Ағылшын көлдерінің Гельвеллин тауы

Mountain in the English Lake District
the opera set here

Helvellyn (/h//ɛ//l/'/v//ɛ//l//ɪ//n/; possible meaning: pale yellow moorland) is a mountain in the English Lake District, the highest point of the Helvellyn range, a north–south line of mountains to the north of Ambleside, between the lakes of Thirlmere and Ullswater. Helvellyn is the third highest point both in England and in the Lake District, and access to Helvellyn is easier than to the two higher peaks of Scafell Pike and Scafell. The scenery includes three deep glacial coves and two sharp topped ridges on the eastern side (Striding Edge and Swirral Edge). Helvellyn was one of the earliest fells to prove popular with walkers and explorers; beginning especially in the later 18th century. Among the early visitors to Helvellyn were the poets Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth, both of whom lived nearby at one period. Many routes up the mountain are possible so that it may be approached from all directions. However, traversing the mountain is not without dangers; over the last two hundred years there have been a number of fatalities. The artist Charles Gough is more famous for his death on Striding Edge in 1805 than for what he achieved in his life. Among many human feats upon the mountain, one of the strangest was the landing and take off of a small aeroplane on the summit in 1926. Since early 2018 the summit of Helvellyn including both Striding and Swirral Edges and the wider Glenridding Common have been managed by the John Muir Trust, a wild places conservation charity under a three year lease with the Lake District Park Authority.

The whole of Helvellyn, above the conifer plantations to the west and the intake walls surrounding the valleys of Glenridding and Grisedale to the east, is Open Access land. in an ITV show presented by Julia Bradbury.

Striding Edge is a popular route which involves some scrambling, linking the summit ridge of Birkhouse Moor to Helvellyn's summit by what becomes a sharp arête. Striding Edge begins at Hole in the Wall and then stretches for over to the Helvellyn summit plateau. This starting point is accessible from both Glenridding and Patterdale. Hole in the Wall used to be a prominent gap in the stone wall on the top of the ridge where a gate was missing. Today the gap has been filled in and a ladder stile crosses the wall. From here the initial part of the ridge is relatively rounded and has a solid path running along the right hand side. This changes upon reaching High Spying How, the highest point on the ridge — At this point a narrow path continues close to the top of the ridge, which becomes increasingly narrow, and scramblers will often follow the very top of the arête. The path on the right hand side continues until near the end of the ridge where it switches over to the left hand side. Scramblers who continue on the top of the ridge are forced to descend an awkward short gully down from the final rock tower to rejoin the path. At this point the ridge connects with the main Helvellyn massif. Reaching the summit plateau involves a steep walk or scramble up about of rough rocky terrain, known as The Abyss by W. A. Poucher, author of a popular series of mountain guide books between 1940 and the late 1960s. Another walker died after falling from Striding Edge in May 2008. Over the August Bank Holiday weekend in 2017, Patterdale Mountain Rescue attended a fatal fall from Striding Edge on the Saturday and helped rescue a seriously injured walker and his dog on the Sunday. Swirral Edge offers a shorter but equally exciting scramble along a similar sharp arête. The main path to it comes up from Red Tarn, which is linked by a surprisingly level path to Hole in the Wall, making this ridge equally accessible from Patterdale as from Glenridding. The ridge walk can be extended to include the summit of Catstye Cam. The climb up or down from the summit plateau onto Swirral Edge is another well known accident spot. In winter it involves climbing down another snow cornice onto steep icy ground. There have been a number of accidents at this spot in recent years, making it as dangerous as Striding Edge. Nethermost Pike also has an east ridge which gives an alternative route to Helvellyn from Grisedale, which many walkers overlook. It can be combined with a scramble on Eagle Crag, or this part can be bypassed by taking the path to Nethermost Cove before joining the ridge.

From Patterdale a long but safe and easy walk on a good path follows the track up Grisedale to the tarn, and then takes the old pony track up the south ridge of Helvellyn. The second part of this walk takes a safe route well away from crags on the side of the ridge (see The south ridge below.) Nethermost Cove also has some routes, including a large gully between Striding Edge and the back of the cove. Browncove Crags on the western side of the mountain has some north facing routes. These are easier to access from a car park, and they can be linked with the Red Tarn routes.

The Lake District National Park Authority employs two "Fell top assessors" during the winter months, usually between December and March. Working alternate weeks, one of these walks up Helvellyn each day during that period to check the weather, snow and walking conditions. Their report and daily photograph appear on Weatherline, the Lake District weather forecast website and phone line service, which also includes a local weather forecast from the Met Office. The fell top assessors also put their assessments and photos on Twitter. This information is important for people who go out hillwalking and climbing in winter, helping them to plan their routes and get an idea of the mountain conditions.

Many people camp on Helvellyn throughout the year, often near Red Tarn which gives good views of Striding Edge, Swirral Edge, and the summit of Helvellyn itself. Although camping in England is illegal without the permission of the landowner, there is a tradition of wild camping in the Lake District. This has often been tolerated so long as people have camped unobtrusively, for no more than one night, and have left no trace of their campsite behind.

The summit of Helvellyn takes the form of a broad plateau, sloping gently to the south west, but dropping abruptly to the north east into Red Tarn cove. So smooth and large is this summit that a small aeroplane was able to land on it in 1926 (see History below). The highest point, above sea level, is the top of a small rocky knoll, marked by a loose cairn. In former times this knoll used to be known as Helvellyn High Man (or Higher Man.) Nearby there is a cross shaped stone shelter; to the north is an Ordnance Survey trig point, slightly lower than the summit at
The view from the top on a clear day extends across the whole of the Lake District to the Solway Firth and hills of south west Scotland to the north west, Cheviot and the Pennine Hills to the north east, Morecambe Bay, Blackpool and the coast of North Wales to the south, and the Irish Sea to the west. Snowdon is hidden by the Coniston Fells, and the Isle of Man is largely hidden behind the Great Gable and Pillar group of fells. The subsidiary top, Helvellyn Lower Man, is about to the north west. Its summit is small compared to the plateau of Helvellyn, but it offers better views to the north west, as the ground falls steeply away from it on that side.

For centuries shepherds have walked over all parts of Helvellyn in the course of their work. It is only since the late eighteenth century that people have visited the mountain for pleasure or recreation. One of the earliest accounts of an ascent of Helvellyn for the pleasure of doing so is contained in James Clarke's guidebook of 1787. He quotes the account of an unnamed gentleman from Penrith who wanted to eat his dinner on Midsummer Day while sitting in a snowdrift on top of Helvellyn. The man left home at two in the morning, rode to Glencoyne and left his horse at a house in the valley there. He started to walk up the mountain at between four and five in the morning and after five hours hot and hard work he reached the snow and the summit. The snow was covered with dust so he had to dig for clean snow to eat with his dinner. He returned by a different route, reaching Glencoyne ten hours after leaving it. This story seems to reflect the colder climatic conditions of the eighteenth century, during the so called "Little Ice Age". Poets and artists were among the early visitors to Helvellyn at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Samuel Taylor Coleridge did a lot of fellwalking during the years when he lived near Keswick. In August 1800, barely a month after moving there, he went to visit his friends William and Dorothy Wordsworth in Grasmere, taking a route over Helvellyn and arriving at ten in the evening. A few days later William Wordsworth with his brother John and their friend Mr Simpson made a trip up Helvellyn, setting out after breakfast and returning home at ten that evening. John Keats speaks of Wordsworth "on Helvellyn's summit, wide awake " in a sonnet that celebrates the poet and other artists. A portrait of Wordsworth, deep in thought among the clouds on the summit of Helvellyn, was painted by Benjamin Robert Haydon in 1842, an example of romanticism in portraiture. An early casualty of the mountain was the artist Charles Gough, who slipped and fell from Striding Edge in April 1805. Three months later a shepherd heard a dog barking near Red Tarn and went to investigate. He found Gough's skeleton, his hat split in two, and his dog still in attendance. Initial newspaper reports that the dog had survived by eating the remains of her dead master were quickly forgotten. Gough became regarded as a martyr to the romantic ideal, and his dog Foxie was celebrated for her attachment and fidelity to her long dead master. William Wordsworth and Sir Walter Scott both wrote poems about the scene; Francis Danby and Edwin Landseer both painted it. A memorial stone to Gough was erected on Helvellyn in 1890 and quotes part of Wordsworth's poem "Fidelity". A small tourist industry began to grow up around the mountain, with inns providing ponies and guides as well as accommodation for the visitors, and guidebooks being published for visitors. Jonathan Otley's guidebook of 1823 described the view from the summit and claimed it gave a more complete view of the Lake District than any other point. William Ford, in his guidebook of 1839 recommended the Horse Head Inn at Wythburn as a good place to stay and where a guide could be hired "at a moderate charge"; he went on to describe the climb up Whelp Side and the view from the top. Harriet Martineau in 1855 described the ascent from Patterdale. Ponies could be taken as far as Red Tarn, where there were stakes to tether them while undertaking the final part on foot via Swirral Edge. "Though trying to unnaccustomed nerves," she said, "there is no real danger"; the other ridge "is always fool hardy to do", and "every one knows" the story of Charles Gough. She also mentioned three routes from the west: one by Grisedale Tarn, one from the Nag's Head at Wythburn, "the shortest, but by far the steepest," and a third from Legburthwaite (that is, from the inn at Thirlspot.) An advertisement in her book, placed by the King's Head Inn at Legburthwaite, claimed "A guide always in readiness at this inn." A further fatality on Striding Edge in 1858 is commemorated by the Dixon Memorial. Robert Dixon from Patterdale was killed while following foxhounds on the ridge. A stone tablet on Helvellyn, south of the shelter, commemorates this landing. Skylarks (Alauda arvensis) and wheatears (Oenanthe oenanthe) are frequently encountered. At one time eagles (probably Aquila chrysaetos) soared over the mountain and bred on the steep cliffs above Red Tarn, but even in Wordsworth's day they had gone, having been persecuted to extinction. The three coves to the east of Helvellyn are all important sites for remnant populations of arctic alpine plants. Species such as downy willow (Salix lapponum), mountain avens (Dryas octopetala), alpine mouse ear (Cerastium alpinum), alpine meadowgrass (Poa alpina) and others have been able to survive in these coves since the last glaciation through a combination of rocks rich in basic minerals, a harsh micro climate and inaccessibility to grazing sheep on cliff ledges. However, these populations are small and are not reproducing well. Natural England has introduced a recovery plan for them. Brown trout and schelly, a species of whitefish, are found in the tarn. Grassland on the Helvellyn range has been heavily overgrazed for many years, yet it supports a diversity of acid grassland species including sheep's fescue (Festuca ovina) on the summit ridge, matgrass (Nardus stricta) on the middle slopes, and fescue bent swards on the lower slopes. The Nardus grasslands are the haunt of the scarce mountain ringlet butterfly (Erebia epiphron), the only alpine species of butterfly found in Britain. Acidic flushes (areas of water seepage) with their carpets of sphagnum mosses are common. Less common are basic flushes, which support a greater diversity of species. Natural England, which is responsible for choosing SSSIs, tries to ensure that the management and use of the area is sustainable.

All the rocks of Helvellyn are part of the Borrowdale Volcanic Group, formed on the margin of an ancient continent during a period of intense volcanic activity during the Ordovician period, roughly 450 million years ago. Helvellyn lies within a geological structure which is interpreted as evidence of a volcanic caldera. This is a semi circular series of faults which sweep eastwards to encompass Helvellyn, Patterdale, Deepdale and Fairfield, and which abut against a major north–south fault to the west (along the line of the A591 road). This caldera was formed by an eruption of exceptional magnitude which produced a series of pyroclastic flows, fast moving currents of hot gas and rock, which buried the whole district of roughly beneath at least (in places up to of ignimbrite). This succession of ignimbrites is known as the Lincomb Tarns Tuff Formation, the most widespread volcanic formation in the Lake District. Above these ignimbrites are found sedimentary rocks of the Esk Pike Sandstone Formation. These were deposited in water, probably in a caldera lake, as the volcanic rocks weathered and were eroded. Structures in these rocks suggest the faults were still active and the caldera was still subsiding. Layers of tuff and lapilli tuff indicate some ongoing volcanism. Helvellyn Mine or Wythburn Mine opened in 1839 by the gill between Whelpside and Helvellyn Screes. but several spoil heaps remain, one covering the gill, along with the old miners' path which zigzags up the hillside, a self acting incline to lower ore to the dressing floor, and the old winding drum house. Various attempts to interpret the name have been made in the past. Some, led by the present spelling, possibly wrongly thought the final syllable was the Welsh word llyn, "lake" Richard Coates in 1988 proposed a Celtic derivation from the deduced Cumbric word hal, "moorland", and velin, the Cumbric equivalent of the Welsh word melyn meaning "yellow." Colour, in the Celtic languages, is perceived differently from the way it is seen and described in modern English. For example, in Scottish Gaelic the spectrum of colours was "pastel rather than primary, gentle rather than bold." Colours were related to a landscape context in which blues, greens, greys and whites in particular were both more diverse and more differentiated than in English. People who relied on the system of transhumance for their livelihood gained the ability to assess the nutritional value of upland grasses from a distance before moving their stock to a summer shieling, and used appropriate colour terms for grasses which would become progressively more green as the spring advanced. Yellow, at least in Gaelic hill names, is not a bright colour. It describes hills which are distinguished by grasses such as Nardus stricta and Deschampsia flexuosa, both of which appear pale and bleached in winter. A name describing the mountain as "pale yellow moorland" is therefore meaningful in a Celtic context. Lower Man. The mountain has two tops, which used to be distinguished as Helvellyn Low Man (or Lower Man) and Helvellyn High Man (or Higher Man). Both are drawn and labelled on a panoramic view of the range found in Jonathan Otley's guidebook of 1823. Striding Edge. An edge in mountain place names is a steep escarpment, on either one side or (as here) on both sides. The first reference to Striding Edge was by Walter Scott in 1805 as Striden edge. A map of 1823 called it Strathon Edge. It is possible that "Striding Edge" has replaced an earlier name, now lost. Swirral Edge may be either "The precipitous ridge that causes giddiness" or "The precipitous ridge where the wind or snow swirls around." An edge is a steep escarpment, as above. Swirrel, a dialect variation of "swirl" has two possible explanations. It can be used to mean "giddiness, vertigo", but it can also be used of a place in the mountains where wind or snow swirls around.