Spurn Heap. 
BrRIPLINGTON 
Bay. 
PINT GAB Ae CONG aD 
accidents have befallen the upper part of the low tract of Holderne/s, which faces 
the congruent fhores. Hedon, a few miles below Hu//, feveral hundred years 
ago a port of great commerce, is now a mile anda half from the water, and has 
long given-way to the rifing fortune of the latter (a creation of Adward I. in 1296) 
on account of the excellency of its port. Butin return, the fea has made moft 
ample reprifals on the lands of this hundred : the fite, and even the very names of 
feveral places, once towns of note upon the Humber, are now only recorded in 
hiftory : and Rawenfper was at one time a rival to Hull*; and a port fo very 
confiderable in 1332, that Edward Baliol and the confederated Englifh barons 
failed from hence with a great fleet to invade Scotland; and Henry 1V. in 1399 
made choice of this port to land at, to effe& the depofal of Richard II. yet the | 
whole of it has long fince been devoured by the mercilefs-ocean: extenfive fands, 
dry at low water, are to be feen in their ftead; except Sunk Ifland, which, till 
about the year 1666, appeared among them like an elevated fhoal, at which period 
it was regained, by embankments, from the fea ; and now forms a confiderable eftate, 
probably reftored to its priftine condition. 
Spurn Head, the Ocelum Promontorium of Ptolemy, terminates this fide of the Hum~ 
ber, at prefent in form of a fickle, near which the wind-bound fhips anchor fecurely. 
The place on which the lighthoufes ftand is a vaft beach near two miles long, 
mixed with fand-hills flung up by the fea within the laft feventy years. 
The land from hence for fome miles is compofed of very lofty cliffs of brown clay, 
perpetually preyed on by the fury of the German fea, which devours whole acres at 
a time, and expofes on the fhores confiderable quantities of beautiful amber. Fine 
wheat grows on the clay, even to the edge of the cliffs. A country of the fame 
fertility reaches from Ki/nfey, near this place, as far as the village of Sprottly, ex- 
tending, in a waved form, for numbers of miles ; and, when I faw it, richly cloathed 
with wheat and beans. 
From near Kilnfey the land bends very gently inward, as far as the great promon- 
tory of Flamborough ; and is a continuance of high clayey cliff, till about the 
village of Hfornfey. Near itis a mere, noted for its Eels and Pikes, at prefent fepa- 
rated from the fea by fo {mall a fpace as to render its fpeedy deftruction very proba- 
ble. A ftreet, called Hornfey Beck, has long fince been {wallowed : and of Hide, a 
neighboring town, only the tradition is left. 5 
The country grows confiderably lower; and, near the bafe of the promon- 
tory, retires fo far in as to form Bridlington bay, antiently called Gabrantovicorum 
Sinus, to which the Geographer adds Evasuey@, on account of the excellency and 
® Madox. Ant. Exch. i, 422, 
5 fafety 
