Stan Beckensall, the doyen of writers about Northumberland, opens readers' eyes to the world about them by showing how the names of local places and fields speak of the county's landscape, its history and the life of its people.

The text is replete with striking examples of the origins, meanings and changes of many local names, and is coupled with a wide range of illustrations -- photographs (especially air photos) , documents and maps (many published for the first time and reproduced by permission of the Duke of Northumberland).

All the research for the field name section of the book was carried out by the author himself.