Mapping Mountains – Significant Name Changes – The Fours - The 400m Hills of England

The Cold Piece (SO 338 996)

There has been a Significant Name Change to a hill that is listed in the The Fours – The 400m Hills of England, with the summit height, col height and their locations, the drop and status of the hill derived from a Trimble GeoXH 6000 survey and subsequent LIDAR analysis conducted by Myrddyn Phillips.

The Cold Piece (SO 338 996)

The criteria for the list that this name change applies to are:

The Fours – The 400m Hills of England.  English hills at or above 400m and below 500m in height that have 30m minimum drop, accompanying the main list are three categories of sub hills, with this hill now being included in the 390m Sub-Four category, the criteria for which are all English hills at or above 390m and below 400m in height that have 30m minimum drop.  The list is co-authored by Myrddyn Phillips and Aled Williams, with the 1^st edition of the booklet containing this list published by Europeaklist in December 2013 and by Haroldstreet in January 2014, with the 2^nd edition of this list due for publication by Mapping Mountains Publications in April 2018.

The Fours - The 400m Hills of England by Myrddyn Phillips and Aled Williams

The hill is adjoined to the Stiperstones group of hills, which are situated in the county of Shropshire close to the Welsh border, and it is positioned with minor roads to its north-east and south, and the A488 road to its north-west, and has the small community of Snailbeach towards the north-east.

When the listing that is now known as The Fours - The 400m Hills of England was originally compiled this hill appeared under the transposed and invented name of Shelve Hill, with an accompanying note stating; Named from village to the South, this was also the name it appeared as when the list was uploaded to the RHB Yahoo group file database.

Extract from the Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 Explorer map

Hill list authors are prone to list a hill by the name that appears nearest to its summit on contemporary Ordnance Survey maps, without much consideration for its local or historical confirmation, or whether map placement is appropriate, and in the case of Shelve Hill this name has been consistently applied by the Ordnance Survey to land south-west of the summit of this hill and approximately 1km from it.  This is not a practice that I now advocate as with time and inclination place-name data can be improved either by asking local people or by examining historical documents, through this form of research an appropriate name for the hill can usually be found, and in the case of this hill it was research conducted by Aled Williams with a local farmer who gave the name of The Cold Piece for this hill.  Consequently the hill was listed as The Cold Piece in the 1st edition of The Fours when the list was published by Europeaklist in December 2013.  

Extract from the Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 Historical map

Extract from the Ordnance Survey series of Six-Inch maps

Therefore, the name this hill is now listed by in The Fours - The 400m Hills of England is The Cold Piece and this was derived from local enquiry. 

The full details for the hill are:

Group:  Stiperstones

Name:  The Cold Piece

Previously Listed Name:  Shelve Hill

 

OS 1:50,000 map:  137

Summit Height:  399.5m (converted to OSGM15, Trimble GeoXH 6000)

Summit Grid Reference:  SO 33849 99695 (Trimble GeoXH 6000) 

 

Col Height:  341.8m (LIDAR)

Col Grid Reference:  SO 34228 99099 (LIDAR)

Drop:  57.7m (Trimble GeoXH 6000 summit and LIDAR col)

Myrddyn Phillips and Aled Williams (January 2018)