Photo Essay: Coast to Coast Walk - Old Norse Landscape Terms

The Lord's Prayer written in Old Norse lettering

Common Landscape Names in Cumbria and Yorkshire

(derived from Norse Words)

There are certain terms used over and over in the Lake District, the Dales, and the North Yorkshire Moors to name landscape features: some of them identify natural features; some are attached to features established by original human settlements. Here is a basic glossary of terms used frequently in this region.

 

beck = stream, brook

brigg or brigge = bridge

cam = bank, slope, ridge

Easedale Beck in the Lake District

carr = marshy woodland, shrubland

dale = valley

foss or force = waterfalls, rapids

Swaledale in the Yorkshire Dales

garth = small grass enclosure beside a house

gate = way or street

gill or ghyll = small, narrow valley or ravine

Gaping Gill in Yorkshire

hause = mountain pass

how = hill

keld or kell = spring or well

Keld photographed from the Pennine Way

knott = rocky hilltop

laithe or leethe = barn, agricultural building

mell = sand dunes

 mere = lake

 

Lake Windermere in the Lake District

moss = bog, marsh

ness = headland, promontory

pike = peak

Scafell Pike in the Lake District

 

scar or scaur = cliff or rocky outcrop with steep cliff

seat, set(t) or side = Summer pasture or dwelling place

sike, syke, or sitch = small stream or gulley, gutter

skyr = shire, county

slack = small valley or depression in the ground

Rossthwaite in the Borrowdale region

 

tarn = lake or pond (especially in uplands)

thorp(e) or t(h)rop = village or small settlement

thwait(e) = village or small settlement

toft = small farmstead with enclosed land (later also came to mean a village or small settlement)

Red Tarn in the Lake District

 Resources

Lakeland Terms: http://www.iainwest.com/celtic.htm

Yorkshire Terms: http://www.viking.no/e/england/yorkshire_norse.htm