Great Borne is a

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 ...

in the English Lake District with a height of . It is a rather secluded hill situated at the western end of the long ridge which divides the Ennerdale and

Buttermere Buttermere is a lake in the Lake District in North West England. The adjacent village of Buttermere takes its name from the lake. Historically in Cumberland, the lake is now within the county of Cumbria. Owned by the National Trust, it forms pa ...

valleys.

Name

The name Great Borne only really applies to the fell's summit area with most West

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 ...

ns actually referring to the fell as Herdus. However Bill Birkett in his ''Complete Lakeland Fells'' gives Great Borne and Herdus the status of separate fells, with Herdus’ summit standing half a kilometre west of Great Borne with an altitude . The meaning of Great Borne translates from the French language meaning "Great Boundary" as in the 13th century the fell denoted the edge of the

Loweswater Loweswater is one of the smaller lakes in the English Lake District. The village of Loweswater is situated to the east of the lake. Geography The lake is not far from Cockermouth and is also easily reached from elsewhere in West Cumbria. Th ...

forest, an alternative meaning has been put forward as "Great Stream" from the southern

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 ...

language with bourne meaning a stream flowing from a spring.

Topography and geology

Great Borne's southern slopes are of some interest, they fall away precipitously towards

Ennerdale Water Ennerdale Water is the most westerly lake in the Lake District National Park in Cumbria, England. It is a glacial lake, with a maximum depth of 150 feet (45 metres), and is ½ mile to a mile (700 to 1,500 metres) wide and 2½ miles (3.9 kilo ...

with steep crags and

scree Scree is a collection of broken rock fragments at the base of a cliff or other steep rocky mass that has accumulated through periodic rockfall. Landforms associated with these materials are often called talus deposits. Talus deposits typically ...

which are composed of pink

granophyre Granophyre ( ; from ''granite'' and ''porphyry'') is a subvolcanic rock that contains quartz and alkali feldspar in characteristic angular intergrowths such as those in the accompanying image. The texture is called granophyric. The texture can b ...

rock which give these slopes a reddish tinge (see picture). Approximately halfway between Great Borne and the part of the fell labelled Herdus on the 1:50,000 O.S. map is the boundary between the Skiddaw Group and the Ennerdale Granophyre intrusion.The Geology of the Whitehaven and Workington district. T. Eastwood et al. pub. HMSO. 1931. page 49. The outlying low summit of Bowness Knott () also lies to the south. It is a geological Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), showing the granophyre in contact with

Skiddaw Slate Skiddaw slate is an early Ordovician metamorphosed sedimentary rock, as first identified on the slopes of Skiddaw in the English Lake District. The base of this series is unknown. The thickness could, therefore, amount to several thousand feet of ...

. Bowness Knott gives good views of Ennerdale Water and is an easy climb from the car park which lies at its foot. Historians have also found evidence of an old (possibly

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...

)

field system The study of field systems (collections of fields) in landscape history is concerned with the size, shape and orientation of a number of fields. These are often adjacent, but may be separated by a later feature. Field systems by region Czech Republ ...

on the lower southern slopes of Great Borne below the crags and scree. The northern flanks of the fell descend to the Floutern Pass, a pedestrian route between Ennerdale and Buttermere. To the east Great Borne is connected to the neighbouring fell of Starling Dodd by a ridge, while the western slopes descend quickly to the low ground of the west Cumbrian plain.

Ascents

Great Borne is customarily climbed from the Ennerdale side of the fell, with the car park beneath Bowness Knott being the usual starting point. The route follows Rake Beck for a short distance and skirts the Herdus crags on the eastern side to gain the summit.

Summit

The summit of the fell has two separate tops divided by a shallow valley, the south top is slightly higher and is marked by an

Ordnance Survey Ordnance Survey (OS) is the national mapping agency for Great Britain. The agency's name indicates its original military purpose (see ordnance and surveying), which was to map Scotland in the wake of the Jacobite rising of 1745. There was a ...

trig point A triangulation station, also known as a trigonometrical point, and sometimes informally as a trig, is a fixed surveying station, used in geodetic surveying and other surveying projects in its vicinity. The nomenclature varies regionally: they a ...

and a considerable wind shelter while the northern top has a large cairn which is visible for miles around and gives extensive views of the

Loweswater Fells Loweswater is a village and civil parish in the county of Cumbria, England. Village Historically part of Cumberland, the village lies between the Lake District lakes of Loweswater and Crummock Water, about south of Cockermouth and within the La ...

. This large cairn is thought to be the boundary marker from which the fell takes its name.

Gallery

Image:Great Borne from Ennerdale Water.jpg, Great Borne seen from Ennerdale Water Image:Greatborne4.jpg, South face of Great Borne Image:Greatborne7.jpg, Great Borne from Crag Fell Image:Greatborne3.jpg, Rake Beck on Great Borne

References

* A Pictorial Guide to the Lakeland Fells, The Western Fells, Alfred Wainwright, * Complete Lakeland Fells, Bill Birkett, * The Mountains of England and Wales, John and Anne Nuttall,
www.wildennerdale.co.uk

{{Western Fells Hewitts of England Fells of the Lake District Nuttalls Loweswater (village) Borough of Copeland