Need help identifying an archway please.

[worms]

It's an aidle tank. Or that's what it would have been called in Ayrshire. Aidle in Scots (addle in Middle English) is the liquid portion of manure from a byre or stables and was used as a liquid fertiliser. The pipe runs from your stables to the underground tank for storage.

Aidle was used sparingly as it could be too strong for the plants and ageing it in the tank probably also helped prevent it scorching when applied. Robert Burns uses the simile when he describes a minister's sermon with the line "then out wi' your ladle, deal brimstone like aidle..", conjuring the vision of scattering his brimstone in targeted spoonfuls across his congregation.

At least... that's my entry for Call my Bluff!

 

[jackpoint]

Thanks for the replies
Yup, it's a hard water area.
Yup, it's a pipe at the back.
The arch/roof is approx the same level as the ground.
I would say the arch/roof is the same age as the walls, but the little 'building' above is a fair bit younger.

Aidle sounds interesting - how would one extract the liquidy goodness from said tank?

 

[worms]

Aidle sounds interesting - how would one extract the liquidy goodness from said tank?

Bucket and chuck-it system! That's why it is part exposed.

 

[jackpoint]

:lol: :lol: Of course, what else :lol: :lol:

 

[Zebra]

Oh jp, how exciting. I've been wondering when you'd get around to getting down there! I don't think I'd have been able to wait. Are the walls tanked, as it were, with cement? Or are they just brick? Is the mortar in cement or lime?

 

[worms]

...and I believe this might be your source!

 

[jackpoint]

Believe you may be right Worms.
Zebra, afraid I haven't been close enough to see what the walls are covered with but the roof arch looks like lime

 

[worms]

Lintel instead of an archway, cast iron tank instead of brick, but we have this version of your tank: