| Treacle mining is the (fictitious) mining of treacle (molasses) in a raw form similar to coal. The subject is put forward as a serious topic but is in fact an
attempt to test the credulity of the reader. The thick black nature of treacle makes the deception plausible. The topic has been
a standing joke in British humour for a century or more.
Several treacle mines have been claimed to exist in Britain, most notably in Bisham (near Marlow, on the Thames), Tadley, Wymsey, Skidby, Ditchford in Northamptonshire and in several northern towns.
Offered explanations include:
- That Cromwell's army buried barrels of molasses that later leaked and seeped to the surface.
- That prehistoric sugar cane beds became fossilised in a similar way to peat and coal.
Origins
"Treacle" originally meant any kind of a thicky syrupy salve, and it is likely that
bituminous seeps from coal deposits were used in traditional remedies, so this may have been the kernel of truth that inspired
the joke. The Tar Tunnel near Blists Hill in Shropshire has natural deposists of tar oozing from
the walls which could be said to resemble treacle.
Actual places
There is a Treacle Mine roundabout at Grays in Essex which features on the local bus timetable.
There is a pub called the Treacle Mine Hotel in Silchester Road Tadley, Hampshire.
History
The subject of the Treacle Mine has been a whimsical joke played on children and the gullible since at least the nineteenth century and may go back even further.
In Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, (1865) Alice is shushed at the Mad Hatter's tea party for
disbelieving a story about a treacle well told to her by the Dormouse.
In Uncle and the Treacle Trouble, a children's book by J.P. Martin,
the main character (an elephant name Uncle) dicovers the true meaning of a
cryptic sign which reads Treac Levat ("Treacle Vat").
A treacle mine features in the novels Reaper Man (1987) and Night
Watch (2002) by Terry
Pratchett. In the fictional Discworld city of Ankh-Morpork there is street named Treacle Mine Road.
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