Mining in a Medieval Landscape

Book excerpt: This book explores an industry that was of profound importance both in terms of the local economy and the history of mining nationally, but is long forgotten: the late medieval royal silver mines at Bere Ferrers in the Tamar Valley. The Bere Ferrers silver mines employed up to 400 men, mining on a scale and at depths not previously possible, and changed forever the way that mining was carried out in medieval Britain.