{"id":6805,"date":"2016-10-31T07:21:31","date_gmt":"2016-10-31T07:21:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/?p=6805"},"modified":"2016-10-31T07:21:31","modified_gmt":"2016-10-31T07:21:31","slug":"another-day-another-world-heritage-site","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/2016\/10\/31\/another-day-another-world-heritage-site\/","title":{"rendered":"Another day; another world heritage site"},"content":{"rendered":"

UNESCO's world heritage sites [WHS] are a\u00a0wide-ranging in scope and focus. \u00a0The UK<\/a> has 30 of them. \u00a0Some are natural, but most are deemed cultural; one, St Kilda, is said to be both, although many could be so designated. \u00a0They range from\u00a0Henderson Island<\/a> which I'd not heard of (I suspect because it's in the eastern South Pacific), to the\u00a0The Forth Bridge. \u00a0Somewhere in the middle, metallurgically speaking, is Ironbridge.<\/p>\n

As I was passing by Saarbrucken the other day, I stumbled across a German WHS \u2013 The V\u00f6lklinger Iron works<\/a> \u2013 and went in. \u00a0Its blurb says it was the first from the \"heyday of industrialisation\" to be classified a\u00a0world heritage site (in 1994). \u00a0It was the worst signposted museum I have ever seen. \u00a0I think that was because, inside the ironworks, there was an incongruous exhibition focused on the Buddha, and all the signage urged you to follow the \"path to enlightenment\".<\/p>\n

That said, V\u00f6lklinger was impressive in a rusting hulk sort of way \u2013 a veritable dark Satanic mill (unless, of course, you believe (as I like to) that Blake was referring to OxBridge). \u00a0But it lacked fire, limestone, noise and\u00a0smoke, and all those alpha-males who would have populated the place as they did here in the coal, iron, steel, shipbuilding and railway industries.<\/p>\n

All this\u00a0brought to mind the\u00a0Song of Steel<\/em> from BBC Radio Two's magisterial\u00a0Radio Ballads. \u00a0Click on ...<\/p>\n