North Yorkshire

Filed under Brigantia England, Geography, Geology, Landscape Archaeology, Maps

Contents

1 North Yorkshire — Geography, Geology, Pre-history, History & Heritage
- 1.1 Why it matters for Brigantian & Ice-Age studies
2 Linked Documents
3 Aldborough Hall, North Yorkshire
4 Aldborough Roman Town
5 Boltby Scar Iron Age Hill Fort
6 Bowbridge Lane Late Bronze Age burial site, Catterick
7 Cana Barn Henge
8 Castle Dykes Roman Villa
9 Catterick Henge
10 Catterick Roman Fort
11 Catterick Roman Marching Camp
12 Cleave Dyke Defensive System
13 Devil’s Arrows
14 Earthwork 300m East of the Entrance to Swinton Castle
15 Earthworks at the top of Holly Hill, Well
16 Eboracum, York
17 Field Systems at Reeth
18 Hutton Moor Henge
19 John O’Gaunt’s Castle and Beaver Dyke – Harrogate
20 Kilburn White Horse
21 Kilgram Bridge Ford
22 Kirklington Tumulus
23 Live Moor Hill Fort
24 Maidens Grave – Burton Fleming, North Yorkshire
25 Marne Barracks Neolithic palisaded enclosure
26 Middleham Castle
27 Motte and Bailey – Northallerton
28 Moulton Henge
29 Near Moor
30 Newsham House, Newsham, Richmond
31 Newton Kyme Henge
32 Nunwick Henge
33 Pickhill Mound
34 Ramsgill Celtic Head
35 Roulston Scar Hill Fort
36 Scorton Cursus
37 Scotts Dyke – Richmond
38 Sinderby Henge
39 Snape Castle
40 St Andrew’s Church, Aldborough
41 St Cuthbert’s Church, Forcett
42 St John the Baptist Church, Kirby Wiske
43 St John the Baptist Church, Stanwick
44 St Mary Magdalen the Leper Chapel Ripon
45 Stanwick Hill Fort
46 Staple Howe West Hesterton
47 Studforth Hill Roman Amphitheatre and Motte and Bailey, Aldborough, North Yorkshire
48 Temple Lane Ritual Routeway
49 The Cistercians in North Yorkshire
50 The Latimer Family
51 The Nevilles
52 The Yorkshire Dales
53 Thornborough Henges

Castle Hill’s imposing silhouette hides a great prehistoric fort, Norman castle and Victorian tower. Thanks to Varley’s trenches and the Read more

West Yorkshire

Maiden Castle Fort Pooley Bridge

A superbly circular "fort", built on the side of the hill, which seems to be a Brigantian fashion (see below). Read more

Maiden Castle Fort Reeth

For over five hundred years, the miners and smelters of Reeth produced mountains of precious lead. The lead ores from Read more

Castle Steads Hill Fort

Castle Steads is a Hill-Side Enclosure, seemingly built without worry of threat from the upper slopes of the hill it Read more

Catterick Henge

The henge at Catterick racecourse is an intriguing prehistoric site. Initially thought to be a Roman amphitheatre, it is now Read more

Catterick Roman Marching Camp

Discovered only recently by air survey and geophysics, this camp lies on the alluvial plain of the River Swale, on Read more

East Yorkshire

East Yorkshire’s Middle-Iron-Age story stands out in Britain because the communities who farmed the chalk of the Yorkshire Wolds developed Read more

Castle Naze Hill Fort

This is a Promontory fort of probable Iron Age date. It uses the natural cliffs of the hill that it Read more

Somerset

Sutton Common Fort

Sutton Common is an early Iron Age fort/enclosure site just north of Doncaster, A key feature of this "marsh fort" Read more

Nunwick Henge

A henge at Nunwick visible both as a low bank and shallow internal ditch and as a cropmark. A berm Read more

North Yorkshire — Geography, Geology, Pre-history, History & Heritage

Theme	Key points	Highlights
Geography	• Covers c. 8 000 km² from the Pennines' spine eastward to the North Sea.• Two National Parks—Yorkshire Dales (Limestone “karst country” dissected by deep dales) and the North York Moors (heather-clad Jurassic upland with dramatic coast).• Lowlands: Vale of York (glacial lacustrine plain) and Vale of Pickering separate the uplands.• Major rivers: Ure, Swale, Ouse, Derwent; all drain to the Humber or directly to the North Sea.	– Highest point: Whernside (736 m).– Iconic coastlines: Whitby Cliffs, Robin Hood’s Bay.– Climate: cool-temperate, wetter on western Pennines, drier east of the Moors.
Geology	• Western Dales: Carboniferous limestones, sandstones and Millstone Grit—classic stepped “Yoredale Series”.• Central lowlands: Permo-Triassic red beds and evaporites; glacial tills mantle the Vales.• North York Moors: tilted Jurassic sequence—Cleveland Ironstone, sandstones (building stone), Shales (jet).• Flamborough Head: only onshore Cretaceous Chalk in northern England.• Quaternary: Drumlins, eskers and the terminal Moraines of the Vale of Pickering.	– Mineral wealth: ironstone (Rosedale), alum shales (16-18 c.), Jurassic jet (Whitby).– Classic limestone cave systems (Ingleborough region).
Pre-history	• Mesolithic: lakeside settlement at Star Carr (9 300 BC).• Neolithic: henge monuments of Thornborough; Rudston megalith on the Wolds.• Early Bronze Age: dense round-Barrow cemeteries on the North York Moors and Dales heights.• Late Bronze / Iron Age: “Arras culture” square-barrow cemeteries and chariot burials (East Riding); hillforts (Ingleborough, Malham Tarn).• Tribal zone of the Brigantes.	– Gold Rillington “Wold burial” finds.– Stanwick Oppidum, one of Britain’s largest Iron-Age enclosures.
History	Roman: Fortified routes (Dere Street, Wade’s Causeway); legionary HQ at Eboracum (York); auxiliary forts at Catterick, Malton. Anglo-Saxon: Kingdom of Northumbria; synod of Whitby (664). Viking: Jorvik (York) Scandinavian hub; Norse place-names blanket the Dales. Norman-Medieval: Castles (Helmsley, Pickering), monastic boom—Rievaulx, Fountains, Jervaulx. Tudor–Georgian: Dissolution reshapes estates; coastal alum and jet industries. Industrial era: Cleveland iron-stone, Whitby whaling, rise of seaside resorts (Scarborough, Filey), North York Moors Railway (1836+).	– York twice imperial Roman capital (Septimius Severus, Constantine I proclaimed 306).– 1132–1539: Cistercian powerhouses (Rievaulx, Fountains) transform sheep-pasture economy.
Heritage today	• UNESCO: Fountains Abbey & Studley Royal World Heritage Site.• York Minster, medieval walls, Viking Jorvik Centre.• Whitby Abbey (English Gothic silhouette inspiring Bram Stoker).• Captain Cook’s birthplace (Marton) & Whitby HM Bark Endeavour story.• North York Moors & Yorkshire Dales National Parks—hiking, caving, heritage railways.• Cleveland Way & Pennine Way long-distance trails.• Agricultural traditions: Wensleydale cheese, Dales drystone walls, sheepfolds.• Rich folklore: barghest black dog of Whitby, Pennine lead-mining “knockers,” the giant Wade legends.	– Annual Viking Festival (York).– Beamish-style open-air museums: Ryedale Folk Museum.– Dark-sky reserves in the Moors promote astro-tourism.

Why it matters for Brigantian & Ice-Age studies

North Yorkshire knit together contrasting terrains—Pennine limestone uplands, glacial lowland corridors and Jurassic coastal plateaux—that became natural migration funnels and resource frontiers from the Late Glacial through Roman and onto modern times. Its deep cave sequences (Victoria Cave, Vicar’s Moor), well-dated barrow cemeteries, and dense Roman-to-medieval documentary record make it a key calibration area for tracing how climate, geology and culture intersect in northern Britain.