Historic Town of Banská Štiavnica and the Technical Monuments in its Vicinity
Over the centuries, the town of Banská Štiavnica was visited by many outstanding engineers and scientists who contributed to its fame. The old medieval mining centre grew into a town with Renaissance palaces, 16th-century churches, elegant squares and castles. The urban centre blends into the surrounding landscape, which contains vital relics of the mining and metallurgical activities of the past.
http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/618
The historic town of Banska Stiavnica and the technical monuments in its vicinity are an outstanding example of a European medieval mining centre.
Central Europe, from the Harz to Slovakia, at that time was the main area for mining and metallurgy. Large scale mining started in Banska Stiavnica in the 12th century, profiting from its location in the middle of an immense caldera created by the collapse of an ancient volcano. From the 15th century on the silver mined here brought great wealth. The city also was the seat of the principal Mining Academy in the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Among many others, the designated area contains the following structures:
- Town centre with the town hall, burgher houses, plague column and several churches
- Baroque Calvary complex
- Old and New Castles
- The buildings of the former Mining Academy
- Knocking tower
- Sitno Castle
- Series of dams and channels
- Bieber drainage gallery
- Mayer shaft
- Silver-lead mining plants
The inscription of this site as a WHS took two tries: in 1992 the proposal was deferred back to the Slovak government in order to gain more information on "the concrete existence of a heritage bearing witness to mining activities". The reply obviously was satisfying, and the site was inscribed in 1993.
http://www.worldheritagesite.org/list/id/618
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