The Krušnohoří Mining Region

Ore Mining in Krušnohoří

Widespread mining shaped the historical development of the Krušné Mountains in the north of Bohemia and influenced life on both sides of the Czech and German border. Over the centuries, the technical monuments, urban compounds, and abundance of intangible heritage created a unique cultural landscape full of beautiful river valleys and scenic villages in the Krušné Mountains.

This important mining region includes a total of 22 locations, a handful of which are in the Czech Republic, while the majority are in Saxony. Regardless of the country in which this region lies today, the character and landscape of Krušnohoří was formed thanks to the extraction and processing of silver, tin, cobalt, copper, iron, and uranium over more than eight centuries, from the 12th century to the end of the 20th.

On the Czech side, there are five areas specifically listed by UNESCO: the Krupka Mining Cultural Landscape, the Jáchymov Mining Landscape, the Abertamy–Boží Dar–Horní Blatná Mining Landscape, the Mining Landscape at the peak of Mědník, and the Red Tower of Death in Vykmanov, also a national cultural monument.

Mining Monuments All Around Us

This landscape contains an immense amount of monuments – above-ground and underground mining facilities, metallurgical plants, and other historic remnants of the mining activity, such as panning placers, spoil heaps, troughs, mine ponds, underground canals, water wheel chambers, and engine rooms with preserved technology, and documents about various mining techniques.

These monuments also contain the intangible heritage of our ancestors. In this mining region, a mining academy was founded in 1765 (today, it is a part of the Freiberg Technical University), which is the oldest still active educational institution in the field of mining in the world. Also in the Krušnohoří mining region, Georgius Agricola wrote his Twelve Books of Mining and Metallurgy in the 16th century, which were used for centuries as handbooks for extracting and processing ores. Silver coin minting was also important. For example, the tolar of Jáchymov gave rise, after many centuries, to the name of the ‘dollar’. Many important inventions and innovations in mining and metallurgy were pioneered in the Krušnohoří Mining Region and then spread throughout Europe and the world, especially from the 16th century on.