[3] Belph: It has been suggested this placename derives from Belge meaning 'roaring river', although only gentle flowing streams are in the vicinity.

To the west lies the Pennine Coal Measures Group, and in the east the New Red Sandstone belt is found.

The Permian limestones outcrop in places, most notably at Creswell Crags, but are usually overlain by shallow clay or soils, which lend well to arable cultivation.

[4] Primarily farmland throughout the parish outside the villages, there is some small forestry south of Belph surrounding the industrial areas.

The earliest fossils at Creswell Crags date from this time, including those of hippopotamus, narrow-nosed rhinoceros and cave hyena.

Around 50,000 years ago, Neanderthals used the caves found there, with the environment being a cool, damp grassland with less taller trees.

After the Neanderthals left Creswell Crags, there being a long period before the first member of our own species began to use the caves.

There is only a small amount of evidence in Britain of these early Homo sapiens visitors, with the climate going into a deeper cooling cycle from around 24,000 years ago.

Eventually, Britain warmed enough for Ice Age people to return to use the caves as seasonal hunting camps.

[9] The more historic of the two locations, Belph was a small dormitory settlement to Whitwell, possibly by 1086 although it was not recorded in the Domesday Book.

As the manor of Whitwell was subdivided, the land between Belph and the site of Welbeck Abbey was acquired by Richard le Fleming, the descendant of one of William I's followers.

As a tiny settlement, Belph was an integrated part of the Welbeck Estate and so there is little reference to the placename after this period until 1846.

By the late 20th century only one new property had been built, whilst several buildings along Mill Wood Lane had been removed, and the Portland Arms having been converted back to private accommodation.

[13] By this period Belph had become a largely residential hamlet as The Portland Arms had closed by 1922 and the decline of the agricultural industry highlighted by Springfield Farm which became unoccupied.

[14] Another of the landowners was Henry Sweet Hodding, a local solicitor, who lived at Harness Grove in nearby Darfoulds to the north, and he provided most of the land for the settlement.

A terrace of four red brick houses called "Bentinck Cottages" and are now 1, 3, 5, and 7 Broad Place were amongst the earliest to be built.

Originally a few stone cottages were in the area in which the village would later develop, and these were known as "Stoneycroft", they were however demolished in 1933–35, and was sited immediately opposite the Junior & Infant School.

For many centuries, the wider area contained many small quarries, which have provided stone for building, road making and lime burning.

A now unused location was north of Station Lane and south west of Hodthorpe, mining sandstone until the turn of the 20th century.

Throughout the life of Whitwell Colliery, coal was produced from four seams: Top Hard, High Hazel, Clowne and Two Foot.

A Primitive Methodist chapel was later also constructed there adjacent to the railway line by King Street in 1903–4, later closing in the early 1950s.

[1] The settlements Hodthorpe, Belph and their surrounding rural areas are combined as one parish for administrative identity.

Creswell Crags is an enclosed limestone gorge on the southern border of the parish, the cliffs in the ravine containing several caves that were occupied during the last ice age, between around 43,000 and 10,000 years ago.

The evidence of occupation is regarded as internationally unique in demonstrating how prehistoric people managed to live at the extreme northernmost limits of their territory.