CASTLES AND STRONGHOLDS OF NORTHUMBERLAND

Much more than an excellent gazetteer to 500 locations, this engaging history shows how the castles of Northumberland were built up throughout the medieval period and later. A bold project was launched that linked a string of towers like a latter-day Hadrian's Wall to create a defence against marauding Scots. Beyond this line were many peles or bastles, homes to the notorious reiving families, cursed by the Bishops of Durham and Glasgow for their brutal way of life, but nonetheless the source of much romance and legend.