Scott's facts and findings
Welcome to Scott's tenth column. In this edition, he discusses the recent Festival of Caves...
"During the festival, organised by Nottingham City
Museums and Galleries, I was proud to be part of this showcase of the city's unique man made cave systems which
lie beneath much of Nottingham."
New caves? - "The festival gave me the opportunity to talk to lots of people and I learned a lot about some of the city's caves, by hearing tales of how they had been used over the years. A number of people also gave me information about possible caves of which the City Council has no record. In the coming weeks, I will be investigating these and I expect the number of known caves to rise."
The caves we know - "There are approximately 700 known caves recorded by
Nottingham City Council, 24 of which have only been identified since 1 July. Of
these, approximately 500 are within the city centre. In fact, every street
in the city centre has caves beneath."
The city's caves are an amazing feature of Nottingham's
heritage. Many of them date to the medieval period, although some are more
recent. Indeed a few date to as recently as the 1960s. They give a great insight
into the development of the city and have been part of Nottingham's identity
since a Welsh monk named Asser described Nottingham as 'place of caves' in the
year 893."
Uses for caves - "Some of the most common functions of Nottingham's caves
include: storage cellars, including beer cellars (most pubs in the city centre
have caves beneath because the caves provide a consistently cool
temperature all year round, making them ideal for storing beer);
tunnels/passages; malt kilns; tanneries; stables; sand mines; follies; air raid
shelters."
Unseen opportunities - "Some caves not usually open to the public were visited during the festival. These included the Ducal Wine Cellar at Nottingham Castle and a cave known as
the Cosmic Ray Cave at Brewhouse Yard. If Nottingham City Council is successful
in its application for Heritage Lottery Funding these caves, and other caves at
the Castle, will be opened up to the public more regularly.
During tours I gave of caves at Brewhouse Yard it was great
to see so many people interested in what are quite extensive caves. Many of the
people had never been in a cave before, and some did not realise these caves
existed, and all appeared to enjoy the experience of walking through hundreds
of years of the city's history.
With this year's event proving so popular hopefully the festival will be an annual event for many years to come."
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