The Cheviot () is an

extinct volcano A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates a ...

and the highest

summit A summit is a point on a surface that is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. The topographic terms acme, apex, peak (mountain peak), and zenith are synonymous. The term (mountain top) is generally used only for a m ...

in the

Cheviot Hills The Cheviot Hills (), or sometimes The Cheviots, are a range of uplands straddling the Anglo-Scottish border between Northumberland and the Scottish Borders. The English section is within the Northumberland National Park. The range includes T ...

and in the county of

Northumberland Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey. It is bordered by land ...

. Located in the extreme north of

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

, it is a walk from the Scottish border and, with a height of above sea-level, is located on the northernmost few miles of the

Pennine Way The Pennine Way is a National Trail in England, with a small section in Scotland. The trail stretches for from Edale, in the northern Derbyshire Peak District, north through the Yorkshire Dales and Northumberland National Park and ends at Kir ...

, before the descent into Kirk Yetholm. The Cheviot was formed when melting in the crust over 390 million years ago gave rise to volcanic activity, and it has subsequently sustained intense erosion. Several watercourses radiate from The Cheviot.
How this tranquil part of the North East is far from the madding crowd . Chronicle Live. Retrieved November 28, 2021.

Etymology

The name ''Cheviot'', which was first documented in 1181 as ''Chiuiet'', is probably of Common Brittonic, Brittonic origin. The name involves the element ''*ceμ-'', meaning "a ridge", and the nominal suffix ''-ed'', which in place-names can mean "having the quality of".

Geography

At above sea-level, The Cheviot is the highest point in the

, the

county top The mountains and hills of the British Isles are categorised into various lists based on different combinations of elevation, prominence, and other criteria such as isolation. These lists are used for peak bagging, whereby hillwalkers attempt ...

, England's highest point outside of Cumbria and fourth-highest outside the Lake District, after Cross Fell, Great Dun Fell and Little Dun Fell. It is located in the

Northumberland National Park Northumberland National Park is the northernmost national park in England. It covers an area of more than between the Scottish border in the north to just south of Hadrian's Wall, and it is one of least visited of the National Parks. The park ...

and is from the city of

Newcastle-upon-Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne ( RP: , ), or simply Newcastle, is a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. The city is located on the River Tyne's northern bank and forms the largest part of the Tyneside built-up area. Newcastle is ...

. The summit is a triangular

plateau In geology and physical geography, a plateau (; ; ), also called a high plain or a tableland, is an area of a highland consisting of flat terrain that is raised sharply above the surrounding area on at least one side. Often one or more sides ...

covered with

peat Peat (), also known as turf (), is an accumulation of partially Decomposition, decayed vegetation or organic matter. It is unique to natural areas called peatlands, bogs, mires, Moorland, moors, or muskegs. The peatland ecosystem covers and ...

quagmires.

Usway Burn The Usway Burn is an upland river on the southern flanks of the Cheviot Hills, in the Northumberland National Park, England. It is a tributary of the River Coquet and is about 15 km in length. It is located close to the northernmost end of ...

, a tributary of the Coquet, rises on The Cheviot, as do College Burn, which merges with the

Bowmont Water Bowmont Water is a stream in the Scottish Borders and Northumberland, England. It rises in the Cheviot Hills and flows by Mowhaugh, Town Yetholm, and Kirk Yetholm. It then crosses the Anglo-Scottish border and continues past Mindrum Mill, Min ...

to form the River Glen near Kirk Newton, and Harthope Burn.

Geology

The Cheviot is an extinct

stratovolcano A stratovolcano, also known as a composite volcano, is a conical volcano built up by many layers (strata) of hardened lava and tephra. Unlike shield volcanoes, stratovolcanoes are characterized by a steep profile with a summit crater and peri ...

eruptive during the

Caledonian orogeny The Caledonian orogeny was a mountain-building era recorded in the northern parts of the British Isles, the Scandinavian Mountains, Svalbard, eastern Greenland and parts of north-central Europe. The Caledonian orogeny encompasses events that ...

(490-390 Ma), in which volcanic activity arose from melting within the mantle crust.Geological history of Northumbria. Yorkshire Geological Society. Retrieved November 28, 2021. The mountain is heavily eroded, and originally may have been as high as 10,000 ft (3,000 m), with a diameter perhaps of 37 miles (60 km).

Volcanic vents A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates are ...

may have been located along the faults at Harthope and Thirl Moor. The earliest volcanic activity in the area was violent and explosive, with exposed ash and

ignimbrite Ignimbrite is a type of volcanic rock, consisting of hardened tuff. Ignimbrites form from the deposits of pyroclastic flows, which are a hot suspension of particles and gases flowing rapidly from a volcano, driven by being denser than the surrou ...

showing

pyroclastic flow A pyroclastic flow (also known as a pyroclastic density current or a pyroclastic cloud) is a fast-moving current of hot gas and volcanic matter (collectively known as tephra) that flows along the ground away from a volcano at average speeds of bu ...

s to have reached

Coquetdale The River Coquet runs through the county of Northumberland, England, discharging into the North Sea on the east coast at Amble. It rises in the Cheviot Hills on the border between England and Scotland, and follows a winding course across the l ...

and Ingram. Later activity consisted of

andesitic Andesite () is a volcanic rock of intermediate composition. In a general sense, it is the intermediate type between silica-poor basalt and silica-rich rhyolite. It is fine-grained (aphanitic) to porphyritic in texture, and is composed predomina ...

trachyte Trachyte () is an extrusive igneous rock composed mostly of alkali feldspar. It is usually light-colored and aphanitic (fine-grained), with minor amounts of mafic minerals, and is formed by the rapid cooling of lava enriched with silica and al ...

and

rhyolitic Rhyolite ( ) is the most silica-rich of volcanic rocks. It is generally glassy or fine-grained (aphanitic) in texture, but may be porphyritic, containing larger mineral crystals (phenocrysts) in an otherwise fine-grained groundmass. The mineral ...

lava extrusion, which abnormally for such lavas, covered an area as large as . Lavas erupted from the Cheviot underlie Branxton and Flodden Ridge.

Granitic A granitoid is a generic term for a diverse category of coarse-grained igneous rocks that consist predominantly of quartz, plagioclase, and alkali feldspar. Granitoids range from plagioclase-rich tonalites to alkali-rich syenites and from quart ...

magma was intruded into the layers of lava during the time period immediately before the volcano became inactive. The resulting

pluton In geology, an igneous intrusion (or intrusive body or simply intrusion) is a body of intrusive igneous rock that forms by crystallization of magma slowly cooling below the surface of the Earth. Intrusions have a wide variety of forms and com ...

was exposed by erosion during the

Carboniferous The Carboniferous ( ) is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic that spans 60 million years from the end of the Devonian Period million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Permian Period, million years ago. The name ''Carbonifero ...

(+298 Ma).

Glacial till image:Geschiebemergel.JPG, Closeup of glacial till. Note that the larger grains (pebbles and gravel) in the till are completely surrounded by the matrix of finer material (silt and sand), and this characteristic, known as ''matrix support'', is d ...

in common in the area, which is a remnant of the Last Ice Age (< 115 Ka), during which the Cheviots were beneath ice sheets. The peat expanses date from the immediately post-glacial period.

Human history

Flattened remnants of a

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...

henge monument have been uncovered at nearby Hethpool. The stone circle may date to around 2500 BC, and is hypothesized to have been a ritualistic gateway to the mountain. Harthope Burn, which cuts a deep valley on the flanks of The Cheviot, marked the boundary between the

reivers Border reivers were Cattle raiding, raiders along the Anglo-Scottish border from the late 13th century to the beginning of the 17th century. They included both Scotland, Scottish and England, English people, and they raided the entire border ...

of the English East and Middle Marches in the 16th and 17th century. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, The Cheviot and the hills surrounding it were the site of aircraft crashes which claimed the lives both of

Allied An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

and German airmen. A local shepherd John Dagg and his sheepdog rescued a pilot following an

RAF The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

crash in 1942. Dagg also rescued survivors of a crash in December 1944, which killed 2 members of a 9-man

US Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

crew. Aircraft wreckage is still seen on the mountain today.

Access

Other than the route via the Pennine Way, most routes up the Cheviot start from the Harthope Burn side to the northeast, which provides the nearest access by road. The summit is around from the road-end at Langleeford; across the valley to the east is the rounded peak of Hedgehope. There are routes following the ridges above either side of the valley, and a route that sticks to the valley floor until it climbs to the summit of the Cheviot from the

head of the valley The head of the valley or, less commonly, the valley head, refers to the uppermost part of a valley.Leser (2005), p. 935. Description The head of a valley may take widely differing forms; for example, in highland regions the valley often ends i ...

. Although the Pennine Way does a out-and-back detour to the Cheviot, many walkers who come this way omit it, since the stage (the most northerly) is long.

View

The view is obscured greatly by the flatness of the summit plateau. Nevertheless, on a clear day the following are visible (from west, clockwise); Broad Law,

Moorfoot Hills The Moorfoot Hills are a range of hills south of Edinburgh in east central Scotland, one of the ranges which collectively form the Southern Uplands. Etymology The name ''Moorfoot'' was recorded as ''Morthwait'' in 1142. The second element is O ...

Pentland Hills The Pentland Hills are a range of hills southwest of Edinburgh, Scotland. The range is around in length, and runs southwest from Edinburgh towards Biggar and the upper Clydesdale. Etymology The name is first recorded for the farm of Pentlan ...

, the

Ochils The Ochil Hills (; gd, Monadh Ochail is a range of hills in Scotland north of the Forth valley bordered by the towns of Stirling, Alloa, Kinross, Auchterarder and Perth. The only major roads crossing the hills pass through Glen Devon/ Gle ...

, Lammermuir Hills, Ros Hill, Long Crag,

Urra Moor Urra Moor is the highest moor in the North York Moors, North Yorkshire, England. At above sea level it is the highest point in Hambleton District and the North York Moors National Park, and the fourteenth most prominent hill in England. The n ...

, Tosson Hill,

Burnhope Seat Burnhope Seat is a high moorland fell in the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) in northern England. It lies between the heads of the Rivers Tees, South Tyne and Wear. The summit is crossed by the boundary between County ...

Cross Fell Cross Fell is the highest mountain in the Pennines of Northern England and the highest point in England outside the Lake District. It is located in the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It lies within the county of Cumbria and ...

Helvellyn Helvellyn (; possible meaning: ''pale yellow moorland'') is a mountain in the English Lake District, the highest point of the Helvellyn range, a north–south line of mountains to the north of Ambleside, between the lakes of Thirlmere and Ulls ...

Scafell Pike Scafell Pike () is the highest and the most prominent mountain in England, at an elevation of above sea level. It is located in the Lake District National Park, in Cumbria, and is part of the Southern Fells and the Scafell massif. Scafell Pi ...

Skiddaw Skiddaw is a mountain in the Lake District National Park in England. Its summit is the sixth-highest in England. It lies just north of the town of Keswick, Cumbria, and dominates the skyline in this part of the northern lakes. It is the ...

Sighty Crag Sighty Crag is a hill in the southern part of the Kielder Forest region in northern England, a region which also includes its fellow Marilyns of Peel Fell and Larriston Fells. It is separated from its higher and more shapely counterpart, Peel ...

Peel Fell Peel Fell is the highest hill in the Kielder Forest region of England, making it the highest hill for several miles in each direction until the Cheviot Hills to the north-east are reached. Because of this, it has enough relative height to make ...

, and Queensberry. The longest possible line of sight from the Cheviot is to

Beinn a' Ghlò Beinn a’ Ghlò is a Scottish mountain situated roughly north east of Blair Atholl in the Forest of Atholl in between Glen Tilt and Glen Loch, in Cairngorms National Park. Details It is a huge, complex hill with many ridges, summits and ...

, 112 miles away in the

Grampians The Grampian Mountains (''Am Monadh'' in Gaelic) is one of the three major mountain ranges in Scotland, that together occupy about half of Scotland. The other two ranges are the Northwest Highlands and the Southern Uplands. The Grampian rang ...

of the

Scottish Highlands The Highlands ( sco, the Hielands; gd, a’ Ghàidhealtachd , 'the place of the Gaels') is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Sco ...

Subsidiary SMC summits

References

External links

* Computer generated summit panoram
The Cheviot
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cheviot, The Cheviot Hills Marilyns of England Hewitts of England Hills of Northumberland Nuttalls Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Northumberland Highest points of English counties Stratovolcanoes Volcanoes of England Devonian volcanoes Kirknewton, Northumberland