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Dropping Well, Levens
Dropping Well
site name:-   Levens Park
civil parish:-   Levens (formerly Westmorland)
county:-   Cumbria
locality type:-   spring
locality type:-   well
locality type:-   petrifying spring
coordinates:-   SD50158572
1Km square:-   SD5085
10Km square:-   SD58
evidence:-   old map:- OS County Series (Wmd 42 7) 
placename:-  Dropping Well
source data:-   Maps, County Series maps of Great Britain, scales 6 and 25 inches to 1 mile, published by the Ordnance Survey, Southampton, Hampshire, from about 1863 to 1948.
evidence:-   descriptive text:- West 1778 (11th edn 1821) 
placename:-  Dropping Well
source data:-   Guide book, A Guide to the Lakes, by Thomas West, published by William Pennington, Kendal, Cumbria once Westmorland, and in London, 1778 to 1821.
image WS21P186, button  goto source
Page 186:-  "... The side of the Kent is famous for petrifying springs, that incrust vegetable bodies, such as moss, leaves of trees, &c. There is one on the park [Levens Park], called the Dropping-well."
evidence:-   old text:- Camden 1789 (Gough Additions) 
placename:-  Dropping Well
item:-  petrifying well
source data:-   Book, Britannia, or A Chorographical Description of the Flourishing Kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland, by William Camden, 1586, translated from the 1607 Latin edition by Richard Gough, published London, 1789.
image CAM2P153, button  goto source
Page 153:-  "..."
"At Levens, ... In the park ... is a spring called the Dropping well, that petrifies moss, wood, leaves, &c."
evidence:-   old text:- Gents Mag
item:-  geology
source data:-   Magazine, The Gentleman's Magazine or Monthly Intelligencer or Historical Chronicle, published by Edward Cave under the pseudonym Sylvanus Urban, and by other publishers, London, monthly from 1731 to 1922.
image G7940112, button  goto source
Gentleman's Magazine 1794 p.112  "... All the springs between Haws-bridge and this place [Levens Park] cover the withered vegetables in their respective channels with a calcareous crust; the water of these fountains is undoubtedly impregnated with lime, suspended in it by an excess of carbonic acid; this gass escaping, when it comes into contact with the external air, leaves the earthy matter to"
evidence:-   old text:- Gents Mag 1794
source data:-   image G7940113, button  goto source
Gentleman's Magazine 1794 p.113  "subside, and form the incrustation in question; which incloses sticks, dead moss and straws cementing them into masses, vulgarly, but improperly, called petrifactions; for, the substance here alluded to is a calcareous tophus. Water thus charged with lime has a brisker taste than what has been rendered soft by exposure to the atmosphere in the river, and generally is preferred for culinary purposes; which seems to invalidate an opinion, entertained by very able physicians, of particular obstructions being occasioned by stony particles received into the system, together with the fluid in question; but this beverage, so suspicious in appearance, is innocent in its effects; for, the stone and gravel are, at least, as uncommon here as in any part of the kingdom, nor do we perceive the smallest symptom of those unseemly tumours of the throat which prevail in the Alps and other mountainous districts."
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