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Marble Steps Hole, North Yorkshire
Marble Steps Pot
High Douk Cave
county:-   North Yorkshire
locality type:-   pothole
locality type:-   cave
coordinates:-   SD67987706
1Km square:-   SD6777
10Km square:-   SD67
altitude:-   1260 feet
altitude:-   384m
SummaryText:-   Grade III-IV; permission Masongill Hall, Westhouse.
references:-   Brook, D & Davies, G & Long, M H &Sutcliffe, J R: 1975: Northern Caves, vol.4 Whernside and Gragareth: Dalesman Books:: ISBN 0 85206 259 1

evidence:-   descriptive text:- Balderston c1890
placename:-  Marble Steps Hole
placename:-  Greygareth End Pot
source data:-   Book, Ingleton, Bygone and Present, by Robert R and Margaret Balderston, published by Simpkin, Marshall and Co, London, and by Edmndson and Co, 24 High Street, Skipton, Yorkshire, about 1890.
image BLD1P065, button  goto source
page 65:-  "..."
"Marble Steps Hole or Greygareth End Pot."
"Following the road past Thornton Hall as far as the point of junction with one from Mason Gill, just below Hunt's Cross, and pursuing the latter for about three-quarters of a mile along the flank of the fell, a green lane from Mason Gill trending directly upwards towards Greygareth Screes is reached. Follow the latter road, ascending it towards the scars, and when it is found to have a wall on one side only, leave it and walk along the side of the remaining wall; by this means a small pot hole, Little Pot, will be found not many yards to the east of the fence. This hole is thirty-three-and-a-half feet deep."
"Surmount the wall and proceed, about one hundred yards to the north, when a small plantation, high up the hill, but in a depression formed by a brook, will be reached; here a tremendous gulf is concealed. The opening is about thirty feet wide, and the small stream named throws itself into the abyss after leaping from a flight of marble steps on the north-eastern side, whilst a second brook enters from the north-western margin. The rock to the south-east is overhanging, and measured from this point the line descends fifty-two-and-a-half feet; but a descent can be made along the course of the brook last named, if due care be employed, down to this depth, when the abyss is seen to be far more extensive, the chasm descending with slight obliquity for about eighty feet further, giving a total depth of one hundred and thirty-two feet or thereabout. Great stones may be sent roaring down the cascade-bathed slope of the inner chasm, in passing to the mouth of which the spray of a shower-bath fall produces"
image BLD1P066, button  goto source
page 66:-  "some little inconvenience. The margin of the yawning abyss is rich in shrubs, and its sides are clad with beautiful mosses, damp with the spray of the great cascades."

evidence:-   old map:- Balderston c1890 map
placename:-  Steps Pot
source data:-   Map, the hills in the Ingleton area, probably by Robert R Balderston, engraved by Goodall and Suddick, Leeds, West Yorkshire, about 1890.
image
BS1SD67T.jpg
"Steps Pot"
item:-  private collection : 27.1
Image © see bottom of page

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