Kepier is a location in the city of

Durham, England Durham ( , locally ), is a cathedral city and civil parish on the River Wear, County Durham, England. It is an administrative centre of the County Durham District, which is a successor to the historic County Palatine of Durham (which is dif ...

in the parish of Belmont, close to

Gilesgate Gilesgate is a place in County Durham, England. It is situated east of the centre of Durham, England, Durham. It is also a ward of Durham with a total population taken at the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2011 census was 8,074. Gilesgate was origina ...

and beside the

River Wear The River Wear (, ) in North East England rises in the Pennines and flows eastwards, mostly through County Durham to the North Sea in the City of Sunderland. At long, it is one of the region's longest rivers, wends in a steep valley through th ...

. It is site of the medieval Hospital of St Giles at Kepier. The name derives from 'Kipe weir', meaning a weir with a fish trap and the convenience of being close to a source of fish (a major part of the monastic diet) may have influenced the location of the hospital. Kepier was also the site of a medieval

corn mill A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that has been separated ...

which continued in use until its destruction by fire on September 24, 1870 caused by a spark from the grinding of the stone millwheels. The mill was never rebuilt; only a stone arch over the remnant of the mill race remains. Kepier may also have been the site of a Roman crossing of the

carrying a postulated Roman road,

Cade's Road Cade's Road is a Roman Road in north-east England. It is named after John Cade of Durham, an 18th-century antiquarian who in 1785 proposed its existence and possible course from the Humber Estuary northwards to the River Tyne, a distance of ...

, which led north to

Pons Aelius Pons Aelius (Latin for "Aelian Bridge"), or Newcastle Roman Fort, was an auxiliary castra and small Roman settlement on Hadrian's Wall in the Roman province of Britannia Inferior (northern England), situated on the north bank of the River Tyn ...

. The Kepier estate previously extended over much of

Gilesgate Moor Belmont is a suburb forming the north-eastern parts of the city of Durham, England, Durham, England. Belmont Parish covers four old coal mining villages of Belmont, Carrville, Broomside and Gilesgate Moor, which have been joined together by ind ...

and

Carrville Belmont is a suburb forming the north-eastern parts of the city of Durham, England. Belmont Parish covers four old coal mining villages of Belmont, Carrville, Broomside and Gilesgate Moor, which have been joined together by industrial and subur ...

. In the 1940s, plans for

Kepier power station Kepier power station refers to a cancelled coal-fired power station on the River Wear at Kepier, north east of Durham, County Durham, North East England. Planned by the North Eastern Electric Supply Company (NESCo) in 1944, it was never rea ...

were drafted, but the project was never undertaken.

References

*Meade, Dorothy M. ''Kepier Hospital''. Turnstone Ventures, 1995. *Watts, Victor. ''A Dictionary of County Durham Place-Names''. English Place-Name Society, Nottingham, 2002.

External links

North East History Pages on Kepier and Gilesgate
* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20061020131737/http://www.northeasthistory.co.uk/the_north_east/leisure/DURMEM250403.html Northern Echo Durham Memories article on Gilesgate and Kepier, 25/04/03br>Northern Echo Durham Memories article on medieval farming around Durham, 05/09/03
Areas of Durham, England {{Durham-geo-stub