What the Miners did to an Old Salt Mine in Poland
~
Deep underground in
Poland lies something remarkable but
little
known
outside Eastern Europe. For centuries,
miners have extracted
salt
there, but left behind
things quite startling and unique. Take a look
at
the
most unusual salt mine
in the
world.
~
Remember, this was all
done over many years by the miners themselves as
they worked
underground!
~
~
From the
outside, Wieliczka Salt Mine doesn’t
look
extraordinary.
It looks extremely
well kept for a place that hasn’t mined any salt
for
over ten years but
apart from that it looks ordinary. However, over
two
hundred meters below
ground it holds an astonishing secret. This is
the
salt
mine that became an
art gallery, cathedral and
underground
lake.
~
~ Situated in
the Krakow area, Wieliczka is a small
town of close to twenty thousand inhabitants. It
was founded in the twelfth century
by a
local Duke to mine the rich deposits
of salt that lie beneath. Until 1996 it did just
that but the generations of miners did more than
just extract. They left behind them a
breathtaking record of their time underground in
the shape of statues of mythic, historical and
religious figures. They even created their own
chapels in which to
pray.
~ Perhaps their most astonishing legacy is the huge underground cathedral they left behind for posterity.
~
~ Perhaps their most astonishing legacy is the huge underground cathedral they left behind for posterity.
~
It may feel like you
are in the middle of a Jules Verne
adventure
as you descend in to
the depths of the world. After a one hundred and
fifty
meter climb down
wooden stairs the visitor to the salt mine will
see
some
amazing sites. About
the most astounding in terms of its sheer size
and
audacity is the Chapel
of Saint Kinga. The Polish people have for
many
centuries been devout
Catholics and this was more than just a long
term
hobby to relieve the
boredom of being underground. This was an act
of
worship.
~
~
~
Amazingly, even the
chandeliers in the cathedral are made
of
salt. It was not
simply hewn from the ground and then thrown
together;
however, the process
is rather more painstaking for the lighting.
After
extraction the rock
salt was first of all dissolved. It was
then
reconstituted with the
impurities taken out so that it achieved a
glass-like
finish. The
chandeliers are what many visitors think the
rest of
the
cavernous mine will be
like as they have a picture in their minds of
salt
as
they would sprinkle on
their meals! However, the rock salt occurs
naturally
in different shades of
grey (something like you would expect granite to
look
like).
Still, that doesn’t
stop well over one million visitors
(mainly
from Poland and its
eastern European neighbors) from visiting the
mine
to
see, amongst other
things, how salt was mined in the
past.
For safety reasons
less than one percent of the mine is open
to
visitors, but even that is still almost four kilometers in length – more
than enough to weary the average tourist after an hour or two. The mine was
closed for two reasons – the low price of salt on the world market made it
too expensive to extract here. Also, the mine was slowly flooding – another
reason why visitors are restricted to certain areas only.
~
visitors, but even that is still almost four kilometers in length – more
than enough to weary the average tourist after an hour or two. The mine was
closed for two reasons – the low price of salt on the world market made it
too expensive to extract here. Also, the mine was slowly flooding – another
reason why visitors are restricted to certain areas only.
~
The religious carvings
are, in reality, what draw many to
this
mine – as
much for their amazing verisimilitude as for
their
Christian
aesthetics. The above
shows Jesus appearing to the apostles after
the
crucifixion. He shows
the doubter, Saint Thomas, the wounds
on
his wrists.
~
