Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains desirable minerals, typically metals, that can be extracted from it. Ore is extracted from the earth through mining and refined, often via smelting, to extract the valuable element or elements.
An adit is an entrance to an underground mine which is horizontal or nearly horizontal, by which the mine can be entered, drained of water, ventilated, and minerals extracted at the lowest convenient level. Adits are also used to explore for mineral veins.
The Tamar is a river in south west England, that forms most of the border between Devon and Cornwall. The area is a World Heritage Site due to its historic mining activities.
The word stannary is historically applied to:
Tin bounds were an ancient legal arrangement used in the counties of Devon and Cornwall in South West England to encourage the exploitation of land for the extraction of tin.
Mining setts were a legal arrangement used historically in the counties of Devon and Cornwall in South West England to manage the exploitation of land for the extraction of tin. The term was also used on the Isle of Man.
Farm tin or the tin dues was one of a number of payments required of tin miners in Devon and Cornwall. The holder of a mining sett was required to pay a portion of the black tin extracted to the holder of the tin bounds in which the sett was granted. The portion was the "farm tin". The portion was normally interpreted to be one-twelfth of extracted tin: they were also required to play toll tin, calculated at one fifteenth.
Black tin is the raw ore of tin, usually cassiterite, as sold by a tin mine to a smelting company. After mining, the ore has to be concentrated by a number of processes to reduce the amount of gangue it contains before it can be sold. It contrasts with white tin, which is the refined, metallic tin produced after smelting.
White tin is refined, metallic tin. It contrasts with black tin, which is unrefined tin ore (cassiterite) as extracted from the ground. The term "white tin" was historically associated with tin mining in Devon and Cornwall where it was smelted from black tin in blowing houses.
Poldice mine is a former metalliferous mine located in Poldice Valley in south-west Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is situated near the hamlet of Todpool, between the villages of Twelveheads and St Day, three miles (5 km) east of Redruth.
Mining in Cornwall and Devon, in the southwest of England, began in the early Bronze Age, around 2150 BC, and ended with the closure of South Crofty tin mine in Cornwall in 1998. Tin, and later copper, were the most commonly extracted metals. Some tin mining continued long after the mining of other metals had become unprofitable.
Gwennap is a village and civil parish in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is about five miles (8 km) south-east of Redruth.
Tin mining in Britain took place from prehistoric times, during Bronze Age Britain, and until the 20th century. Mention of tin mining in Britain was made by many Classical writers. Tin is necessary to smelt bronze so without tin there could not have been the Bronze Age. As South-West Britain was one of the few parts of Anglian stage England to escape glaciation, tin ore was readily available on the surface. Originally it is likely that cassiterite alluvial deposits in the gravels of streams were exploited but later underground working took place. Shallow cuttings were then used to extract ore. In the 19th century advances in mining engineering enabled the exploitation of much deeper mines. In a few cases these mines even extended both to multiple levels and workings below the seabed.
A bal maiden, from the Cornish language bal, a mine, and the English "maiden", a young or unmarried woman, was a female manual labourer working in the mining industries of Cornwall and western Devon, at the south-western extremity of Great Britain. The term has been in use since at least the early 18th century. At least 55,000 women and girls worked as bal maidens, and the actual number is likely to have been much higher.
Mining in the United Kingdom produces a wide variety of fossil fuels, metals, and industrial minerals due to its complex geology. In 2013, there were over 2,000 active mines, quarries, and offshore drilling sites on the continental land mass of the United Kingdom producing £34bn of minerals and employing 36,000 people.
Stoping is the process of extracting the desired ore or other mineral from an underground mine, leaving behind an open space known as a stope. Stoping is used when the country rock is sufficiently strong not to collapse into the stope, although in most cases artificial support is also provided.
The Ding Dong mines lie in an old and extensive mining area situated in the parish of Madron, in Penwith, Cornwall, England. They are about two miles north east of the St Just to Penzance road. They look out over Mount's Bay and St Michael's Mount to the south west. Since 2006 the site has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site, part of Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape.
Tin mining began early in the Bronze Age, as bronze is a copper-tin alloy. Tin is a relatively rare element in the Earth’s crust, with approximately 2 ppm, compared to iron with 50,000 ppm.
Phoenix United Mine is a disused 19th century copper and tin mine in Cornwall, England, UK. Heavy metals left over in the soil from the mining operations have allowed mosses and lichens to flourish, and today the site is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), noted for its biological characteristics.
Devon Great Consols was a copper mine near Tavistock in Devon. The lease on the site was taken from the Duke of Bedford in 1844 by a group of investors. The 1,024 shares, sold at one pound each, were divided among the six men. Earlier attempts to mine this property had all ended in failure.
