of Carlisle and Sir James Lowther. The latter owned a 184 History of Cumberland. fishery in the Eden belonging to the barony of Burgh-by- Sands, which the Lowthers had purchased from the Howards of Greystoke; while the mayor, aldermen, bailiffs, and citizens had their fisheries under old royal grants. How this suit ended is not known ; it was insti- tuted by the corporation against Sir James, and the evidence, so far as it is preserved, does not seem to support the corporation claim. Fresh litigation soon broke out The third Duke of Portland, who succeeded to his title in 1762, had, in 1765, by the quiet possession of his family for seventy years of the whole of the Forest of Inglewood, and of the socage manor of Carlisle, a title which no one could impeach but the Crown, under that exception to the rule, fixing sixty years as the term of prescription, which is embodied in the maxim, Nullum tempus occurrit regi. The Duke filed bills in Chancery against both the Corporation of Carlisle and Sir James Lowther, alleging that he (the Duke) was owner of a fishery in the Eden in right of the socage manor of Car- lisle, and that Sir James and the corporation, by the adoption of a novel method of fishing, namely, by stretch- ing nets, called stell-nets, from bank to bank across the river, had made his fishery valueless. The Duke did not pray for any relief, but prayed that the evidence of certain persons might be taken and preserved of course as a ground for future proceedings. Before, however, the Duke could do this, he must prove some sort of title to the fishery he said he was possessed of, and this title it was open to the defendants to upset if possible ; such a course would be their best strategic move, as it would once for all stop this and any future attacks at law by the Duke. Sir James Lowther's legal advisers, in making an investigation into the title, discovered the facts about King William's grant that we have related ; they con- sulted in the Crown Offices both the grant to Queen Katherine and the grant to Bentinck, and also found the The Norman Settlement: II. The Forest. 185 original note of instructions, written by the then Surveyor- General for the guidance of the legal persons who were to draft the grant to Bentinck. It expressly directed them to omit from it the lordship of the Forest of Inglewood and the socage manor of Carlisle. Sir James at once saw that if he could, by a lease from the Crown, place himself in the Crown's shoes, the legal proceedings against himself and the corporation must collapse. Sir James at once informed the Crown of the discovery he had made, and asked for a grant to himself of the pro- perty out of which the Bentincks were keeping the Crown. This request was referred to the Surveyor-General, whose deputy, in August, 1767, reported that the Forest of Ingle- wood and the socage of Carlisle were not conveyed by King William's grant to the Earl of Portland, but were still vested in the Crown ; and recommended that a lease of both should be granted to Sir James for ninety-nine years, terminable on three such lives as he should nominate, reserving a yearly rent of 133. 4d. for the Forest of Ingle- wood, and 50 for the socage of Carlisle ; and also one- third of all the yearly profits that should be recovered. The Duke of Portland, on hearing of these proceedings, entered caveats in the proper offices, and petitioned the Treasury for leave to be heard and to defend his title by counsel. The lease to Sir James was, however, made in December, 1767, and bills were at once placarded over Cumberland announcing that the Forest of Inglewood and the socage manor of Carlisle had been granted to Sir James Lowther, and warning all tenants and residents in the Forest and manor to pay no rents, fines, or services, to anyone else. The Duke placarded a counterblast, maintaining that the Forest and manor were his. A great war of pamphlets at once ensued ; the Gentleman's Magazine and the Annual Register discussed the pros and cons at length ; a bill to abrogate the maxim of Nullum tempus occurrit regi, and so deprive Sir James of the rights 1 86 History of Cumberland. he had acquired under his lease from the Crown, was brought into Parliament. It was rejected, after a violent debate, by a majority of 20 the numbers being 124 to 144. Parliament was almost immediately dissolved, in 1768, and Sir James Lowther and the Duke of Portland fought out their differences with great acrimony, and at vast expense, in the constituencies of Cumberland and Carlisle. In Cumberland the Portland candidates were Henry Curwen and Henry Fletcher, while their opponents were Sir James Lowther and Major Senhouse. The poll lasted nineteen days, during which the whole county was in an uproar, and the Duke and Sir James are said to have spent from "80,000 to 100,000 between them. Sir James nobbled the sheriff, who rejected a large number of votes, on the ground that the land-tax lists, which were then the registers of voters, were in many cases signed by only two commissioners, and not by three. The result was : Curwen - - 2,139 Lowther - - 1,977 Fletcher - - i,975 Senhouse - - 1,891 On a petition this was upset, and Fletcher and Curwen were seated ; but a compromise was afterwards arranged, under which Fletcher and Curwen were to sit for that Parliament, and in future the representation was to be divided. This compromise endured for sixty-three years. In Carlisle the Portland candidates were Lord E. C. Bentinck and George Musgrave, while the Lowther ones were Captain Elliott and Captain Johnstone. Money flowed like water, as much as 1,000 being considered a trifle for one night's bribery and debauchery. The result was: The Norman Settlement: II. The Forest. 187 Bentinck - - 387 Musgrave - - 385 Elliott - - - 309 Johnstone ... 307* In the second session of the new Parliament the Nullum Tempus Bill, as the Bill to repeal the maxim, Nullum tempus occurrit regi, was called, was reintroduced, and passed by a compromise, under which a peculiarly-worded clause was introduced into the Bill, excluding Sir James from its operation provided he lost no time in instituting and prosecuting legal proceedings. Accordingly, Sir James commenced in the equity side of the Court of Exchequer, and filed a bill against the Duke. He also served 300 writs of ejectment on various persons in- terested in the Forest. The Duke's defence was very extraordinary. His plea, in answer, did not attempt to make out that the Forest of Inglewood and the socage of Carlisle were included in King William's grant, either expressly or in general words. That point was abandoned, and one was set up which it takes a lawyer to understand ; it was that the Duke is a Purchaser, without Notice that the Crown had any right ; for that both the lands and royalties which he is admitted to hold with justice, and those which are at present in dispute, were settled upon his father's marriage in consideration of his mother's fortune. In plain English, the Duke's defence was that the second Duke of Portland had no right to the lands and royalties in dispute, but had taken his Duchess's fortune and probably spent it, settling upon her instead land and royalties to which he had no title. The third Duke, the offspring of this marriage, now pleaded that it was hard upon him to be deprived of the property which had been settled upon him in lieu of his mother's fortune. Sir * A full account of both these elections, by the author of this book, is in his " Cumberland and Westmorland M.P.'s." Carlisle : C. Thur- nam and Sons, 1871. 1 88 History of Cumberland. James, in reply to this defence, offered to pay so much of the Duke's mother's fortune as he would lose by being deprived of the disputed lands and royalties, but the offer was not accepted. The Duke did not rely alone upon his legal defence ; he got his friends to introduce into Parliament a Bill to repeal the clauses of the Nullum Tempus Act, which exempted Sir James from the operation of that Act. This was opposed as in the House a breach of faith, and, after debates in which the leading statesmen of the day took part, was defeated. The law took its course, and the grand finale is highly ludicrous. On November 20, 1771, the cause about the Forest of Inglewood came on for hearing before the Barons of the Exchequer and a special jury from Cumberland. Mr. Wedderburn opened the case shortly for Sir James, producing old records to show that the Forest of Inglewood and the honour of Penrith were wholly distinct properties. In putting in his formal proof he had to read the lease from the Crown to Sir James. When he mentioned the reserved rent of 135. 4d. the Judges at once raised an objection that under the Civil List Act of Queen Anne the lease to Sir James was bad. That Act enacts That upon every grant, lease or assurance, there be reserved a reason- able rent, not being under the third part of the clear yearly value of such of the said manors, messuages, lands, etc., as shall be contained in such lease or grant. The Gentleman's Magazine says this objection seemed " to be totally new to the counsel for Sir James Lowther, who appeared to be struck with an electrical shock. The Court gave them an hour to recover their senses and consult together." On the reassembling of the Court, Sir James's counsel attempted to make out that the reservation of one-third part of the profits satisfied the requirements of the Act, and that 135. 4d. was, under the circumstances of Sir James having to pay all the costs of The Norman Settlement: II. The Forest. 189 recovering the property, a reasonable rent. The Judges, however, non-suited Sir James without calling on the Duke's counsel. The cause about the socage manor of Carlisle came on the next day (Thursday), and Mr. Wedderburn, for Sir James, did not complete his opening until eleven on Friday. He argued that the Duke had no title, and that there was, and never had been, any connection between the honour of Penrith and the socage of Carlisle. The counsel for the Duke rested their defence wholly on the defects in Sir James Lowther's lease, and did not attempt to prove that the Duke had any title. Had they hoped for success on this point we think they would have argued it, for this lease was a very different case from that of the Forest. The rent of 50 was the old rent that had been reserved on leases of the socage manor granted by Queen Henrietta Maria and by Queen Katherine ; but in these leases the Castle was included, while it was excepted from the lease to Sir James, who thus paid the usual rent, but for diminished premises. His lease, however, in- cluded which the older ones did not the mines and the trees. It was admitted that there was neither mine open nor tree growing on the premises ; but the Duke's counsel argued that there might be both before the lease ended, and that, under this contingency, the old rent was not enough. The Judges decided against the Duke on all his objections but that about the mines, which they reserved for a special verdict. The account in the Gentleman's Magazine says : " Upon all these points, without pretending to show any title except possession, the counsel for the Duke of Portland rested their defence." The decision on the point about the mines was given in the Michaelmas Term of 1772, and was in favour of the Duke. Thus Sir James's lease of the socage of Carlisle was declared to be bad because there was a possibility that mines might be opened on it. It will be observed that under the circum- stances of Sir James's two leases turning out bad, the 190 History of Cumberland. Duke's title to the Forest of Inglewood and the socage manor of Carlisle was never tried. There can be little doubt but that the Portlands were originally usurpers, and would have been evicted by Sir James had higher rents been reserved in his leases. The failure of these leases and the passing of the Nullum Tempus Act gave the Duke of Portland a good title, under which the whole property was, in 1787, sold to the then Duke of Devon- shire.* This ends, for the present, the history of the Forest of Inglewood, but the Duke of Devonshire's rights as lord of the socage manor of Carlisle were recently in litigation between the Duke and the Corporation of Carlisle, with disastrous results to the latter body, who claimed to have the right to hold a cattle market on certain waste lands of the socage manor of Carlisle called the Sands. This right they were unable to substantiate. * A full account of this curious transaction is contained in the author's "Cumberland and Westmorland M.P.'s," chapter vi. CHAPTER XIII. THE NORMAN SETTLEMENT: III. THE CITY OF CARLISLE.* THE reservation of the City of Carlisle to the Crown entitles Carlisle to be called a royal city, a title it may well claim, for all its charters are held direct from the Crown. Thus Madox, in his " Firma Burgi," gives Car- lisle as one of eleven towns, of which he says the Crown was seized in the reign of Henry I., and he cites as proof the following entry from a roll, which he states to be of uncertain date, but which is the 3Qth Henry I. : Chaerleolium Hildredus r c de xiiii/ & xvis & v\d de veteri firma de Chaerleolio & de Maneriis Regis. Et in operibus Civitatis de Chaer- leolio videlicet in Muro circa Civitatem faciendo liberavit xiiii/ & xvij et \\d Quietus est. Mag. Rot. anni incerti Hen. I., Rol. 14 m.i.b. From these towns in royal demesne, the King raised a revenue by rents, and by other means, just as from any other property he had : there was no difference originally in the mode of managing the Crown's town property and the Crown's country property. The revenues of both were collected by the sheriff, and both alike were subject to the sheriff and to the County Courts. The only differ- * The substance of this chapter was delivered by the writer as lectures at Carlisle in 1882 and 1883, and has also been utilized in the preface to " Municipal Records of Carlisle/' published by Thurnam and Sons, Carlisle, for the Cumberland and Westmorland Archaeolo- gical and Antiquarian Society, a book full of curious matter. 1 92 History of Cumberland. ence between the town property and the country was that the inhabitants were thicker on the ground in the former than in the latter. It was the duty of the sheriff of each county to collect all the Crown rents and revenues, and regularly pay them into the exchequer, first deducting his disbursements, for very much of the royal expenditure went through his hands, and was paid by him. Thus in the extract I have just read, Hildred, the sheriff, accounts for 14 i6s. 6d. as the profits of Carlisle and the manors, but as he has paid just that sum for building a wall round Carlisle, he has nothing to pay into the Treasury ; and the account says, " Et Quietus est " and he is quits. In addition to Crown rents, the sheriff collected all sorts of miscellaneous things, such as the profits of the Forest of Cumberland, timber and hay sold, pannage, or the charge for people feeding swine in the Forest ; poundage fees on stray cattle, fines of all sorts, the geldum animalium or noutgeld, a cornage rent or Crown rent paid in cattle, and a variety of other items of revenue. Against his receipts the sheriff sets down all sorts of payments which he was authorized to make : an annual allowance of 273. 4d. to the Canons of Carlisle ; expenses connected with repair of Carlisle Castle, and its chapel, mill, bridge, and gaol, the maintenance of its garrisons, and similar expenses for Appleby, Prudhoe, Pontefract, and Bam- burgh ; money laid out in buying large quantities of military arms and stores, sometimes for Carlisle, some- times for Ireland ; in discharging the expenses of royal writs ; sometimes in buying hawks, and hounds, and in sending them to the King. With so much money passing through his hands, it is not to be wondered that the office of sheriff came to be a very lucrative one. The Crown let it out to farm, and the nobility began to bid against one another for the post ; thus the Bishop of Ely tendered for the fee farm for the counties of York, Lincoln, and Northampton, 1,500 marks, cash down, and 100 The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 193 increase upon the usual farm of each county; but this was capped by Geoffrey Plantagenet, who bid another < 1,500 marks. The sheriffs thus regarded their offices as means by which to make money. General dissatisfaction arose in consequence of the severity with which these officers performed their functions, so that in towns and populous places people clubbed together and negotiated to pay fixed sums and so be rid of the sheriff. Now Carlisle had, at a very early period, some sort of organized government; thus, in 1156, the sheriff appears on the Pipe Roll as accounting for xx li de dono civitatis Carleolii. In the next year the same entry appears as de dono Burgi de Carleolio ; and the inhabitants appear as Gives and Burgenses, but we hear nothing of any mayor or corporation. In the 6th R. I., 1195, we find an entry which shows they wanted to manage their own affairs : In Soltis, p. breve, R Ipi Vic. Hi li p lii li qas Burgenses de Carl como- dauant dno Regi ad facienda negocia sua de firm Civitatis, qu ipi Bur- gesses tenant i Capite ad firm de ipo vie. In payments by the writ of the king himself to the sheriff of 52 on account of ,52 which the Burgesses of Carlisle had advanced to the Lord the King in order to do their own business relating to the farm of the said City, which the said Burgesses hold as tenants in chief at farm of the Sheriff. It is not clear what they did in the years immediately following, but we find a tallage levied on the royal pro- perty in Cumberland, which is made up thus : Homines de Scottebi ... 305. Homines de Dalston - - 403. Homines de Penred - ~ 4 marks. Homines de Salkeld - - 2 marks. Homines de Langwadebi - 203. Homines de Steinweges - los. Gives Carleolii - - - .50. The distinction between the "cives" of Carlisle and the " homines " of other places, shows that some regular government, beyond a mere constable and a township jury, existed. 13 194 History of Cumberland. In the 3rd of King John, 1201, the citizens of Carlisle made a proposal to farm the city themselves : they agreed to pay 60 marks down, and 3 advance of rent over what the sheriff paid. The sheriff, however, offered the same increase, and 20 a year more on the royal manors. The King then threw over the citizens and accepted the sheriff's offer, and apparently made a bad speculation, for the sheriff died within three years, without paying the 60 marks, and leaving the rent in arrear. The rent was then reduced to the old amount. We now come to a very important document. This is a writ of Henry III. to the sheriff of Cumberland, dated September 29, in the fifth year of his reign [1221], and preserved in the Chancery Fine Rolls. It contains most valuable information respecting the early municipal history of Carlisle. It begins by reciting that an inquisi- tion had been made by the King's command, whereby it was found that the citizens of Carlisle had formerly held their city of the sheriff of Cumberland at a yearly rent of 52, and that, together with the city, the citizens were accustomed to have his mills, which were under the city, and a certain fishery in Eden (the Kinggarth fishery), and the toll of the shire (theolonium comitatus) to make up their rent. It then states that the King has granted to the citizens their city with the appurtenances to farm during his pleasure at a yearly rent of 60, to be paid by the citizens at the Exchequer half-yearly, at Easter and Mid- summer, and commands the sheriff to cause the citizens to have full seisin of the city, together with the mills, and fishery, and tolls, to enable them to pay the yearly rent of 60. This writ thus records a most important era in the history of Carlisle. From it, and from what has been stated, it is clear the " Gives Carleolii " the citizens of Carlisle had, prior to 1221, prevailed upon the sheriff to let them rent from him The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 195 the profits of the city at a fixed sum. The sheriff was saved the trouble of collecting, and the citizens levied the amount of the rents proportionately among themselves, thus getting rid of foreign interference. The sum of 52, which they paid yearly to the sheriff, includes the rent of the city or " firma burgi," made up of the rents the citizens paid for their burgage tenements ; it also includes the rents of two mills, and the Kinggarth fishery in Eden, and the shire toll. The King, as lord of the city, was entitled to require that all citizens should grind their corn at his mills. The citizens now rented the mills from the sheriff, and compelled all the people living in the town to grind their corn at them. They also took the fishery, which they probably found means to make more profit- able than the sheriff could, and they were allowed to collect the shire toll. They sublet the mills for 40 marks a year, and the fishery for 15 marks. What the toll brought in does not appear. For the balance they would have to assess themselves in some way to make up the 52. By this arrangement the citizens freed themselves from much interference, but the city was still only a part of the county under the jurisdiction of the sheriff, who was able to exercise his power to the annoyance of the citizens if he was so disposed. The next step was to get rid of the sheriff altogether, and pay direct to the Crown. This is what was effected in 1221. The sheriff is directed by the writ of Henry III. of that date to hand the city over with the mills, fishery, and toll to the citizens, and they hold it of the King at 60 a year during his pleasure. This arrangement was not binding on the King, and it is probable that the sheriff offered a higher rent, and got back the city for a year or two. The citizens, however, were in possession in 1292, when Edward I. issued a quo warranto against the Maiorem et Communitatem Karleoli, and a quo warranto 132 196 History of Cumberland. was a writ of which Edward L, who was a great lawyer, was very fond. He sent out justices itinerant to inquire under what warrant the great barons, the clergy, and the boroughs held their franchises and properties. The Earl of Warenne replied by flinging his sword on the table. The citizens of Carlisle were not so bold ; they appeared at the assizes at Carlisle, before Sir Hugh de Cressing- ham, and in reply to the King's attorney, William Inge, pleaded their charters, but a jury of county gentlemen decided that the mills and fishery were without the juris- diction of Carlisle, and in the county ; further, that they were not the city's, but the King's, and that the mills were worth 40 marks a year, and the fishery at Kinggarth 15 marks. The fact was the two charters of Henry II. and Henry III. were burnt, and the city had no title- deeds to show. It is probable the citizens gave the King something handsome, or he considered theirs a hard case, for the quo warranto resulted the following year in a charter, that of 21 Edward I., 1293, which contained an inspeximus of the tenor of the charter of Henry III., and, after reciting that it was burnt, granted an exemplification of it. However, in the ninth year of Edward II, (1316) the city tolls, fishery, and the vacant places in the city, were granted by charter to the citizens of Carlisle at a fee farm rent of 80, and they were also made free of " toll, pontage, lastage, passage, wharfage, carriage, murage, pavage, and stallage for all their wares and merchandise throughout the kingdom." The rent of 80 continued to be paid until the first year of Edward IV., who reduced the fee farm-rent to 40, on account of the impoverished and ruined state in which the city was left after the Wars of the Roses, and that sum of 40 is still paid out of the city fund every year to Lord Lonsdale as the grantee of the Crown. We have thus traced out the steps by which Carlisle The Norman Settlement: II L The City. 197 became a city apart from the county, and got out of the jurisdiction of the sheriff, for clear of him the city is, as a later charter of Edward III. more fully proves, and Car- lisle is, in all but name, a county of itself, and perfectly independent of the county and all county jurisdictions, having its own bailiffs to execute the office of sheriff, and its own coroner ! But here it will be convenient to go back in point of time and endeavour to trace the constitu- tion of the governing body of Carlisle, which, in the manner related, secured for the city its liberties and inde- pendence. It has already been pointed out that in the Pipe Rolls in the reigns of Henry II., Richard L, and John (1154-1216) the inhabitants of Carlisle are called " Gives " and " Bur- gesses," in distinction to the term " Homines," used of the inhabitants of Penrith and Scotby. This points out clearly that at Carlisle there existed at that day some sort of municipal authority beyond a mere township jury, but it does not necessarily imply that they had a mayor or corporation. Let us now have a look at the earliest charter ever granted to Carlisle, namely, that of Henry II., who re- covered the city from the Scotch, who had held it during the reign of Stephen. This charter was burnt, but it is recited in a later that of 35 Henry III., of which the exemplification granted by Edward I. is still amongst the corporation muniments. It contains a confirmation of the liberties and customs which the citizens of Carlisle had theretofore freely enjoyed. It grants them exemp- tion from toll, passage, pontage, and all customs belonging to the Crown, and gives estovers of wood in the Forest of Carlisle, for burning and building, and a Free Merchant Guild ; gildam mercatoriam liberam ita quod nihil inde res- pondeant aliquibus. This free merchant guild would be an association, or brotherhood of the leading merchants and citizens of Carlisle. It no doubt existed long before it 198 History of Cumberland. got the royal license. Its object would be partly trade purposes, partly good fellowship and works of piety. The royal license would confer on it power to settle disputes among its members, and exemption from the jurisdictions to which their county neighbours were amenable. These merchant guilds possessed a quantity of peculiar customs, which kept the burgesses or townsmen of the kingdom as a class by themselves, although they never, as in Scotland or Germany, adopted a confederate band of union, or organized themselves in leagues, as the Hanseatic League. The grant to a town of a free merchant guild is the earliest stage of development of a municipal constitution, and was granted to such as were too humble or too poor to ask for more. The King took payment for his favours. The next important steps were to oust the sheriff and his exactions (how that was done has been already detailed), to have the free election of magistrates, and the maintenance of ancient customs. The first mention of a mayor of Carlisle is in the quo warranto of Edward L, 1292, which is directed against the mayor and commonalty of Carlisle. But the sub- sequent charter of Edward II., in 1316, is directed to the citizens without any mention of the mayor at all, so that he may have been a spontaneous or voluntary effusion of the citizens which the Crown did not recognise. This charter of 9 Edward II. granted to the citizens of Carlisle the King's mills in the city and the Kinggarth fishery of Eden at a fee farm-rent of 80, also the King's vacant places in the city and suburbs, and freedom from tollage, pontage, etc. The next charter, 9 Edward III., contains an inspeximus and confirmation of 21 Edward I. The next charter which mentions a mayor is that of 26 Edward III., 1353, which recites, among other things (we quote from a translation made for the purposes of a trial about the fisheries in Eden), that The citizens of our city of Carlisle have been accustomed to have among the liberties and customs belonging to the said City the full return of The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 199 all writs as well of summons of the Exchequer as of all other writs whatsoever, and one market twice in every week, that is to say, on Wednesday and Saturday, and a fair on the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Mary in every year, for fifteen days next following the said Feast. And a free gild and a free election of their mayor and bailiffs within the said City, and two coroners amending the assize of bread, wine, and ale broken gallows infangentheof ; and also to hold pleas of our Crown, and to do and exercise all things which belong to the office of sheriff and coroner in the City aforesaid ; also the chattels of felons and fugitives condemned in the aforesaid City ; and to be quit of all fines and amerciaments of the county and suits of the county and wapentake. The charter mentions several other things the City Mills, the King's fishery in Eden, the right to dig and carry away turf on Kingmoor, have the Battailholm to hold markets and fairs on, and to devise their tenements in Carlisle by will; and it goes on to say that "the aforesaid liberties and quittances belonging to the said city they have had from time whereof memory is not," i.e., by pre- scription. Now, legal memory begins from the first year of King Richard I., or 1189, an< ^ we ma y therefore sup- pose Carlisle had a mayor, bailiffs, and coroners at that time. Probably they had, or pretended to have ; but they certainly had not got the full liberties claimed in this charter of Edward III., 1353, for in 1195 they are nego- tiating for liberty, ad facienda sua negotia, to do their own business. But in 1353 they had clearly got, and had had for some time, full liberty to " do their own business," and that liberty of local self-government Carlisle has retained from that time down to the days of the Local Government Board. The charter further states in the 23rd year of Edward III., the sheriff of Cumberland, Thomas de Lucy, had hindered them in the enjoyment of their liberties, and it therefore confirms and grants to them all their liberties as of old. These rights have been confirmed by several sub- sequent charters, and finally by the charter of Charles I., known as the governing charter, for under it (modified 2OO History of Cumberland. by sundry Acts of Parliament) the city is now governed. The intermediate charters are those of 5 Richard II., 2 Henry IV., 13 Henry VI., i Edward IV., I Richard III., 3 Henry VII., I Henry VIII., i Edward VL, 5 Elizabeth, 9 Elizabeth, 2 James I. That of Edward IV., as mentioned before, reduced the fee farm-rent from 80 to 40. It also gave another fishery, in addition to the King's fishery in Eden (the Kinggarth one), viz., the sheriffs net or frithnet, or free net, now known as the boat right. That of 9 Elizabeth is important. It states an inspeximus of a writing, with schedule annexed, made by the commonalty of the city of Carlisle, under their common seal. This instrument states it was agreed that the government of the city should be by the mayor with eleven worshipful persons of the city, and that the mayor should not do any act without the assent of the majority of the eleven. Also that the mayor and eleven should choose to them twenty-four able persons, and that the thirty-six should choose the mayor. That on the death of any of the thirty-six they should fill up the number. This is signed by several of the citizens. The charter contains an inspeximus of several resolutions of the Corporation on the nature of by-laws. They are contained in the " Dormont Book," and have been printed.* This charter of Charles I., the governing charter, is one of the finest productions of the conveyancer's art we ever perused. It begins : Carolus Dei Gratia Angliae Scociae Franciae & Hiberniae Rex fidei Defensor, etc., Omnibus ad quos praesentes literae pervenerint salutem. Inspeximus literas patentes praeclarissimi nuper patris nostri Domini Jacobi nuper Regis Angliae, etc., and continues with a most intricate piece of conveyancing ) reciting the previous charters, each charter reciting within * " Municipal Records of Carlisle," published for the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, 1887. The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 201 itself its predecessor, like a nest of Chinese ivory balls. Each King who granted a charter is said to have inspected the preceding charter : or, if it was burnt (as was the case with those of Henry II. and Henry III.), then he is said to have inspected the tenor of it, and caused it to be testified to. The operative part of the charter com- mences by confirming all liberties, customs, etc., and by granting a pardon for all past sins of omission and com- mission. It then gives a new constitution, and incor- porates the governing body by the name of the " mayor, aldermen, bailiffs, and citizens of the city of Carlisle." One of the aldermen is to be appointed mayor, and eleven honest men (undecim probi viri) besides the mayor are to be aldermen ; two other men to be bailiffs, and two dis- creet men (viri discreti) to be coroners, and twenty-four others to be capital citizens. It is curious that whereas the eleven aldermen are required to be honest, and the two coroners discreet, the mayor is not required to be either one or the other. Powers are given to this body to meet in the Guild Hall from time to time, and to make by-laws and to enforce them, and other necessary powers. A recorder is also appointed, and he, the mayor, and the two senior aldermen are to be justices of the peace, and a long list of things is prescribed into which they may inquire, including all manner of felonies, witchcrafts, en- chantments, sorceries, necromancy, trespasses, forestalling, regrating, engrossing, and extortions ; also, of all such as presume to go or ride armed, or to lay in ambush to maim and slay people. Next are powers for the appointment of a Portator Gladii nostri coram Maiore Civitatis, a bearer of our sword before the mayor ; and also of three Servientes-ad-Clavas, or sergeants-at-mace, and the charter goes on to say (we quote from the translation) : And further will and ordain and by these presents for us, our heirs, and successors, do grant to the said mayor, aldermen, bailiffs, and citizens, 2O2 History of Cumberland. and their successors, that as well the aforesaid bearer of the sword of us our heirs and successors, as the aforesaid sergeants-at-mace in the same city to be appointed shall carry and bear maces of gold or silver, and engraved and adorned with the sign of the arms of this our kingdom of England everywhere within the said city of Carlisle and liberties of the same before the Mayor thereof for the time being.* * Municipal pageantry has a meaning. The citizen of olden times looked upon the municipal insignia with a political significance. When he saw the mace and sword (says Mr. Thompson in his '' Muni- cipal History"), when he saw the banner of his community unfurled, his heart exulted in the thought that his fellow-citizens and he con- stituted a body enjoying entire independence,their own civil and criminal jurisdiction, and a name in the land which kings and lords respected. The language of this section should be noticed. In the first place, the official who is to carry the sword is Portator gladii nostri coram Maiore. (The bearer of our sword before the Mayor.) '' The sword of us, our heirs and successors," that is, the bearer of the King's sword, not the mayor's or the corporation's. The sword is the emblem of civic independence, of our right to govern ourselves ; and also of the criminal jurisdiction wielded by the mayor. At Amiens, in France, the insignia of supreme justice consist of two swords of antique shape carried in the hands of 'officials, and a similar custom prevailed among all the great corporations of France, which, undoubtedly, had a continuity from Roman times. The sword is always carried sheathed, denoting the reserve of force behind the civil power : it is always to be carried point upright, even in church. The dean and chapter of Chester litigated the question with the corporation of that place, and it was decided that "as often as the mayor repaired to the church to hear divine service or sermon, or upon any great occasion, he was to be at liberty to ha\e the sword of the city borne before him with the sword upright." The maces are to have upon them the arms, not of Carlisle, but of England, and they denote that part of the royal authority which is entrusted to the mayor during his year of office. The sergeants-at-mace, servientes-ad-clavas, are very ancient and honour- able officers ; but it is no part of their duty to carry the great gold mace which belongs to the corporation of Carlisle. Their original duties were to execute process, summon juries, attend courts of record, and so on, and one of them, the mayor's serjeant, and also the sword-bearer, are specially the mayor's attendants ; small silver maces are their insignia of office, on production of which the citizens would be bound to attend the mayor without any written summons. The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 203 The charter then grants to the Mayor authority to take recognizances, according to the provisions of the statutes merchant. It also grants a court leet and view of frankpledge. It contains a reservation of the accus- tomed fee-farm rents. It grants power for the Corpora- tion to hold, get, and receive land, etc., not exceeding the annual value of 40. It confirms the grant of the Bat- tailholme for holding the markets and fairs. Up to this point each successive charter granted to Carlisle broadens its municipal liberties ; we now come to two charters those of 16 and 36 Charles II. which were intended to curtail them, but, except for a short time, they have always been regarded as waste parchment. Their history will be more properly told when we come to deal with the seventeenth century. We have thus traced the various steps and charters by which the citizens of Carlisle gradually won from the Crown their municipal rights and franchises, such as the free election of their magistrates, exemption from the exactions of the sheriffs, and liberty ad facienda sua negotia. The result was summed up in a report made to the corporation of Carlisle by their late town clerk, Mr. Nanson : It appears evident that under the above charter (26 Edward III., 1353), the city was in all but name a county of itself, being perfectly inde- pendent of the county and all county jurisdiction, having its own bailiffs to execute the office of sheriff, and its own coroners, and being free from the payment of any purvey or rate to the county. Carlisle has thus fallen short, by a little, of the highest form of municipal independence ; it has never actually been created a county, or had its own sheriff, but it has attained very near thereto. The question has recently been raised in litigation between the Crown and the corporation of Carlisle as to whether there is or is not a manor of the city of Carlisle, of which the mayor and corporation are lords. The 204 History of Cumberland. decision of the court of first instance is that the mayor and corporation have not made out that any manor of the city of Carlisle exists. As the corporation has not carried the case to the court of appeal, though advised thereto, the question must at present be considered an open one, and may be more fittingly discussed when the municipal charters of Carlisle come to be published. It is agreed on all hands that the castle of Carlisle is a manor, and there is also the socage manor of Carlisle, now vested in the Duke of Devonshire under the circum- stances detailed in the last chapter. This socage manor includes the Sands, the Swifts, and other lands, mainly to the north of Carlisle. It seems probable that the manor, or lordship, of Carlisle Castle and the socage manor were originally one, the lordship of Carlisle Castle and that the lands of the socage manor furnished subsistence for the garrison. It is now incumbent upon us to endeavour to deal with the municipal history of Carlisle from a more domestic point of view, to discuss the strife between citizen and citizen rather than between the citizens and the Crown. The earliest charter ever granted to Carlisle was by Henry II., who recovered the city from the Scotch, who had held it during the reign of Stephen. This charter was burnt, but it is recited in a later that of 35 Henry III. It contains a confirmation of the liberties and customs which the citizens of Carlisle had theretofore freely enjoyed, and it grants them a free merchant guild gildam mercatoriam liberam ita quod nihil inde respondeant aliquibus. This guild mercatory, or free merchant guild, is the germ from which the present corporation grew. No records remain to tell us anything about it : we have only mention of it once in the recital (in the charter of Henry III.) of the burnt charter of Henry II. But the name long survived as the designation (and the proper one too) of the building in the market-place, now The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 205 commonly called the Town Hall, but whose name in the Corporation records is always the Guild Hall, or Moot Hall. That fact it is important to preserve, as taking the history of Carlisle back to the free merchant guild, or guild mercatory, and back further than that to the moots of an early village community. The free merchant guild, or guild mercatory, of Carlisle was very shortly absorbed into another organization that of mayor, bailiffs, and citizens of a later charter and did not, as at Preston, drag on a curiously intermittent existence. But though the name almost wholly disappeared, the struggle which everywhere took place between the oligarchic guilds mercatory and the democratic craft guilds was long waged in Carlisle, until it culminated in the storms of the famous Mushroom Elections of last century. It can hardly be said to have died out until the old corpora- tion of Carlisle died itself, in the changes of 1835, by which time the craft guilds themselves had become oligarchies as narrow as that against which they had so long struggled. Much learning has of late been expended in researches into the history and origin of guilds. Mr. Coote, in his able work, " The Romans of Britain," finds the origin of the English guilds in the Collegia of ancient Rome ; while Dr. Brentano, whose essay is prefixed to Toulmin Smith's " English Guilds," refers them to the German tribes in Scandinavia. But Professor Stubbs well says : The simple idea of a confraternity united for the discharge of common or mutual good offices, supported by contributions of money from each member, and celebrating its meetings by a periodical festival, may find parallel in any civilized nation at any age of the world. The ancient guild is simply the club of modern manners. The ancient guilds were burial clubs, charitable clubs, dinner and drinking clubs, trades unions, local boards, and the like. The craft guilds were trades unions, while the free merchant guilds, or guilds mercatory, were local 206 History of Cumberland. boards. In all sorts of guilds the following characteristics are to be found : the members are fratres, or brothers ; great importance is attached to the due burial of the dead ; and great importance is also attached to the dining or drinking together on certain occasions. Further, a religious character is always attached to a guild ; of some guilds, like the famous guild of the Corpus Christi at York, the objects were purely religious. But even in the craft or trade guilds of Carlisle, which were mere trades unions, the religious character stands out well marked. The craft guilds of Carlisle took part in celebration of Corpus Christi day. In the rules of the Taylors' Guild we find It is Ordained and appointed by ye said Occupacon that upon Corpus Christi day as old use or custome before time the whole Light and ye whole Occupacon and Banner be in Gt. Maries Churchyard at ye Ash tree at 10 of ye clock in ye forenoon and he yt comes not before ye banner be raised to come away pay VId. each offender toties quoties. This picturesque order gives an idea of what mediaeval Carlisle looked like on a great church festival. Early in the morning the guilds, with banners and candles, would assemble in St. Mary's Churchyard ; probably they carried with them the images of their patron saints the shoe- makers still possess an image of St. Crispin or men would be dressed up to play the characters. High Mass would be celebrated within the cathedral, and then, to the strains of solemn music, a long-drawn procession of prior and canons and ecclesiastics of high degree would wend down the Norman aisles, and emerge from the western door. As the pyx containing the consecrated bread was borne past under its magnificent baldachino every head would be bared ; then would succeed, radiant in jewellery and stiff in brocade, a life-size image of our patroness, the blessed Virgin Mary ; the guilds would fall into the rear of the procession, and the pageant would wind in and out the narrow streets of the quaint old city, past a background The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 207 of half-timbered and gaily-painted houses, to witness in the market-place the performance of a miracle play. And to wind up the enjoyment of the day, the Butcher's Guild would find a wretched bull or two to be baited in the bull- ring under the windows of the guild chambers in Redness Hall. The religious character of the local craft guilds is further marked by their days of meeting being fixed on festivals of the church. Thus the quarter days of the Weavers at Carlisle were fixed on Allhallows, Candlemas, St. Helen's, and Lammas ; those of the Shoemakers were fixed by reference to St. Sebastian and St. Fabian, St. Philip and St. James, St. Mary Magdalene, and St. Crispin and St. Crispianus ; the Smiths regulated themselves by St. Helen's Day and Lammas Day, All Saints Day and St. Blaze's Day. The craft guilds of Carlisle possess all the character- istics which have been mentioned as belonging to guilds ; they call themselves fraternities, and their members brothers. Each guild kept a hearse-cloth, or funeral- pall, for the use of the members ; and the whole frater- nity were bound to attend the funeral of any brother who had " departed to God's mercy," or of any brother's wife, child, or apprentice. Also it is ordered (by the fraternity of Taylors) that when any brother or brother's wife of this occupation deceases that [they] have ye whole light [a candle] with ye banner, ye son or daughter to have half-light with ye banner, and ye apprentice a third of ye light with ye banner. As for dining and drinking together, the rules of all the Carlisle craft guilds are precise and full on the subject of " quarterly drinkings " and periodical dinners. The rules of the free merchant guild, or guild mer- catory of Carlisle, cannot be cited, as can those of the trade or craft guilds ; those rules do not exist ; but the special objects of these merchant guilds are well known. They arose from the frith guilds, or peace clubs, associa- 2oS History of Cumberland. tions voluntarily formed by neighbours for their mutual protection and local government. In them each member was responsible for the deeds of his colleagues, as in earlier days he was held responsible for those of his kin ; thus going back to the early village communities, wherein each man was related, and all were responsible one for the other. In towns, and towns are only larger villages, the frith guilds became town guilds, and, as commerce became more and more the mark of a town, the town guilds came to be called free merchant guilds or guilds mercatory, as being the body that made laws for the regulation of trade. But as in the village community, so in the town, the possession of land was essential to the notion of a full townsman or free burgher, and the merchant guild was a club of the landed proprietors of the town, a ruling oligarchy, an autocratic local board, which often, as at Carlisle, York, etc., developed into the full-blown mayor, aldermen, citizens, etc., of a town council. We have already sketched out how the free merchant guild of Carlisle became a town council, and need not recur to its struggles and contests with the Crown. Attention must now be directed to another side thereof: its relations with its fellow-townsmen, the working crafts- men. The governing body, constituted of landed pro- prietors, excluded from all part in municipal affairs the craftsmen, the traders without land, the new settlers in the town, and the poor generally : so these, too, combined and formed guilds for their own protection, and for the furtherance of their own interests. These guilds are the trade or craft guilds : of them Carlisle possessed eight, namely, (i) the Weavers ; (2) the Smiths, who included Blacksmiths, Whitesmiths, Goldsmiths, and Silversmiths, or all that live by the Hammery Art ; (3) the Tailors or Merchant Tailors, as they called themselves in later days ; (4) the Tanners ; (5) the Shoemakers or Cordwainers ; (6) the Skinners and Glovers ; (7) the Butchers ; (8) the The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 209 Merchants. These trade or craft guilds are very old, but no record exists of any of them older than the middle of the sixteenth century. It is curious that there is no guild of carpenters, nor of any trade connected with building. And it is noteworthy to find three guilds which work in leather, while a fourth, the Butchers' Guild, deals in hides. This is due to the fact that cattle and sheep were the staple products of the county. Seven of the guilds are guilds of manual craftsmen. The eighth, the merchant guild, is quite different from the free merchant guild, or guild mercatory, which became the town council. The trade guild of merchants included the shopkeepers : some were grocers and seedsmen, and others were drapers. Nothing is at present known about the early struggles between the town council that had grown out of the free merchant guild, or guild mer- catory of Carlisle, and the eight trade or craft guilds. We know that in other places these struggles were severe, resulting, as at London, in rioting and in bloodshed. We may suppose something of the sort occurred in Carlisle, for we know Carlisle to have had a turbulent population, who are recorded, in the fourteenth century, to have mobbed the bishop and his suite, and who would little hesitate to stone the mayor in the event of their having any serious difference of opinion with him as to their rights. However, in the year 1561, we emerge from the sea of conjecture, and set foot upon the dry ground of historical records, commencing with the Dormont Book. On the title-page of this volume is the following : THIS CALLED THE REGESTAR GO VERNOR OR DORMONT BOOK OF THE COMONWELTH OF THI TH NHABITANCES W IN THE CITIE OF CARLELL RENEWED IN THE YERE OF OUR LORD GOD 1561 14 2io History of Cumberland. It contains a code of by-laws for the government of the city of Carlisle. These must have been compiled with great care and much deliberation, for amongst the corporation papers, two original drafts of them remain. These by-laws are preceded by a prologue, which is headed : Deo et Virtuti omnia debent. Prolog. Lyke as the Universale noumber of subjects and people in all realmes and countres cannot haue continuall encreas nor good sureties ip unitie and peas only by good providens godly orders and holesome Lawes provided mayd. and orderyd. after thare estate wth dew execution of the same by good governors, and officers which ledeth the people to one perfect submission unitie and trayd of concord wereupon restett all the comoneweth for th. encreas of the gude people in vertu and cor- rection of the Evyll in Vice. The prologue continues in this high falutin style for two or three long pages, and ends with " Amen." We shall not reproduce the whole, but it states that The mayr and citezens of this citie with the advise of the counsale and corporation of the same. . . . have taken parte labor travell and Diligence of zeal and gudwyll to devise orders &ct. After the " Amen," it continues In Witness hereof as well the mayr and counsale with foure of everie occupation of the foresaid citie for and in the naym of the hole citizens and thinhabitances thereof haith subscribed this book with thare owne proper hands as also Annexed hereto thare comon Seall. Now, the point to be noticed is this, that the by-laws are made by the mayor and citizens with the advice of the council and corporation, and that the testamur is by the "mayr counsale and four of everie occupation" or guild, as representing the citizens, thus showing that the trade or craft guilds of Carlisle had asserted themselves, and become powerful checks on the town council or guild mercatory. This runs all through the by-laws. Though the mayor and council are the administrative body, yet they are prohibited from laying out money without the The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 211 consent of four of every occupation. Two of the four keys of the common chest of the city are to be in the custody of the occupations. The recorder, and auditors, and other officers, not specified in the then existing charters, are removable by the " mayr and counsale and four of every occupation," who are to appoint the suc- cessors to officers so removed. The two points of most importance as having been most frequently the subject of local squabbles and litigation are the claim of the craft guilds to control the audit of the city accounts, and the following by-law, which is No. 19 : Item, that the Mayr of hymself shall not hereafter make any outmen fremen without the advice of the moste parte of the counsale and foure of euere occupacon, which is agreeable to the ancient custom and constitution of the citie. The words " outmen," and " foure of euere occupacon," are interpolations. As the rule at first stood, the mayor, and the majority of the council acting together, could have made freemen, but apparently the representatives of the guilds refused to sign, until they had a check put on a power which might be used in a way detrimental to their interests. These two points, the supervision or audit of the city accounts, and the power of the mayor to make freemen, continued for long to be in dispute, and out of them arose the exciting episodes in the history of Carlisle known as the Mushroom Elections. The charter of Elizabeth, 1566-7, states an inspeximus of these by- laws and a confirmation of them. Under this charter the town council consisted of the mayor and eleven others. How they got on with their thirty-two masters provided by the occupations or guilds, we have little to tell us : pretty well apparently until the middle of the seventeenth century. From these by-laws we get a telling picture of mediaeval Carlisle. The first twelve rules or sc relate to the council, and prescribe how its business was to be conducted. The 14 2 212 History of Cumberland. door is to be locked, and the key laid beside the mayor. All are to sit or stand in due order. Those that haith borne noe office with in the citie shall give place to those ancients such as haith borne office and franckly and gentilly suffer to sit or stand over them. Each councillor is to give his opinion in order, and anyone who interrupts is to be put out. They had a most effectual method of settling the minority. Item, if any counsalor beyng present be obstinate or led by affec- tion and stand in pie against his fellows beyng counsellors, and not reconciled that then the mayr either to punishe hym extremly or else to exclude from that cause or matter only. And the determination of the residue of the counsale to be good and effectual. This is a very practical style of cloture, and might be recommended to the consideration of Parliament. A member of the minority in the town council of Carlisle under Queen Bess had rather a rough time of it. If he stayed away from the council he was fined 6s. 8d. ; if he disagreed with the majority the mayor punished him " extremely," or put him out. When he had got down the steps he dare not relieve his feelings by telling his fellow-citizens why he had made so precipitate, possibly an undignified, exit ; for a discloser of council Was not hereafter to be takene as one of the counsale, but clearly abiect from the same as a man not worthe vocation. He had not even the poor consolation of being able to bear a grudge against a fellow-councillor. If he had, the mayor and four other councillors under the sixth by-law would proceed to appease it for him, and if he would not be appeased he was promptly expelled, and the same fate befell him if he railed at his fellow-councillors. The ninth by-law is headed, " Disorder in the mayor to be. reformed," but in reality it is for the protection of the mayor and the bailiffs. No one is to sue those function- aries at common law, but is first to apply to the council, The Norman Settlement: III. The City. 213 and the penalty for suing the mayor at common law is imprisonment. Thus, if the mayor of Carlisle in 1561, with the consent of the majority of the town council, kicked the minority out, the minority would be put in prison if they tried to find a remedy at the common law. Then the majority had another stick at hand in the thirty-second by-law, which prohibits any inhabitant from speaking or Reporting any unhonest, undecent, or slanderous words, or un- reverently use them against the mayr or counsale. If a councillor did this dreadful deed, he was fined 205. for the first offence, and expelled for the second. If a "commoner" (a man was a commoner who was not in the town council of Carlisle, tempore Queen Elizabeth), he lost his freedom of the city, and was punished at the dis- cretion of the mayor and six of the council. If he was abandoned enough to offend again he was excluded the city and its liberties. The eleventh by-law is How as often as any nobleman or strangers worthy shall cum to the citie that then upon warnynge from the mayr all the counsale with the most part of the honest men of the citie in there decent apparell shall attend and accompany the mayor for the worship of the citie upon payne of euere default \\}s. \\\]d. From the accounts of the chamberlains it appears the nobleman was treated with sugar and wine, and no doubt the honest men in their decent apparel got a drink too. But the next by-law tells of more serious calls. How that all men shalbe in redinesse immediately to cum to a fray or Soden Fyer, and that all men attend and assiste the Mayr without havynge respect or ayd either to frend foe or adversarie. And the offenders therein if any be hereafter, shall have condign punyshment or else be discharged of his frelidge (if ther be fremen) for not attend- ynge nor obeying the Mayr. Next follow a series of rules relating to financial matters. The corporation had no bankers and no 214 History of Cumberland. banking account ; they kept their money in a huge chest, hooped and bound with iron, and secured by four fetter-locks, which is in the Carlisle Museum. One of the keys was kept by the mayor; a second by "one of the most auncient and most Discret of the counsale," and the other two were kept by two members of the occupations or guilds. Whenever money was taken out of the chest, a gage dr obligation a voucher, in fact had to be put in in place of the money, and no money could be laid out without the consent of four from every guild. The yearly audit was to commence in the first or second week of Lent, and to be continued " until the same be finished and the fote thereof openly declared." The mayor signed it in presence of representatives of the guilds ; and the book of account had to be passed by the council, and then it was deposited in the common chest, but the auditor kept a "president of it." In the common chest the city leases, title-deeds, and records, were all to be kept. The mayor and chamberlains had to collect the town rents in time for the audit, and if the mayor was in default, any deficiency was stopped out of his fee ; if the chamberlains were in fault, they had to put the defaulting tenant in ward that is, custody or be put in themselves until the rent was paid. The mayor got a yearly fee. Item, that the Mayr for his year beynge shall have for his fee viij/. vjj. viij