Visit the Ancient and Quirky Lowestoft Scores

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The Lowestoft Scores are a great place to start your visit to this historic town.

The Scores are a unique feature of Lowestoft. They are a series of narrow lanes created over the years by people wearing paths in the soft, sloping cliff as they travelled between the historic High Street and the Beach Village. The origin of the word ‘score’ is thought to be a corruption of ‘scour’, or possibly from the Old English ‘scora’, which means to make or cut a line.

Although the Beach Village is no more, the Scores are still of great interest to visitors. The Scores trail has been designed to help visitors to understand a little more of Lowestoft’s history and of the significance of these ancient pathways leading down to the sea. You find your way around the trail by reading the map in the leaflet or by following the red herring waymarkers.

Leaflets are available from the East Point Pavilion (tel: 01502 533600) and various High Street shops.

The Ravine
Now a road running down to the Dene’s caravan site and car park, the Ravine borders Belle View Park and Sparrow’s Nest Gardens and can best be viewed from the impressive Victorian footbridge that spans the Ravine.

Cart Score
Previously known as Gallow’s or Gibbet Score, Cart Score is now also a road linking the Denes and the A12.

Lighthouse Score
Once called Lighthouse Hill, Lighthouse Score gets its name from the Lighthouse that still looks out over the North Sea from its lofty position on the cliff above Sparrow’s Nest Gardens.

Mariners Score
Earlier called Swan’s Score due to the Swan Inn which stood there. This was the inn where Cromwell stayed when he visited the town to put down ‘malignants’.

Crown Score
Formally known as Lion Score because records show that the Lion Inn was on the corner of this score and the High Street. The score has 48 steps and is flanked by brick and pebble walls, which are very characteristic in this part of the country. The score is also home to the ‘invasion of crabs’ sculpture, which is one of a series of works by artist Paul Amey designed to augment the Scores Trail. The design is to suggest that the crabs, having escaped the fishmonger’s slab, are threatening an assault on the High Street.

Martin’s Score
Originally known as Gowing’s Score until 1850. The score is best known for two reasons. The first records the visit of John Wesley on the 11th October 1764. Wesley preached in the open air with his back to a garden wall. In his journal he noted, “A wider congregation I have never seen”.

The second, which cannot be substantiated, concerns the small post set against a wall on the south side. Originally put there in 1688, and has since been reviewed in 1788, 1888and 1998. The post bears the initials ‘TM’ and is commonly known as the ‘Armada Post’.

Rant Score
The name of the score has been connected to a Christopher Rant who owned property at the top or bottom of the score in the early seventeenth century.

Wilde Score
The Heritage Workshop Centre can be found on Wilde Score. Named after the Wilde family who lived in the Flint House from 1588 to the 1740’s when John Wilde left in trust, money for the building of a schoolhouse for the free education of boys from fishing families. A school remained there until WWII when it was bombed. Part of the old school still remains and has been converted into The Lowestoft Heritage Workshop Centre.

The bottom of the Score was blocked and the cottages at the bottom were demolished to allow the development of Birds Eye. The Score now turns right into Cumberland Place and then winds down past the shoal of herring to Whapload Road.

Maltsters Score
Named after the Folly Maltsters Public House.

Spurgeon Score
Named after a worthy of the town.

Herring Fishery Score
The name is taken from an earlier name of the pub at the top of the score.

Frosts Alley Score
Now covered by the new police station, this was the oldest score and said to have been the seaward end of a prehistoric pathway.

The Score
This ran from the back of the vicarage, south of Arnold House, to Whapload Road. Access to the High Street was via the private garden of the house and was only used for emergencies, such as flooding in the Beach Village.

It was the vicarage to St. Margaret’s Church. The Rev. Cunningham was vicar there between 1830 and 1860, and he was married to the sister of Elizabeth Fry, the famous prison reformer.

How to find the Lowestoft Scores:

Address for the Lowestoft Scores:

Lowestoft Scores,
Lowestoft,
Suffolk,
UK

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