Copeland (borough)

Copeland is a local government district and borough in western Cumbria, England. Its council is based in Whitehaven. It was formed on 1 April 1974 by the merger of the borough of Whitehaven, Ennerdale Rural District and Millom Rural District.

The name is derived from an alternate name for the Cumberland ward of Allerdale above Derwent, which covered roughly the same area.

Different explanations exist for the name. According to a document issued at the time of the borough's grant of arms, the name Copeland is derived from kaupland or bought land, the area of the Forest having been bought from the estate of St Bees Priory.^[1]

Angus Winchester (1985) upholds that the name kaupland derives from the Irish-Norse invasion of the area in the tenth century (Wainwright 1975). According to this explanation, the area was purchased from the Kingdom of Strathclyde, possibly with loot from Ireland. Geoffrey Hodgson (2008) argues that this Viking invasion accounts for the high frequency of the Hodgson surname in the area.

Governance

Elections to the borough council are held every four years, with currently 51 councillors being elected at each election. Since the first election in 1973 the council has been under Labour control, apart from between 1976 and 1979 when it was under no overall control. As of the 2011 election the council is composed of the following councillors:-^[2]

References

• Hodgson, Geoffrey M. (2008) Hodgson Saga, second edition (Standon, Hertfordshire: Martlet Books).
• Wainwright, F. T. (1975) Scandinavian England: Collected Papers (Chichester: Phillimore).
• Winchester, Angus J. L. (1985) 'The Multiple Estate: A Framework for the Evolution of Settlement in Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian Cumbria', in Baldwin, John R. and Whyte, Ian D. (eds) (1985) The Scandinavians in Cumbria (Edinburgh: The Scottish Society for Northern Studies), pp. 89–101.