Lead Smelting in Swaledale

lead smelting

No, this isn’t a maze for Swaledale sheep, it’s a cut-away view of the smelting flues used by lead mines in Swaledale: hearth for the smashed up ore on the right, outlet chimney centre and the maze of corridors in between where various minerals settled out from the vapours as they precipitated out.

details of smelting flues

I suspect that this drawing was a rough for my book Yorkshire Rock, a Journey through Time published by the British Geological Survey in 1996 but still in print today (see link below).

Yorkshire Rock page

If it was intended for the book, it didn’t make it into the final cut, which instead featured the less technical but more dramatic process of hushing.

Link

Yorkshire Rock

Yorkshire Rock, a journey through time at the BGS shop, £6.50.

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.