Martin Roe writes that "The discussion on mining
landscapes appears to be getting rather focussed on
one site." Yes, but the problems described are
often similar elsewhere.
Martin mentions mining villages and their place in
the landscape - this aspect is definitely worth
following. Do we, however, really want to set
villages in aspic? It is probably much easier to
define ‘mining villages’ in colliery areas, whereas
villages in metalliferous mining fields were
arguably more places where miners lived than mining
villages. This area of work could be the new blue.
I also agree that Andrew Fleming's work in Swaledale
is fascinating and raises all manner of questions
for those interested in that area. He does not,
however, always have the archaeology (yet) to
support all his conclusions. Nevertheless, his
approach is a good one and, as Martin points out,
could/should be applied elsewhere.
In my first response to this subject I did try to
hint at some of the wider issues. The concept of
archaeological landscapes was running in the 1980s
when NAMHO got involved. English Heritage was still
toying with it in the early 1990s and, except that
it apparently came to nought, I do not know what
became of that work. I’m trying to find out and will
let you know if I’m successful.
At the risk of being boring, I'll repeat some of my
points. We are, for example, ruled by the Monuments
Protection Programme. Under this, the scheduled
areas of a mining landscape (like Grassington Moor)
form a series of closely spaced islands. This is
because, under the current legislation, it is very
hard to sustain a case for scheduling large areas of
land which have no demonstrable historical value.
As for "biggest" or "best" sites - the MPP, with its
scoring system, does rather tend to push in that
direction. Still, it is trying to identify
nationally important sites as opposed to ones of
regional or local importance. Most of the
extractive industries have been covered by the MPP
and, for lead sites at least, the schedulings are
coming through.
We should, therefore, be concentrating on regionally
or locally important sites, which means considering
alternative methods of protection to scheduling.
People often do not understand that one of the
principal functions of the various protection
systems available to us is to give the monument a
legal entity.
This means that if a planning application is
received which affects a site, it is automatically
flagged up in the monitoring process. This can be
achieved fairly quickly by getting details of it
onto the Sites and Monuments Register for your
particular county (sorry - administrative unit!).
David Poyner's point about the importance of having
available published accounts of sites is spot on.
As is his comment about the importance of working
with local councils, people etc.
For buildings, there is the extra protection of
‘Listing’ which, as I’ve already said, is
administered by the local tier of government. This
has the advantage of being more flexible than
scheduling and covering locally/regionally important
monuments. A site’s aesthetic, as opposed to purely
historical/archaeological, merits are more likely to
carry weight in this process. My experience of the
local planning officer at Cononley was that he saw
the (albeit not vast) spoil heaps and ruined
buildings as adding to the landscape and breaking up
green swathes.
It might even be appropriate to consider having a
site classed as a Site of Special Scientific
Interest. This is something I do not know much
about, but it has been used to protect parts of the
Mongo Gill - Stump Cross Caverns system and extends
to the surface.
I’m sure that there are other, even more
imaginative, ways of protecting sites.
--------------------------------
Mike Gill
President and Recorder of the NORTHERN MINE RESEARCH SOCIETY
Britain's foremost mining history society at:-
http://www.exeter.ac.uk/~RBurt/MinHistNet/NMRS.html
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