Type: educational

With a hammer on a geopath
During the classes, participants search for minerals in the Jizera Mountains, and have the opportunity to experience an extraordinary adventure. Visiting the St. John's Mine in Krobica is an integral part of the workshops.

What age group are the workshops dedicated to?
Families, children and youth, adults and seniors

Is prior appointment necessary?
Yes

What age group are the workshops dedicated to?
Any age group, for children from 6 years of age

Is the place adapted for people with disabilities?
No

On what days are the workshops held?
All week

Availability:
All year

Duration of the workshops:
approx. 4 hours

St. John's Mine in Krobica
Lower Silesia is an extremely rich area in terms of geology, in a small area there are many types of rocks from different periods. This situation makes this region very rich in terms of mining; the first treasure hunters and precious metal ores appeared in the Middle Ages. An example is the legendary Laurentius Angelus.

A fragment of the geopark in the Jizera Mountains can serve as an example of a well-preserved old mining facility.

The St. John Mine in Krobica is a part of a larger complex of underground tunnels, accessible to almost everyone, that were built in the area since the 15th century. In this area, mainly tin and cobalt ore were mined. The latter element was initially treated as the result of the malicious activity of gnomes called kobolds, who stole precious ores such as tin and replaced them with cobalt.

Work in such a mine was hard and laborious, required courage, knowledge and experience. It had to be done voluntarily to be effective. A miner was a well-paid, privileged person - with a higher social status than other inhabitants of the settlement. Miners' houses were usually built in separate clusters - marked in red on the old map. A miner could travel, hunt in the Lord's forest, cut down trees at will. All these privileges had an economic justification. He had no time to breed game for meat, he needed wood for lining - security, when he exhausted a deposit, he would look for a new one, sometimes he had to take a trip to a neighboring country.

Learning the profession began at an early age. Children aged 3-5 "helped" their mother at the mine to sort the spoils brought out by their father and learned to distinguish what was good and what was worthless. When a boy's first baby tooth fell out, it was a sign that he was already old enough to enter the adit with his father. After a ceremonial haircut, the boy entered a dark adit, lit only by a small oil lamp. His first job was carrying stones outside, so he didn't spend the whole day in the darkness of the underground and he got used to the workplace. The bucket, adjusted to the size of the little worker, grew along with his muscles. His father taught the boy more work inside - installing props to support the ceilings, boards to protect the sidewall from crumbling…

Little sunlight meant less vitamin D, which was necessary for growth. Bones had to be strong, so they grew shorter. In this way, an adult man reached a height of 150 cm. A miner was always shorter than his neighbor working in the field in the sun.

The constantly humid environment and constant temperature of around 8 degrees required appropriate clothing. A leather cap and a leather cape were characteristic parts of a miner's wardrobe.

Among the treasures extracted was not only tin ore. There is sulphide, there is iron, so you could come across pyrite resembling gold, which when bitten was much harder than the more valuable ore and, thanks to the presence of iron, contained small clusters of rust. Garnet was also found in the walls, which, despite being contaminated with hematite and titanium, had its value.

A visit to this place is simultaneously a journey into the world of non-ferrous metals, precious stones, minerals and unusual elements in their natural environment and a journey back in time by several hundred years.

Dust from crushed mica and sericite schist, fumes from the lamp, hard physical work in the dark and cold were not indifferent to the miner's health. Around the age of 30, he was a hard-working pensioner, he lived to be around 35, if he did not die crushed by stones in the mine before that.

The tourist attraction was created in 2010-2013 as part of the project entitled "Reclamation of areas degraded by mining operations". The beneficiary of the subsidy and the main investor was the Commune of Mirsk - the owner of this extraordinary place. 350 m of underground route led through the 18th century St. Leopold's and 16th century adits - the name comes from the older adit. 8 km of ground route called Geopark. From 2023, the leaseholder of the facility is the HAWK company from Miedzianka.

Address:
Krobica 90,
59-630 Mirsk, Lwówecki district
[email protected]
www.kopalniakrobica.pl
451 523 200