Tivyside | Archive | 2004 | May | 12
From the Tivyside Advertiser, first published Wednesday 12th May 2004.
Whalebones aren't perhaps the first thing that people get excited about - but for author Nick Redman they have been a 30-year obsession.
Mr Redman has spent the past few years documenting every whalebone in the UK for his forthcoming book 'Whales' Bones of the British Isles'.
But just as the 600-page tome was due to leave for the printers last week, he received a letter from a friend in Cardiff mentioning the whale bone arch in the grounds of Cardigan Castle.
"I'd never heard of them - and here was I thinking I knew every whalebone in the British Isles," he said.
Within 24 hours Mr Redman had driven down to Cardigan from his home in West London to view the bones which had been brought back to Cardigan by a sea captain in the 19th century.
The bones - which were once the jaw of a giant whale - are one of only two jaw bone arches in Wales. And Mr Redman pointed out that a good three to four feet of the bones lie buried underneath the soil.
Mr Redman's lightening visit paid off in more ways than one. He was told by Cardigan library that there was another whalebone in St Dogmaels vicarage - again one he had never heard of. "My visit has been more than worthwhile," he said.
© Newsquest Media Group 2008