Below. The remains of a medieval mineshaft. Shafts can only be examined when they appear in section at the end of a phase of overburden removal. This mid-fifteenth century shaft has oak frames every metre or so down the shaft. Smaller branches pushed behind the frames stop earth and stones falling down the shaft walls.

Coleorton

Medieval coalmines, 100 ft deep, have recently been brought to light at Coleorton in Leicestershire. C

OLEORTON lies at one end of the Leicestershire coalfield near Ashby de la Zouch. The village, (which was originally known as Overton), is where the coal seams finally come to the surface, so that coal can be picked up in the fields. It has thus been exploited from an early age and it is known as one of the classic places where coal was mined by the Beaumonts in the 16th century.

Recently however British Coal decided to finish it all off by opencast mining, removing 4 million tons of coal from 8 separate seams. John Crocker, a former official of British Coal, began to research the possibility of earlier mining, and was soon rewarded; he was later joined by Robert Hartley, one of Leicestershire's Archaeological survey Officers. In the event over 1 million tons appeared to have gone missing to the miners of the medieval and later periods, and a variety of old workings, some as recent as the 1960s have been revealed, producing many tools and pieces of machinery.

The most amazing early mine was discovered 100 ft down when the opencast mining removed the overburden, thus bringing the old mine literally to light. Since British Coal has to supply pure cleaned coal to the power stations nearby, the remains of medieval mining had to be excavated and swept clean by hand with brushes before the coal could be removed. Here the typical form of early mining was revealed, called pillar and stall working, which was ubiquitous before the introduction of long wall workings in the 17th and 18th centuries. Here pillars of coal were left in position to support the roof, and stalls were dug to remove the coal.

Numerous timber-lined shafts were found, and one was selected for closer examination. When first discovered it was assumed to be the work of the 16th century, perhaps indeed the work of the Beaumont family. However a number of oak pit props still remained in position, perfectly preserved by the underground conditions. These were taken to Nottingham University for dendrochronology dating and revealed dates of 1450, 1453, 1455 and 1463. Since the bark was still in position these are the dates of the cutting of the wood. This therefore demonstrates that the mines were 100 years earlier than had been anticipated and shows that deep mining in Leicestershire was carried out on an extensive scale a century earlier than had been thought.

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CURRENT ARCHAEOLOGY 134