Dewponds can be found across The White Peak in Derbyshire
Records show the Anglo Saxons used them in the Medieval period, it seemed that they actually believed that the ponds were renewed every night by the dew.
However experiments proved, it is the extent of the large saucer shaped basin, which extends way beyond the pond itself, which would collect more rainfall than a pond without such a surrounding feature.
Dewponds are usually shallow, saucer-shaped many being built on a bed of straw to keep the stone lining insulated from the warmth of the ground beneath.
This would then be lined with a layer of lime ash and then two layers of puddled clay; each layer being beaten down by wooden rammers. Finally the pond would be paved with stone "setts" and then left to fill with water.
If you like nostalgia, take a look at Grandma’s Little Black Book of Recipes from 1910.
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