CORBRIDGE  , a small

market town in the Hexham parliamentary division of Northumberland, England; 31 M . E. of Hexham, on the north bank of the river Tyne, which is here crossed by a fine seven-arched bridge dating from 1674 . Pop . (1901) 1647 . Corbridge was formerly of greater importance than at present . Its name, derived from the small river Cor, a tributary of the Tyne, is said to be associated with the Brigantian tribe of Corionototai . About 76o it became the capital of Northumbria; later it was a borough and was long represented in parlia• ment .. In 1138 David of Scotland made it a centre of military operations, and it was ravaged by Wallace in 1296, by Bruce in 1312, and by David II. in 1346 . Its chief remains of antiquity are a square peel-tower and the cruciform church of St Andrew, of which part of the fabric is of pre-Conquest date, though the building is mainly Early English . Extensive use is made of building materials from the Roman station of Corstopitum (also called Corchester), which lay half a mile west of Corbridge at the junction of the Cor with the Tyne . This site has from time to time yielded many valuable relics, notably a silver dish, discovered in 1734, 148 OZ. in weight and ornamented with figures of deities; but the first-rate importance of the station was only revealed by careful excavations undertaken in 1907 seq . There were then unearthed remains of several buildings fronting a broad thoroughfare, one of which is the largest Roman building, except the baths at Bath, yet discovered in England .

Two of these buildings were

granaries, and indicate the importance of Corstopitum as a base of the northward operations of Antoninus Pius . After his conquests had been lost, and Corstopitum ceased to be a military centre, its military buildings passed into civilian occupation, of which many evidences have been found . A fine hoard of gold coins, wrapped in lead-foil and hidden in a wall, was discovered in 1908 . Corstopitum ceased to exist early in the 5th century, and the site was never again occupied .