CORPSE roads around Cumbria are to be showcased with a new book published this month.

Authors Alan Cleaver and Lesley Park have compiled the routes, history and legends surrounding the county's ancient corpse roads which date back to medieval times.

The roads were used to transport the dead from remote parishes to the 'mother' church.

Mr Cleaver, 58, said: "There are few written records about the corpse roads but we have included what records do exist alongside the oral tradition, legends and half-remembered tales that still survive.

"We have traced the famous 'ghost story' on the Wasdale to Eskdale corpse road to its origins and looked at how the long-held belief that a corpse road will always be a public path was tested even in the High Court in London."

One of the better documented of Cumbria's corpse roads is the Flookburgh to Cartmel route, which was first recorded in 1872 by author James Stockdale.

Mr Cleaver, of Church Street, Whitehaven, said: "He describes a dispute about the body being taken along the precise route as tradition dictated.

"This meant it went between two farms rather than on the main road, no doubt to the annoyance of the farmers.

"It was considered bad luck to deviate from the 'true' corpse road."

The Cartmel corpse road also passes the Headless Cross, the remains of an ancient cross which tradition says was used to say prayers at before people attempted to cross the treacherous Morecambe Bay.

Corpse roads featured in the book include ones at Beetham, Grasmere, Loweswater, Keswick, Shap, Greystoke and Garrigill.