In the mid C12 Bishop William of St. Barbara granted "Stellinglei", with all appurts of woodland, meadows, fisheries, mills etc. to the Nunnery of St. Bartholomew in Newcastle. Allowing for Bishop Puiset apparently granting it to the master of his mint, the nunnery held the manor of Stelley, as it was called in Hatfield's Survey, for 13s 4d p.a. until the Dissolution. There is no clue as to how the nunnery used this property, or what buildings they may have had here. After the Dissolution it passed through a number of R.C. families - Tempest, Widdrington and Townley, and belonged to Joseph Cowen in the late C19. Stella Hall (SMR 1694) was a large irregular building of the late C16/early C17, with 18th century-C19 alterations, and was demolished in 1955. Dated C12th.

In 188 , W.L.S. Charlton donated a 2 ae coin of Constans found at Ryton to the museum of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle. The O.S. noted in 1959 that neither the Society nor the Museum of Antiquities had any record of this coin.

"Near to the door leading from the rectory are the remains of the village stocks, which stood at one time near the Cross".(1) The above grid reference is to the cross. That old know-all, W.A.Cocks, told the O.S. in 1952 that while he remembered seeing the stocks near the Rectory when he was a boy, they had since disappeared.

At the east end of Ryton church there is a solid stone coffin, with the external dimensions - length 2.1 m, width at head 0.7 m, width at foot 0.5 m, depth 0.4 m. There is a recess for the head at the wider end. The date 1610 has been inscribed on the head end, and Bourne speculates that "Probably one of the early rectors was buried in it, and 1610 the date when it was disinterred".

"A barbarous coin of Tetricus II" was found in 1972 in, according to the accession records of the Museum of Antiquities, Paddock Hill Woods, up from the Derwent near the north end of the old railway viaduct. It was donated to the Museum by D. Dickson, 37 Solway Street, Newcastle. The find spot is rather obscure. The first grid reference above is from the museum records, the second from the O.S. cards. The actual description of the find spot suggests it was south of both these references, and could be on the neighbouring map, hence the second map reference above.

On 13 November 1939 a cist was uncovered at Summerhill sand quarry. This emerged after the earlier ones had been published by W. Bulmer, and its discovery is recorded in the local papers, and in Cocks' unpublished notes. Cocks informed J.H. Ostridge, of the O.S., about this cist but it does not appear among the O.S. archaeological record cards. Cocks recorded that this cist, which measured 2 ft 11 in x 2 ft 1 in, was found empty. He added, "It is the small one now in my garden", and - in another place - "in the rockery".

On 23 November 1938 a cist burial was found on the edge of Summerhill sand quarry while turf was being removed. The find spot was SE of the crossroads of the Blaydon-Greenside road and Path Head Lane, some 5 yards NW of SMR 611. The cist was excavated by T.R. Goddard, curator of the Hancock Museum. Under the ? cairn (SMR 614) there was a well-constructed cist, its long axis 7 degrees N of E, and its internal dimensions 3 ft 6 in x 2 ft, x 1 ft 6 in deep. The side slabs were noticeably larger and thicker than those of SMR 608 and 611, as was the cover stone which measured 5 ft 6 in x 3 ft, x 4 in thick. The joints between the stones were packed with small stones or clay, and the floor of the cist consisted of 3 slabs of sandstone, 1 in thick, carefully fitted together. The cist contained a contracted skeleton and a beaker, and - apparently placed there deliberately - sand and pebbles, plus some fragments of charcoal and burnt bone.

On 23 November 1938 a cist burial was found on the edge of Summerhill sand quarry while turf was being removed. The find spot was SE of the crossroads of the Blaydon-Greenside road and Path Head Lane, some 5 yards NW of SMR 611. The cist was excavated by T.R. Goddard, curator of the Hancock Museum. This burial differed from the neighbouring ones "in being covered by numbers of rounded water-worn stones from 6 to 12 inches in length packed in the surrounding sand and forming a roughly circular heap some 5 to 6 feet in diameter". This did not project above the ground level in 1938, and does not appear to have risen more than 18 inches above the top of the cist. It nevertheless seems possible that there had originally been a cairn over this burial.

On 11 Nov. 1938 a cist burial was found on the edge of the Summerhill sand quarry while turf was being removed. The find spot was 40 yards from the Blaydon-Greenside road, opposite to a point 20 yards east of the lane which crosses that road at Path Head. The cist was excavated by T.R. Goddard, the curator of the Hancock Museum. The cist was constructed of four sandstone slabs which formed a rectangular space 2 ft x 3 ft 4 in, x 2 ft 3in deep, with its long axis 20 degrees E of N. The floor consisted of several thin irregular sand stone slabs; the coverstone was broken and had fallen into the cist. The cist contained a contracted skeleton, and a Food Vessel, and in the sand which had accumulated over the floor there were small fragments of charcoal and burnt bone.

On 5 August 1937 a cist was found accidentally in Summerhill sand quarry, Blaydon. It was duly excavated by G.W. Temperley, hon. secretary, Natural History Society, W. Bulmer etc. It was located "above the west face of the sand quarry, 50 yards south of a point on the Blaydon-Greenside road 800 yards from its junction with the Blaydon-Hexham road, at the west end of the new road bridge". It was found 18 ins below ground, and was constructed of four 3 in thick sandstone slabs to form a cavity 3 ft x 2 ft 3 ins x 1 ft 9 ins deep. The coverstone (or stones) was badly broken. Its long axis lay NNE. It contained a contracted adult skeleton and a flint knife.