300 Roman Mining Operations on the Borders of Wales. 



shallow cutting. In some places the cutting is wide ; while in 

 others it is at the same time very narrow and very deep, in one 

 instance sinking to a depth of, I believe, forty yards, yet not 

 wide enough for more than one man to work in it. In other 

 places the vein of ore had been more massive, and in following 

 it the Eomans had hollowed in the rock cavern-like chambers, 

 from which galleries ran in different directions, which are 

 now blocked up by rubbish. The entrance to one of these 

 caverns is shown in the accompanying engraving, made from 

 a very excellent photograph by Mr. Colley of Shrewsbury. 

 The Roman miners also sunk shafts. In one of the largest of the 

 caverns on the line of the vein I am describing, near the brow of 

 the hill, the vein has been followed downward by a shaft of great 

 depth ; in its present state a stone is heard rolling down for 

 several seconds. It is not easily examined from its position, 

 but having been carried up to the surface of the rock above, 

 no doubt for the purpose of more easily raising weights up and 

 letting them down, we were enabled to ascertain that it was a 

 square shaft of small dimensions. We have, however, still 

 better evidence of the extent to which the Roman miners per- 

 forated the mountain. I have just stated that at the bottom of 

 the hill, just under these large Roman surface workings, there 

 is a modern mine, which was begun some years ago, but, for 

 some reason or other, was soon abandoned. This mine has 

 been recently taken by a most respectable company, which has 

 taken the name of the Roman Gravel Lead Mining Company, 

 who in the prosecution of their own works have met with nume- 

 rous Roman shafts and galleries to a considerable depth.* 

 The antiquity of these mines has been proved, not only by the 

 Roman pigs of lead already mentioned, but by Roman coins and 

 pottery found from time to time among the old rubbish. Early 

 mining implements also have been found, but none have been 

 preserved, with the exception of a curious description of spade, 

 two examples of which, in the possession of Mr. More, are repre- 

 sented in the accompanying cut. These spades are formed of 

 lanringe of oak timber, roughly split, and cut into the shape here 

 exhibited, with a very short stumpy handle, and a square hole, 

 sloping on one side in the blade. This hole was evidently in- 

 tended to receive a short staff, which might be used as a lever 



* When we consider the facility which nature gave to the ancients to obtain 

 the higher metal from the surface, and the length of time they no doubt worked 

 the mines, and the fact that we learn from ancient documents that mines were 

 worked here in the middle ages, and at vai-ious more recent times, aDd that dur- 

 ing the last seventy years an unceasing large supply has been raised, although not 

 a fifth of the ground has been explored, we may imagine the richness of this 

 district hi ore. Immediately under one part of the ancient workings, about fif- 

 teen years ago, one pipe of ore produced two thousand tons in eleven montlis at 

 a deptli of eighty yards. 



