Shap Summit
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Shap is a
linear village Linearity is the property of a mathematical relationship ('' function'') that can be graphically represented as a straight line. Linearity is closely related to '' proportionality''. Examples in physics include rectilinear motion, the linear ...
and
civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
located among
fell A fell (from Old Norse ''fell'', ''fjall'', "mountain"Falk and Torp (2006:161).) is a high and barren landscape feature, such as a mountain or moor-covered hill. The term is most often employed in Fennoscandia, Iceland, the Isle of Man, pa ...
s and isolated dales in
Eden district Eden is a local government district in Cumbria, England, based at Penrith Town Hall in Penrith. It is named after the River Eden, which flows north through the district toward Carlisle. Its population of 49,777 at the 2001 census, increased ...
,
Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England, bordering Scotland. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. C ...
, England, in the historic county of
Westmorland Westmorland (, formerly also spelt ''Westmoreland'';R. Wilkinson The British Isles, Sheet The British IslesVision of Britain/ref> is a historic county in North West England spanning the southern Lake District and the northern Dales. It had an ...
. The parish had a population of 1,221 in 2001, increasing slightly to 1,264 at the 2011 Census.


Location

The village lies along the
A6 road This is a list of roads designated A6. * A006 road (Argentina), a road connecting Las Cuevas with the Christ the Redeemer monument in the border between Argentina and Chile * ''A6 highway (Australia)'' may refer to : ** A6 (Sydney), a road connec ...
and the
West Coast Main Line The West Coast Main Line (WCML) is one of the most important railway corridors in the United Kingdom, connecting the major cities of London and Glasgow with branches to Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Edinburgh. It is one of the busiest ...
, and is near to the
M6 motorway The M6 motorway is the longest motorway in the United Kingdom. It is located entirely within England, running for just over from the Midlands to the border with Scotland. It begins at Junction 19 of the M1 and the western end of the A14 at ...
. It is situated from Penrith and about from Kendal. Shap is on the route of the
Coast to Coast Walk The Coast to Coast Walk is a long-distance footpath between the west and east coasts of Northern England, nominally long. Devised by Alfred Wainwright, it passes through three contrasting national parks: the Lake District National Park, th ...
.


Etymology

Early (12th and 13th century) forms such as ''Hep'' and ''Yheppe'' point to an
Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and their overseas settlemen ...
rendering ''Hjáp'' of an
Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th c ...
original ''Hēap'' = "heap", (of stones), probably referring to an ancient stone circle, cairn, or to the Shap Stone Avenue just to the west of the village.


History

Although Shap is geographically a small village, it is legally a
market town A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village or city. In Britain, small rural ...
with a charter dating from the 17th century. The parish was, between 1905 and 1935, administered by an
urban district Urban district may refer to: * District * Urban area * Quarter (urban subdivision) * Neighbourhood Specific subdivisions in some countries: * Urban districts of Denmark * Urban districts of Germany * Urban district (Great Britain and Ireland) (hist ...
council. At one time, the granite works (which are situated about a mile outside the village) was in itself a separate community, with its own
Co-op A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is "an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-control ...
store. Shap polished pink granite can be found in many buildings in the UK, including outside St Paul's Cathedral in London.


Shap today

The village has three
pubs A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...
, a small supermarket, a
fish and chip Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of liv ...
shop, an antique book shop, a butcher's shop, a primary school, a newsagent's, a coffee shop, a ceramic art studio called ''Edge Ceramics'', a
fire station __NOTOC__ A fire station (also called a fire house, fire hall, firemen's hall, or engine house) is a structure or other area for storing firefighting apparatuses such as fire engines and related vehicles, personal protective equipment, fire ...
, a shoe shop (
New Balance New Balance Athletics, Inc. (NB), best known as simply New Balance, is one of the world's major sports footwear and apparel manufacturers. Based in Boston, Massachusetts, the multinational corporation was founded in 1906 as the New Balance Arch ...
factory shop) an Anglican church and 3 B&B/ Hostels. There is also a small library, which is in the process of being relinquished from local council control and being adopted by the community as part of a budget cutting measure. Major employers in the area are
Hanson Hanson or Hansson may refer to: People * Hanson (surname) * Hansson (surname) * Hanson (wrestler), ringname of an American professional wrestler Musical groups * Hanson (band), an American pop rock band * Hanson (UK band), an English rock ...
and
Tata Steel Tata Steel Limited is an Indian multinational steel-making company, based in Jamshedpur, Jharkhand and headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. It is a part of the Tata Group. Formerly known as Tata Iron and Steel Company Limited (TISCO), Tata S ...
. Some of the scenes in the feature film ''
Withnail and I ''Withnail and I'' is a 1987 British black comedy film written and directed by Bruce Robinson. Loosely based on Robinson's life in London in the late 1960s, the plot follows two unemployed actors, Withnail and "I" (portrayed by Richard E. Gran ...
'' were filmed around Shap. Sleddale Hall, the filming location for Uncle Monty's cottage Crow Crag, is located near Wet Sleddale Reservoir. On 22 October 1999, a Hawk jet from
RAF Leeming Royal Air Force Leeming or RAF Leeming is a Royal Air Force (RAF) station located near Leeming, North Yorkshire, England. It was opened in 1940 and was jointly used by the RAF and the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF). Between 1950 and 1991, it ...
crashed into an empty barn in the village before disintegrating across the A6 and West Coast railway line, killing its two-man crew.


Attractions

Shap Summit is located on the motorway at and the railway at . Shap Fell used to be notorious for the difficult and dangerous stretch of A6 for drivers, and it includes a well-known section of the West Coast Main Line. It has a 1:75 gradient for trains heading north, and in the days of steam locomotives banking engines from Tebay were often used to assist trains. It has been popular with railway photographers and there have been many pictures published taken in the area, most notably at Scout Green which lies on the southern approach to the hill. Shap Fell is known for Shap
granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies under ...
, a pink rock rich in
orthoclase Orthoclase, or orthoclase feldspar ( endmember formula K Al Si3 O8), is an important tectosilicate mineral which forms igneous rock. The name is from the Ancient Greek for "straight fracture," because its two cleavage planes are at right angles ...
,
quartz Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica ( silicon dioxide). The atoms are linked in a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon-oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall chemical ...
and biotite; Shap Pink Quarry takes its name from this.
Shap Abbey Shap Abbey was a religious house of the Premonstratensian order of Canons regular situated on the western bank of the River Lowther in the civil parish of Shap Rural, around from the village of Shap, in the Eden District of Cumbria, England. Th ...
is nearby in the secluded valley of the river Lowther. Now impressive ruins dating from 1199, the Abbey was one of the last abbeys to be dissolved by Henry VIII in 1540. Shap Wells has a
mineral spa Mineral spas are spa resorts developed around naturally occurring mineral springs. Like seaside resorts, they are mainly used recreationally although they also figured prominently in prescientific medicine. Origins Spas were used for millen ...
located in the grounds of the Shap Wells hotel which was used in
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 opposing ...
as a prisoner of war camp.


In literature

A scene in Robert Neill's historical novel ''Crown and Mitre'' is laid in Shap. In 1659 the book's protagonist Hal Burnaby, a young Royalist, rides through the village on a clandestine mission connected with the restoration of King Charles II. Shap also appears in Anthony Trollope's novel ''
Can You Forgive Her? ''Can You Forgive Her?'' is a novel by Anthony Trollope, first published in serial form in 1864 and 1865. It is the first of six novels in the Palliser series, also known as the Parliamentary Novels. The novel follows three parallel stories o ...
'' as the nearest village to Vavasor Hall, the ancestral home of the heroine Alice Vavasor.


Governance

The
civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
of Shap (formerly Shap Urban Parish) includes the hamlet of Keld and parts of the granite works and limestone works, and has a population of 1,221, increasing to 1,264 at the 2011 Census. The parish shares a joint parish council and an electoral ward with Shap Rural. The total population of the electoral ward taken at the 2011 census was 1,394. Shap is in the
parliamentary constituency An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger state (a country, administrative region, or other poli ...
of Penrith and the Border. Neil Hudson was elected its Conservative
Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...
at the 2019 General Election, replacing
Rory Stewart Roderick James Nugent Stewart (born 3 January 1973) is a British academic, diplomat, author, broadcaster, former soldier and former politician. He is the president of GiveDirectly, a visiting fellow at Yale University's Jackson Institute for ...
. Prior to
Brexit Brexit (; a portmanteau of "British exit") was the withdrawal of the United Kingdom (UK) from the European Union (EU) at 23:00 GMT on 31 January 2020 (00:00 1 February 2020 CET).The UK also left the European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC ...
, for the
European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...
its residents voted to elect MEP's for the North West England constituency. For
Local Government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-l ...
purposes it is in the ''Shap Ward'' of
Eden District Council Eden may refer to: *Garden of Eden, the "garden of God" described in the Book of Genesis Places and jurisdictions Canada * Eden, Ontario * Eden High School Middle East * Eden, Lebanon, a city and former bishopric * Camp Eden, Iraq Oc ...
and the ''Eden Lakes Division'' of
Cumbria County Council Cumbria County Council is the county council for the non-metropolitan county of Cumbria in the North West of England. Established in April 1974, following its first elections held the previous year, it is an elected local government body respon ...
.


Transport

The Lancaster and Carlisle Railway (now part of the
West Coast Main Line The West Coast Main Line (WCML) is one of the most important railway corridors in the United Kingdom, connecting the major cities of London and Glasgow with branches to Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Edinburgh. It is one of the busiest ...
), opened on 17 December 1846, and runs along the eastern edge of the village. Shap railway station was closed in 1968, though there have been calls for its re-opening. Penrith is the closest railway station and is situated on the West Coast Main Line.


Dialect

The people of Shap speak a variant of the ''Penrithian'' dialect, which is itself a variant of the
Cumbrian dialect The Cumberland dialect is a local Northern English dialect in decline, spoken in Cumberland, Westmorland and Lancashire North of the Sands, not to be confused with the area's extinct Celtic language, Cumbric. Some parts of Cumbria have a ...
spoken around the Penrith and Eden district area.


See also

* Listed buildings in Shap


References


External links


Cumbria County History Trust: Shap
(nb: provisional research only – see Talk page)
Shap Community Website – Maintained by the Parish Council

Shap Air Crash Anniversary

Rail Worker's Monument, Shap

Video footage and history of Keld Chapel

Video footage of the Shap Wells Spa and Hotel
{{Authority control Villages in Cumbria Westmorland Civil parishes in Cumbria Eden District