BASSENTHWAITE, a village, a parish, and a lake in Cockermouth district, Cumberland. The village stands on the E side of the lake, opposite Bassenthwaite L. r. station, 5 miles NNW of Keswick; and has a post office under Windermere. The parish is divided into two constablewicks, High-side around the village and Low-side or Hawes. Acres, 6,930. Real property, £4,568. Pop., 570. Houses, 120. The property is much subdivided. The surface is highly diversified and picturesque, ranging from the summit of Skiddaw to the meadows on the lake. Lead ore has been found; and a mine of antimony worked. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Carlisle. Value, £150. Patrons, the Dean and Chapter of Carlisle. The church is old but good; and there are charities £14 and some land.-The lake is in the basin of the Derwent river; commences 3 miles NW of the foot of Derwent water; extends 4½. miles north-north westward, with a mean breadth of ¾ of a mile; and has a surface elevation of 210 feet above the level of the sea. Its bosom is not gemmed with any island; its head is flat and open, but looks away to the mountains round Derwent water; its W side is flanked by a range of wooded fells, mostly rising from the water's edge; its foot is screened by vale and slope, going up at 3 miles distance to Binsey hill; and its E side is flanked by the grand skirts and shoulders of Skiddaw, crowned, at 2½ miles' distance, by that mountain's summit. Pike and perch abound in the lake; and salmon pass through it to the Upper Derwent.

(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))