Mountain habit

Miners in Paradehabit (Bergparade in Marienberg 2005)

The Berghabit or miner's habit is the traditional clothing of the miners. It differs according to region, mining activities and work and festive clothing or costume.

Components

At work, the medieval miner wore the normal costume of the respective region - pit trousers , shoes and smocks .

Only gradually formed by the addition of distinctive mining elements such ass leather , knee rest , driving cap or cap (later Schachthut ), which for the work required Gezäh , so hammers , iron, wedges , wedge pick , scraper , blade , crowbar / crowbar , Mallets and recovery iron or carpenter's hatchet , the pit lighted (often a frog lamp ), and the Tzscherpertasche (for Tzscherperknife and lamp accessories such as rapeseed oil , flint and tinder ) the typical miner's costume.

There were specific elements for the individual professional groups. The Steiger wore as the Steiger Haeckel, Häuer and Doppelhäuer contributed mountain Barten . The smelters wore the leather as an apron in front of their stomach ("upside down") and carried the firke or fur , the rake and the chisel or tapping lance .

The Marienberger Bergmeister von Trebra introduced the wearing of the black mountain habit in Saxony in 1769.

In the mountain lifts typical of the mining regions, the diversity of the mountain habitat is still shown today.

gallery

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  Miners with hoods (depiction after Agricola in the middle of the 16th century)

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  Friedrich Constantin von Beust in his habit as Saxon chief miner

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  Mountain Brotherhood Pobershau in Paradehabit (2004)

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  Mountain musicians in Sanok, Poland (2009)

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  Mountain smock as worn by Montanists in Austria

Prussian insignia of rank 1890

The mountain habit with badges of rank was worn by Prussian supervisory officers as well as by employees and workers of state and private companies.

Badge of rank	Official titles for civil servants	Job titles for employees and workers
No badges of rank	-	Tusks
	-	Steiger
	-	Movers; Mining enthusiast
	-	Obersteiger; Mine separators
	Controlling Marksider; Steam boiler auditor; Mountain trainee; Senior teacher at royal mountain schools	-
	Inspector; Chief inspector; Oberbergamts-Markscheider; Mountain assessor; Director of the royal mountain schools; District Geologist	-
	District officer ; State geologist	Member of the mining directorates
	Directors and members of the upper mining authorities, the ministerial department for mining, metallurgy and saltworks; Directors of the Bergakademie	Director of the State Works; Chairman of the Mining Directors
Source:

literature

• GE Rost: Costumes of the miners and smelters in the Kingdom of Saxony . According to the latest regulations with landscape surroundings from the various mining authority districts drawn from nature, engraved in copper and faithfully colored. Freiberg 1831 ( digitized version ).
• Karl-Ewald Fritzsch , Friedrich Sieber : Mining costumes of the 18th century in the Ore Mountains and in the Mansfeld region . With 31 picture plates. In: Publications of the Institute for German Folklore . tape 12 . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1957 (79 pages).

Web links

Commons : Berghabit  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Wikisource: Costumes of the miners and smelters in the Kingdom of Saxony  - sources and full texts

• The miner's uniform and its history: On the origin and social position of the Saxon miner's costume

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Lexicon entry at zeno.org
2. ^ Carl Schiffner : From the life of old Freiberg mountain students . Ernst Mauckisch publishing house, Freiberg 1935. p. 117
3. ↑ Горняцкая униформа и знаки различия прусских шахтеров образца 1890 г. antique-photos.com, accessed December 5, 2017 (Russian).