NOTTINGHAM AND ITS REGION 35 



Next is the country extending northwards from the city. Here the 

 surface is formed by the Bunter Sandstone, which is bordered on the east 

 by the Keuper escarpment, a feature of varying prominence, and on the 

 west by the valley of the Leen. The thin, loose-textured, sandy soil and 

 the porous surface give rise to an open rolling country with broad dry 

 valleys. Settlements are few, apart from scattered farms, much of the 

 surface being covered by tracts of heath and bracken, woods and occasion- 

 al modern plantations, thus providing a foretaste of the conditions pre- 

 vaihng in the Dukeries beyond. There is, however, a spaciousness and 

 breadth of view which, in the absence of towns and villages, makes this 

 relative wilderness attractive. Near Nottingham the wooded estates of 

 Bestwood, Ramsdale and Sherwood Lodge virtually constitute a httle 

 Dukeries. At the head of the Leen valley in the midst of a large estate, 

 now unhappily being broken up for building purposes, is Newstead Priory, 

 the ancestral home of the Byron family. The poet's remains are interred 

 in the church at Hucknall, a small mining town a few miles to the south. 

 The belt of industrialism which extends northward along the Leen valley 

 from the city, spreads out beyond Newstead into a broader zone en- 

 compassing the populous areas of Kirkby, Sutton-in-Ashfield, and the 

 approaches to Mansfield. Besides coal, it is from this part of the county 

 that have come so many of Nottinghamshire's most famous cricketers. 



Further to the west is the third of the tributary districts. This is the 

 stretch of undulating country between the Leen and Erewash valleys 

 whose surface is composed mainly of the Magnesian Limestone and the 

 clays and shales of the Middle Coal Measures. The water-parting be- 

 tween these valleys is formed by the somewhat broken and often in- 

 conspicuous scarp of the limestone, the eastward dip of which furnishes 

 a gentle slope conveying many streamlets to the Leen. Despite the 

 presence of collieries, much of the land is farmed and several ancient 

 estates survive with their fine old houses of the pre-industrial age, set 

 amidst extensive grounds. Such are Annesley, Beauvale, Watnall, Nuttall 

 and Strelley. Towards the Erewash, however, the productive Middle 

 measures have promoted an intenser degree of industriahsm. The course 

 of the Top Hard seam in particular has determined the location of many 

 of the pits, e.g., Selston. Brinsley, Newthorpe, WoUaton. Drab and shape- 

 less settlements straggling one into the other, spread across the coalfield 

 into Derbyshire with scarcely a break between the buildings. The slopes 

 of the valley are in places so comparatively gentle, as at Trowell and 

 Langley Mill, that the succession of mines, factories and houses along the 

 chief roads causes a number of places in Derbyshire to be brought within 

 the commercial and social influence of Nottingham. Ilkeston. Sandiacre 

 and Stanton (the official address of the great ironworks being Notting- 

 ham) are instances. Heanor, too, with its textile mills and its large daily 

 traffic of workers travelling to and from Nottingham, is in some respects 

 more closely connected with that city than with Derby. 



The mining region is bounded on the south by a reappearance of the 

 Trias plateau. To reach the Trent the Erewash has cut a narrow gap 

 across the northward-facing scarp between Stapleford and Sandiacre. 

 First the Bunter beds and then the presence of resistant ' skerry ' layers 



