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Shakespeare's Caves - Keith Jones (1998)This is something I found on the Internet a few years ago. I don't remember where I got it from but thanks to those involved. It was Mason (1866) who posed the idea that Hoyle’s Mouth Cave near Tenby might be the model for Shakespeare's Belarius Cave in his play Cymbeline. He described the cave as being near Milford Haven and suggested that visitors would have passed within a few miles of the site. Indeed, one of the heroines of the play Imogen, had strayed much nearer to the sea during her travels. Mason was particularly struck by the extraordinary similarity that existed between the two caves but did not consider two other famous caves situated much closer to Milford, just five miles or so by ferry. Wogan’s Cavern beneath Pembroke Castle, and Priory Farm Cave just outside the town could be other contenders. In his final analysis however, Mason concluded that any similarity was accidental, but this is not the end of Shakespeare, caves and Wales. The Great Bard is also associated with two other limestone sites in South Wales. Dale (1965) for example claimed:`The Vale of Neath is a land of wooded glens, mountain torrents, turbulent waterfalls and crystal clear pools. It has been said that this sylvan paradise was the setting for Shakespeare’s play A Mid Summer Night's Dream'. To further complicate the issues Beaumont, formally a special correspondent with The Daily Express, put the location of this particular scene in a second limestone area, Chepstow. While following the adventures of Baconists Dr Orville Owen wrote in the issue of 23rd February 1911: `I learned that a few miles away there is a garden which is proudly shown to visitors as the garden where `A Mid Summer Night’s Dream' was written. Even the bank of' Wild Thyme is there, with Titania’s bower.' On this occasion however, the author of the play was Bacon and not Shakespeare. Some commentators have refused to accept that such great plays could in fact have been written by someone who went to grammar school in the Midlands and they have attempted to prove that the plays were written by a member of the aristocracy or at least a graduate of Oxford or Cambridge. Apart from Bacon, several others have been credited with authorship of Shakespearian plays including an Elizabethan nun, The Earl of Oxford and Christopher Marlowe (Daiches 1971). Francis Bacon (1561-1626), an English philosopher, threw over Aristotelian deductive logic for the inductive method. His impulsive writings which included `Novum Organum' gave rise to the founding of the Royal Society 36 years after his death. Some authorities claimed it was Bacon who was the true author of the Shakespearian plays. An American, Dr Orville Owen, was such a Bacon convert who claimed that Bacon had concealed his manuscripts but had left clues to their whereabouts. Owen charged Shakespeare as a drunken fraud and, in association with fellow American Dr William H. Prescott, worked out a complicated system for decoding ciphers whereby he could find hidden works of several Elizabethan authors. Owen argued that these ciphers were located in such works as Sir Phillip Sidney Knight's ‘The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia,’ and even in `The Tempest'. Owen even gave an example of one such clue to the press: `BECAUSEOFITALLIBURIEDECAVE'. According to Owen these ciphers continually referred to a place called `Striguil'. Owen learned when he arrived in Britain that ‘Striguil' was a Norman corruption of the Welsh `Ystraigl,' the early Welsh name for Chepstow. Bacon's father-in-law lived near Chepstow, and Bacon had a business in the town. It was concluded that the missing manuscripts were packed into iron chests and buried somewhere in the lower Wye Valley. During 1909 he started a fruitless search in sites such as Peglar's Cave near Chepstow Castle: `According to Dr Owen’s readings of the cipher Bacon originally secreted his treasures in a cave or caves near Chepstow Castle then walled up the entrance and disguised its outward appearance in order to deceive prying eyes. Later on, fearing molestation, he removed the boxes and placed them in an excavation'. At one time the Daily Express special correspondent reported from the excavation below Wasp Hill a few hundred metres on the west bank, just above the castle. He reported that over 700 tons of mud had been removed from eight holes up to eight feet deep, with eye catching head-lines: INTENSE EXCITEMENT AT CHEPSTOWProgress of Shakespeare-Bacon Search. Discovery of Structure made of Stout Oak Timbers. Weird midnight visit to the scene. Owen was convinced he was on to something, when he applied his cypher `the message which the author had so cunningly hidden, in a mosaic of words, stood out astonishing and clear’ (Beaumont 1941 ). Eventually his backer, the Duke of Beaumont, withdrew financial support and that was the end of the venture. What are we to make of the idea of buried treasure? Perhaps Billy Bones from Treasure Island had sound advise, "Keep you weather eyes peeled for a sea faring man with one leg Jim, and search Ben Gunn's Cave." There is yet a third limestone site associated with Shakespeare generally, and `A Mid-Summer Night’s Dream' specifically, in the Clydach Valley. Cwm Pwca is located south of the river, just downstream from the huge waterfall, and contains Shakespeare's Cave. Cwm Pwca aptly translates into `Valley of the Goblin. ' Harries ( 1919) claims of this valley: There is a Welsh tradition to the effect that Shakespeare received his knowledge of the Cambrian fairies from his friend Richard Price, son of Sir John Price of The Priory, Brecon. It is even claimed that Cwm Pwca, or Puck Valley, a part of the romantic glen in Breconshire, is the original scene of A Mid-summer Night's Dream, a fancy as light and airy as Puck himself. Anyhow, there Cwm Pwca is, and in the sylvan days before Frere and Powell's ironworks were set up there it is said to have been as full of goblins as a Methodist's head is full of piety'. More recently, Jones-Pugh and Holiday ( 1979) concluded `Although there is no hard proof that the play-wright did indeed visit Brecon, nevertheless a strong case can be made out which suggests Shakespeare collected his fairy lore from Welsh sources.' But nature spirits may no longer inhabit Cwm Pwca: `Unhappily today this area has long since been butchered by industrial development’. It is interesting to note that Shakespeare had portrayed the Welsh with a syrnpathetic image of as brave, honourable, congenial and not in the usual comic role (Williams 1985). Welsh nature-spirits were called `Ellyllon', a word derived from `el', a spirit. There are in Wales other places bearing like names, where Pwca's pranks and nature spirits are well remembered by old inhabitants, Craig yr Dinas for one, but few are associated with Shakespeare. In this particular Cwm Pwca in the Clydach Valley, there is a resurgence cave from which a small stream flows out from the base of a cliff. Although the cave may always have been open, it may not have been as well known as other caves. The entrance is rather low and can easily be overlooked. The cave was first explored by Brian Price, known in the caving world as `Buzz,' in 1946. He gave a brief description of the location and stated in his description: `A pool passable with a submersion up to the shoulders. I have not gone further’ (Price 1946). No doubt Price named the cave after the local legend of Shakespeare's visit. During 1981 Tony Oldham, whilst reflecting on the nature of the cave, suggested that it may have been named after Shakespeare's play ‘As You Like It.’ It was another six years before a group from the Hereford Caving Club, including Les Hawes, passed this duck only to be confronted by a tight sump with `rock fins' which stopped progress. This `sump' succumbed to a lump hammer and became Duck Two, until progress was once again halted by Sump One. Mel Davies and a party of four from British Nylon Spinners also explored the cave during 1958 and 1964. They were stopped by the second duck, then a sump. Sump One was successfully passed April 1964 by Mike Jeanmaire and Colin Graham with the use of breathing apparatus. They were then stopped by the final constricted Sump Two. But activity increased, due in the main to the intriguing sound of falling water behind Sump Two. Several people were involved during this phase, including Mike, John Elliott and the late Roger Solari, pushing the various side passages and using chemical persuasion, but the sump did not give. It was during one of these activities that the by-pass was located. August l5th and l6th Mike, along with Chris Williams, made this important discovery. While Mike was pushing a tight duck Williams reported: `While my guide was pushing this, I noticed a dry passage in the right hand wall, leading upwards. After ten feet it turned right into a Z-bend squeeze which had obviously not been passed. It proved to be fairly easy, although double-jointed knee- caps would make it easier, and led to a knee-crawl over a virgin clay floor. This went for about I50 ft with some fine stal. and helecites halfway along. Another section 50 ft long, of abandoned stream passage, with a very tight water filled cross rift, led to a squeeze over a boulder from which running water could be heard. On being joined by Michael, we dug out the intervening section in about an hour, only to rejoin the stream about 50 ft below Sump One, about 6 ft above water level. This passage now forms a by-pass to the sump, but the muddy duck at the top now makes the sump route much pleasanter and cleaner.’ That discovery was called The Stratford By-Pass, apparently after the discoverer’s home town. Activity increased on and off in the cave for the next six years with the aid of explosives and more conventional tools such as lump hammers (Solari 1970). Digging continued on 13th & 14th December until a small waterfall could be seen in a very narrow cleft about two metres away. A return visit found the entry rift thigh deep in water, and the first duck sumped to about two feet. Eventually interest turned to the principal sink to Shakespeare's Cave, Llanelly Quarry Pot, some 800 metres distant and 64 metres higher. The final chapter in the discovery of the cave commenced during September 1986 with the Llanelly diggers (Checketts, Dickenson and Green 1989). The pot was dug until the breakthrough on 14th July 1987. Eventually with over a kilometre of passages, the down-stream section of the cave ended at a tight sump, just 14 metres distant from Shakespeare's Cave. When mentioning Shakespeare's Cave, Thorner, Stride, Stride and Myers (1953) seemed to have had their wires crossed when they reported: `Entrance leads to short cave with deep water in central portion. River sinks 1/4 mile down Clydach Valley and issues from a cave about 150 ft lower down.' References:Anon. 1949. The British Caver Vol. 19, p. 77 - 78. |
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