A clay pit is a quarry or mine for the extraction of clay, which is generally used for manufacturing pottery, bricks or Portland cement.
The brickyard or brickworks is often located alongside the clay pit to reduce the transport costs of the raw material. These days pottery producers are often not sited near the source of their clay and usually do not own the clay deposits. The other essential raw material is fuel for firing and potteries may be located near to fuel deposits rather than the clay.
Former claypits are sometimes filled with water and used for recreational purposes such as sailing and scuba diving. The Eden Project at Bodelva near St Austell, Cornwall, UK is a major redevelopment of a former china clay pit for educational and environmental purposes.
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Famous quotes containing the words clay and/or pit:
“When Nature was shaping him, clay was not granted
For making so full-sized a man as she wanted,
So, to fill out her model, a little she spared
From some finer-grained stuff for a woman prepared,
And she could not have hit a more excellent plan
For making him fully and perfectly man.”
—James Russell Lowell (1819–1891)
“Not Chaos, not
The darkest pit of lowest Erebus,
Nor aught of blinder vacancy, scooped out
By help of dreams can breed such fear and awe
As fall upon us often when we look
Into our Minds, into the Mind of Man.”
—William Wordsworth (1770–1850)