Chalk

Why is Highclere built where it is? One answer is chalk. 

The chalk escarpments which make up the North and South Downs of this part of southern England are one of the single largest geological features in Britain. Chalk itself has very little value: you cannot build with it, and it contains no coal, oil, precious minerals or metals. However, it can be built on even if it lies forgotten underfoot. 

Chalk came into existence between 80 and 100 million years ago during what is known as the Cretaceous period, from the Latin “creta” for “chalk”. The Earth was entering a warming phase with rapidly rising sea levels so much so that at least one third of the landmass present today disappeared beneath the oceans.

This period lasted about 80 million years, after which the earth began to cool again. Then, about 50 million years ago, the African plate crashed into Europe and the land began to buckle upwards, forming a series of ridges. These became mountains, including the Pyrenees and the Alps, whilst in southern Britain a series of low chalk hills and ridges slowly emerged from the sea. To begin with mud and sandstone disguised the chalk hills but over time the caps were eroded away, leaving the bare chalk scarps of the North and South Downs as well as the Chilterns slightly further north of Highclere.

This chalk escarpment begins with the towering cliffs of Dover, the exposed chalk brightly white especially when contrasted with deep blue summer skies. These have become symbolic of England, standing high and proud above the English Channel but the chalk has no idea of national boundaries: it is simply part of the geology that dips under the channel and remerges in France in the champagne region. Taking advantage of this terroir, and with the help and encouragement of the French champagne house Joseph Perrier, we have planted a vineyard here at Highclere and are beginning to make our own sparkling wine. 

Beacon Hill in the middle of the Highclere estate is a massive chalk escarpment, but it probably also hides a deep thickness of rock arching up to a mile in depth below. 

hChalk is highly permeable and acts as a huge aquifer, providing a source of calcium enriched drinking water. It also also acts as a natural filter, purifying the water that drains through it. Thus, early humankind would have discovered this was a good place to live. Fast forward a little and villages and towns were gradually built, usually on the gentle lower slopes where once the sea ebbed and flowed whilst the steep escarpments and valley grassland bowls with chalk loving groups of beech trees give the scenery a quintessentially English look. You can just imagine the sound of the ball on a cricket bat on a village green in the summer.

Sitting on the top of Beacon Hill, the unique scent of the chalk down and wildflowers ebbing on a summer breeze, it is easy to drift, slowly imagining where for millions of years of years a sea flowed below for millions of years. Lying back on the soft turf, hearing the hum of insects somewhere above me a skylark is calling. It is seeing the literacy of the landscape, listening to it and quietly studying the surface. which gently leads the mind to the past.