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Durham

City and administrative headquarters of the county of Durham, northeast England, on the River Wear, 19 km/12 mi south of Newcastle-upon-Tyne; population (2001) 42,900. Formerly a centre for the coalmining industry (the last pit closed in 1993), the city now has light engineering industries and manufactures textiles, carpets, and clothing.

Features

Durham has a fine Norman cathedral and the remains of a castle built in 1072 by William I. The cathedral and castle are together a World Heritage Site. Other features include the university's Gulbenkian Museum of Oriental Art and Archaeology (1960), the UK's only museum wholly devoted to the subject, and the annual Miners' Gala. The university was founded in 1832.

Cathedral and castle Durham Cathedral and castle are situated on a 30 m/98 ft-high sandstone hill which forms a peninsula surrounded on three sides by the River Wear. According to tradition, Bishop Aldhun and his community of monks from Lindisfarne brought the uncorrupted body of St Cuthbert (died 687) here from Chester-Le-Street in 995, guided by a girl looking for her lost dun cow. They established a church to serve as St Cuthbert's shrine, which became a place of pilgrimage for Saxons and Normans. The site was then called Dunholme, or ‘hill island’. Little remains of the original Saxon cathedral.

The present cathedral was built between 1093 and 1133. The nave was begun in 1093 by Bishop William of St Carileph and finished in 1128 by Bishop Flambard. The interior of the cathedral is richly ornamented and has the earliest English examples of pointed transverse arches, and ribbed vaulting on a grand scale. The remains of the theologian and historian the Venerable Bede were brought to Durham in about 1020, and they were encased and put in the Lady Chapel in 1370.

In return for defending the northern Marches against Scottish invasions, the bishops of Durham were given important secular powers, holding sway over a county palatine with many royal privileges. They had their own army, courts, councils, and judges. The palatinate powers of the bishops were gradually reduced after the 14th century and William van Mildert (1826-36) was the last ‘prince bishop’.

The castle, situated on Palace Green opposite the cathedral, was the palace of the bishops of Durham until it was transferred to the new Durham University in 1836, when the bishops moved their home to the palace at Bishop Auckland. The university now occupies most of the castle buildings, and the keep is a student hall of residence. Other features include the kitchen, built in 1499; the Black Staircase, added by Bishop Cosin in the 1665; and the Norman chapel dating from about 1080. The Great Hall was originally built in Norman times but the present structure was built by Bishop Hatfield in the early 14th century.

The building nearest the castle gate, now part of the university library, was once the exchequer built by Bishop Neville in 1450. Nearby is the library built by Bishop Cosin in 1669. On the opposite side are the 17th-century almshouses, now lecture rooms, also built by Bishop Cosin.

Other architectural features The restored St Oswald's Church dates from the 11th century; St Margaret's has considerable late-Norman remains; St Giles was built in 1112; and St Mary-le-Bow has an 18th-century screen. The town hall, built in 1851, incorporates examples of modern stained glass. The mayor's chamber has 18th-century panelling and a fine Jacobean overmantle. The two main bridges, Framwellgate and Elvet, both date from the 12th century. The buildings at the southeast end of the Elvet bridge show traces of the chapel of St Andrew which once stood on the site. From Prebend's Bridge, built in the 1770s, there are fine views of the cathedral. Kepier Hospital was founded in 1112; and Sherburn Hospital, established as a 12th-century leper hospital, was extensively rebuilt as a combined hospital and almshouses. Durham Light Infantry Museum illustrates the history of the Durham regiment.

The site of the Battle of Neville's Cross, where the English defeated the Scots in 1346, is on the northern outskirts of the city.

Durham Cathedral