Cockermouth Leisure Centre, Cockermouth, Cumbria. Archaeological Desk-Based Assessment and Watching Brief.

Day Cummins Ltd have submitted proposals (Planning Reference 2/06/1344) for the construction of an extension to Cockermouth Leisure Centre, Castlegate, Cockermouth, Cumbria (NGR NY 1243 3081), together with footpaths, cyclepaths
and additional carparking bays within the carpark. The development site lies partially within the Cockermouth Urban Conservation Area and is situated very close to Tute
Hill motte, a Scheduled Ancient Monument (SAM 23798). Following consultation from Allerdale Borough Council, Cumbria County Council Historic Environment Service (CCCHES) issued a brief for a programme of archaeological investigation to be undertaken in association with the development, comprising a desk-based assessment and a watching brief. Following CCCHES approval of a project design, Oxford Archaeology North (OA North) were commissioned by Day Cummins Ltd to undertake the work.
The desk-based assessment, undertaken in April 2007, identified 13 known sites of archaeological interest within a 500m radius of the proposed development site. As
well as the adjacent Tute Hill motte (Site 01), which will not be directly affected by the proposals, parts of the Deer Orchard (Site 03), a medieval deer park attached to the later Cockermouth Castle (Site 02), fall within the development site. It has been contended that the Tute Hill motte, the origins of which may actually lie in the
prehistoric period, was the focus of a pre-twelfth-century urban centre located east of the River Cocker on St Helen’s Street. That the motte was later subsumed into the
Deer Orchard, which protected the area around Tute Hill from the depredations of both agriculture and development, would suggest that there is potential for archaeological remains dating from the prehistoric to medieval periods to survive in the area. Moreover, these remains have the potential to relate not only to the use of Tute Hill as a medieval defensive feature, and latterly as a deer park, but might also include deposits and features relating to the putative early urban settlement.