Rockcliffe is a village 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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

in the

Cumberland Cumberland ( ) is an area of North West England which was historically a county. The county was bordered by Northumberland to the north-east, County Durham to the east, Westmorland to the south-east, Lancashire to the south, and the Scottish ...

district of

Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders the Scottish council areas of Dumfries and Galloway and Scottish Borders to the north, Northumberland and County Durham to the east, North Yorkshire to the south-east, Lancash ...

, England. Part of the parish is a

marsh In ecology, a marsh is a wetland that is dominated by herbaceous plants rather than by woody plants.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p More in genera ...

y peninsula between the mouths of the rivers Esk and Eden. The parish includes the settlements of Rockcliffe, Rockcliffe Cross, Floristonrigg, Todhills, Low Harker and Harker. Rockcliffe formerly had a railway station, on the Caledonian Railway Main Line, that closed in 1965. Another station was located nearby at Floriston that closed in 1950.

Place-name meaning

Rockcliffe does not mean 'cliff by rocks' or 'rocky cliff' as many might think. The name means 'red cliff', implying a

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

cliff-face. The name is from

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

''rauðr'' meaning "red" and Old English ''clif'' for "

cliff In geography and geology, a cliff or rock face is an area of Rock (geology), rock which has a general angle defined by the vertical, or nearly vertical. Cliffs are formed by the processes of weathering and erosion, with the effect of gravity. ...

", similar to Radcliffe in

Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders Lancashire to the north, Derbyshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Cheshire to the south, and Merseyside to the west. Its largest settlement is the city of Manchester. ...

Governance

Rockcliffe is the largest parish in the

electoral ward A ward is a local authority area, typically used for electoral purposes. In some countries, wards are usually named after neighbourhoods, thoroughfares, parishes, landmarks, geographical features and in some cases historical figures connected t ...

of Longtown & Rockcliffe. The ward covers the two parishes and the area in between. The total ward population at the 2011 Census was 4,123. Population of Rockcliffe Parish through time

Population of Rockcliffe Parish through time

References

External links

Cumbria County History Trust: Rockcliffe
(nb: provisional research only – see Talk page) * Villages in Cumbria Civil parishes in Cumbria Cumberland (unitary authority) {{Cumbria-geo-stub

Place-name meaning

Governance

See also

References

External links