Durham eBook

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. Durham, however, has from the earliest times been looked upon as a district apart, not simply as a piece shorn off from a larger division. It has never, that is, been called a sbire as its big neighbour on the south has. The old kingdom of Northumbria, the land north of the Humber, included Durham and Yorkshire as well as Northumberland. But the space between Tyne and Tees was regarded as a close dependency of the Church and its governor was not a king but a bishop. The whole county formed the land of the cathedral on the Wear. It was the patrimony of St Cuthbert, the dominion ruled over by the successors of this great missionary. Not till late in the Middle Ages did men Speak of it as County Durham. In the survey that William the Conqueror ordered to be taken and recorded in Domesday Book it is called Saint Cuthbert''s Land.