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But a new study has uncovered that they are far more likely to be dated back to the 9th century Dark Ages.
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Edmund Simons, principal investigator of the project and a research fellow at the Royal Agricultural University (RAU), said in a press release: This makes it probably the oldest intact domestic interior in the UK - with doors, floor, roof, windows etc - and, what s more, it may well have been lived in by a king who became a saint.
Local legends link the caves to Saint Hardulph - a fragment of a 16th-century book states that at that time Saint Hardulph has a cell in a cliff a little from the Trent and local folklore identifies these caves as those occupied by Hardulph, also known as Eardwulf the king of Northumbria from 796 to 806.
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Anglo-Saxon cave could be UK s oldest domestic interior
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Archaeologists identify ninth century Anglo-Saxon cave house
Archaeologists identify 9th century Anglo-Saxon cave house (Edmund Simons/RAU)
A near-complete Anglo-Saxon dwelling and oratory believed to date from the early ninth century, has been discovered in Derbyshire.
The caves, which were cut out of the soft sandstone rock, had long been considered to be 18th century follies.
However, the new study demonstrates the caves are more likely to be early Medieval in date.
Archaeologists from the Royal Agricultural University’s (RAU) newly-formed Cultural Heritage Institute, working with colleagues from Wessex Archaeology, conducted a detailed survey of the grade II listed Anchor Church Caves between Foremark and Ingleby in south Derbyshire.