EDEN (CASTLE), a parish in the southern division
of EASINGTON ward, county palatine of DURHAM,
!OU miles (E. by S.) from Durham, containing 281 inhabitants.
The living is a perpetual curacy, in the archdeaconry
and diocese of Durham, endowed with £200
private benefaction, and £200 royal bounty, and in the
p atronage of Rowland Burdon, Esq. The church., dedicated
to St. James, was rebuilt in 1764, at the expense
of Rowland Burdon, Esq., whose son and successor
enlarged it by the addition of two aisles. The
petty sessions for the division are held here. This was
a place of some note anterior to the Conquest. Robert
de Brus, by charter, granted the chapel of Eden,
which he had founded here, to the monks of St. Cuthbert,
directing that a chapel should be built by the prior,
within four years afterwards, which was probably the
origin of the present parochial edifice. The ancient castle
has long fallen to ruins, and has been succeeded by a
modern mansion. The Dene, a narrow glen about
four miles in length, through which runs the Eden
rivulet, abounds with scenery of a wild and romantic
description. The skeleton of a human figure, and a
curious glass-vase, were found in 1775, beneath a cairn,
about a hundred yards northward from the bridge, but
they were not then removed: the cairn having been
subsequently re-opened., the former, from exposure to
the atmosphere, had mouldered into dust, and the latter
was then taken away.