CAMPAIGNERS seeking the return of the Lindisfarne Gospels to the region hold their annual St Cuthbert's Day pilgrimage today.

Along the six-and-a-half mile route from Chester-le-Street parish church to Durham Cathedral, members of the Northumbrian Association will seek support for the return of the manuscripts.

Association members will gather names on a petition, set up to maintain the pressure on the British Library to release the 1,300-year-old gospels. St Cuthbert, an early Bishop of Lindisfarne, died in 687AD.

The gospels were written in his memory by the monks at the priory, off the Northumberland coast, in the late seventh and early eighth centuries.

When monks fled from Viking invaders, the manuscripts and the saint's remains were kept at what is now St Mary's and St Cuthbert's Church, in Chester-le-Street, for 113 years.

Members of St Cuthbert's community of monks eventually made their way with the remains and the gospels to Durham, in 995AD.

The cathedral was built as a shrine to Cuthbert and became a place of pilgrimage.

During the Reformation, the gospels were removed from the cathedral and are now in the British Library, in London.

There have been repeated calls for the gospels to be housed in Durham Cathedral.

A Parliamentary campaign has been taken up by Durham MP Robert Blackman-Woods.

The British Library has commissioned and donated a replica copy of the gospels, now on show at the cathedral, but has refused to return the original.

Northumbrian Association treasurer John Danby urged anyone backing the cause to either join the walk, or turn up at the start to sign the petition.

The walk starts at the parish church, in Church Chare, Chester-le-Street, at 10am with a lunch stop at Finchale Priory, ending at the cathedral at about 2pm.

A St Cuthbert's Day festal evensong and procession to his tomb, will be held at the cathedral from 7pm to 9pm tonight.