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All the United Kingdom England Caynton Caynton Caves

Caynton Caves

This mysterious underground cave in Shropshire dates back to the 18th or 19th century.

Caynton, England

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The caves have a network of walkways and chambers.   Richard Law/CC BY-SA 2.0
Entrance to the cave   Richard Law/CC BY-SA 2.0
Carvings on the walls - some ancient and some modern.   Richard Law/CC BY-SA 2.0
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It’s easy to miss if you don’t know where it is, but an innocuous-looking rabbit hole in Shropshire, holds the entrance to an intriguing cave, which legend has it was built and used by the mysterious Knights Templar for their secret rituals. But there's no concrete evidence to link this site with the 12th-century religious military order and many experts have refuted the accuracy of this rumor. 

The mysterious cave system is intriguing nonetheless. The caves, which appear largely untouched, are located on the grounds of Caynton Hall and contain a network of walkways and arches beautifully carved out of sandstone. Spelunkers may need to crawl through some particularly narrow chambers to fully explore the tunnel. Walking (or crawling) through the caves, you can see niches created for candles and symbols drawn on the walls and roofs, and deep within the cave is a font, a stone structure used to hold water for baptisms. 

The Caynton cave site is listed as a grotto, an artificial cave, on the Historic England site, which also dates it to the late 18th or early 19th century. It was sealed off in 2012 when vandals were misusing the space. It is on private land, and it may be inaccessible.

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Published

March 9, 2017

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Sources
  • https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3029431/rabbit-hole-holds-incredible-secret/#comments
  • http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-39193347
  • https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1367600
  • http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4289774/Secret-underground-world-Knights-Templar-Shropshire.html
  • http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1391862

Related Tags

Caves Mystery Catholic Religion Ecosystems Sacred Spaces
Caynton Caves
Caynton, England, TF11 9JQ
United Kingdom
52.623672, -2.329955

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