Berchtesgaden salt mine

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Berchtesgaden salt mine
on the right: Mitterberghaus ; left: Ferdinandberg visitor entrance , behind: cash desk, shop, changing rooms

The Berchtesgaden salt mine is the oldest active salt mine in Germany, in which salt is mainly extracted using wet mining , and is also a show mine in the Salzberg district in Berchtesgaden .

history

founding

Salt mining in Berchtesgaden formed the economic backbone of the Berchtesgaden monastery from the 13th century at the latest , which not least for this reason was to achieve ever greater political independence - from 1380 as an imperial prelature and from 1559 as a prince provosty . At the same time, it was also the cause of the desires of the neighboring prince archbishopric of Salzburg , which even resulted in armed conflicts ("Salzirrungen") several times.

Already Eberwin , the first provost of Berchtesgaden, had during his reign (1101-1142) might have access to the first salt springs . Provost Dietrich (1174–1178) was the first to not only mine salt on the property of the Berchtesgaden monastery , but also began to trade with it. Under his successor Friedrich I (1178–1188), the salt trade that his predecessor Dietrich had started “strived to get rich”. Not least because, according to more recent historical research, Friedrich had the Golden Bull , granted by Friedrich Barbarossa in 1156 , supplemented by the freedom to mine salt and metal ( salt shelf ) in 1180 - an interpolation that was by no means uncommon at that time or a subsequent falsification ( Impeachment ) of such a document. From 1193 in the nearby Schellenberg (in the "salt mountains" of the " Tuvals ") and from 1194 in the immediate vicinity of the Gollnbach (other spellings: Golmbach or Gollenbach ) in Salzberg , rock salt was mined , then passed in open wooden channels to the pan of a salt works in Schellenberg and Simmer there to evaporate salt.

The "Salt Mine Berchtesgaden" was finally in 1517 western "further afield" of the mining area Gollbach during the tenure of the pin Propsts and poor prelates Gregor Rainer ascended . The first tunnel was the "Petersberg tunnel".

owner

The salt mine facilities were owned by the Reich Prelature of Berchtesgaden from 1517, which was raised to the status of the Prince Provost of Berchtesgaden from 1559, and were jointly managed by the Hallinger of the Salt Office in Schellenberg. In the meantime, the salt mine was under the administration of the Electorate of Cologne from 1594 to 1723 by the Wittelsbachers . After secularization from 1803, the salt mine belonged to the Electorate of Salzburg , from 1805 to the Austrian Empire , in 1809 for a short time to France under Napoleon and from 1810 to the Kingdom of Bavaria and its political successors . In 1927, the convicted Bavaria its previously as state -owned companies out mining activities in the BHS Bavarian mountain, hut and salt works AG, as well as the salt mine Berchtesgaden, remained the sole shareholder of the Free State.

In 1991 the Free State sold the shares to SKW Trostberg . In 1995, Südsalz GmbH was founded and the Berchtesgaden salt mine was brought in. Südsalz GmbH is now part of the Südwestdeutsche Salzwerke AG group .

Brine pipes and salt pans

The Schellenberger Saline ("Sulzrin nach Schelnberg") served as the saltworks when it started operating until 1805, and from 1564 the Frauenreuth saltworks in Berchtesgaden.

  • Saline in Schellenberg around 1900 or earlier, demolished in 1906

  • Saline Frauenreuth in Berchtesgaden (1890)

Following the incorporation of the prince-priesthood of Berchtesgaden into the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1810, Georg Friedrich von Reichenbach was commissioned in 1816 to build a brine pipeline to Reichenhall - the oldest saltworks in Germany - as the fuel supply was difficult due to centuries of intensive forest use and the restricted catchment area in Berchtesgaden . The brine pipeline was in operation from 1817 to 1927 and is considered a technical masterpiece due to its length of 29 kilometers and considerable height differences (e.g. 360 m height difference Ilsank - Söldenköpfl ). It led from Berchtesgaden through Ramsau over the Schwarzbachwacht pass to Reichenhall. The lower transition to Reichenhall am Hallthurm was then still on Austrian territory and was therefore not used for the route.

The historic brine pipeline was followed by a new brine pipeline with partly changed routing, but also leading over the Schwarzbachwacht pass to Bad Reichenhall. Today's third brine pipeline leads over the Hallthurm.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the saltworks in Berchtesgaden were completely stopped, since then the brine from Berchtesgaden has only been pumped into the saltworks in Bad Reichenhall, 18 kilometers away, where it is boiled or processed into table salt and road salt .

Facility as a show mine

Already in the prince's time, the salt mine was used as a show mine for tourists to enter . From autumn 2006 to Pentecost 2007, the visitor area above and below ground was fundamentally redesigned while visitor entry operations continued.

  • Typical visitor photo after leaving the show mine from 1926

  • Part of the workshop, behind it the social building and (hidden) administration

  • Mitterberghaus

  • Figures at the salt mine in festival habit

Mining technology, delivery rates, employees

In uninterrupted operation since 1517 - and thus the oldest active salt mine in Germany - in Berchtesgaden has always been wet mining . For centuries, the brine was extracted in sinking works , now wet mining takes place in drilling flushing works . The salt content of the Haselgebirge averages 50 percent, from which around 850,000 m³ of brine are extracted annually.

Today around 100 employees work in the mine , 50 of them underground. This makes it one of the largest employers in Berchtesgaden .

Visitor entrance, salt healing tunnel

A visitor entrance route to the mine is open to tourists and is used by around 350,000 visitors annually. The length of the visitor pit railway is 1400 meters, its track width 56 centimeters. The railway is operated with direct current of 400 volts, which is fed via a busbar on the side . The vehicles currently used for passenger transport date from 1995.

The visitor route was modernized in 2007 and reopened in the form of a multimedia edutainment show under the name SalzZeitReise - Berchtesgaden Adventure Mine . A trip through the mine shows the development of the mining methods as well as the further processing steps of the salt on the spot as well as multimedia presentations on the topic. The entrance with the mine train takes place after the guests are dressed in overalls . (Until the beginning of 2000, the guests were dressed in traditional miners' clothing consisting of black trousers, white jacket and cap, supplemented by a leather apron.) Afterwards, visitors can choose to take stairs or miner's slides deeper into the pit to a salt lake. After taking a cable ferry across the salt lake, the train takes you back up to the exit. The tour lasts about an hour.

Special events such as concerts and the Dinner de Sole are also held in the mine . Since 1990 there has also been an 850 m² “salt healing tunnel” in the mine, which is used for “health entrances”, but not for speleotherapy .

  • Mine train with visitors

  • Salt sample souvenir

  • Salt healing tunnel

literature

Reading sample , PDF file with 6 pages.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c SalzZeitReise fact sheet - interesting facts about our salt mine ( Memento from July 30, 2016 in the Internet Archive ), as of: September 2013, PDF file, 3 pages
  2. ^ Dieter Albrecht : The prince provost of Berchtesgaden . In: Max Spindler, Andreas Kraus (Hrsg.): Handbuch der Bavarian Geschichte , p. 288 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
  3. ↑ General German Real Encyclopedia for the Educated Stands , Volume 3, p. 65. Brockhaus, Leipzig 1864 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
  4. ↑ On salt mining in Pleickard Stumpf: Bavaria: a geographical-statistical-historical handbook of the kingdom , p. 95
  5. ↑ Stefan Weinfurter , The Foundation of the Augustinian Canons ' Monastery - Reform Idea and Beginnings of the Canon Regulars in Berchtesgaden , in: History of Berchtesgaden: Between Salzburg and Bavaria (until 1594), Vol. 1 , ed. by W. Brugger, H. Dopsch, PF Kramml, Berchtesgaden 1991, pp. 229-264, here: p. 253.
  6. ↑ “So in Berchtesgaden (..) a new document, an expanded new edition, was drawn up on the basis of a real preliminary document with the purpose of securing the salt shelf. “In Manfred Feulner: Berchtesgaden - History of the country and its inhabitants , p. 37.
  7. ↑ Ulli Kastner: Salt has been part of Berchtesgaden's history in Berchtesgadener Anzeiger for 900 years , news from May 22, 2002 and June 3, 2002 in berchtesgadener-anzeiger.de, which is no longer available.
  8. ↑ a b see reading sample , PDF file p. 6 In: Herbert Fritz, Hans Neumayer: Das Salzbergwerk Berchtesgaden and his railways , Association Railway-Media-Group, Vienna 2013, ISBN 978-3-902894-11-3
  9. ↑ Matthäus Merian : Taffel des Stifft Berchtersgaden (monastery monastery or prince provost of Berchtesgaden) , zoomable map: copper print 28 × 34 cm, map orientation South up (south above). Title description see coat of arms below right. Merian, Frankfurt aM (first time) 1644, in: Archiepiscopatus Salisburgensis series, fold 28, Topographia Bavariae, location: Bern UB storage magazine . Sector E4 | Signature: MUE Ryh 4706: 28, online at biblio.unibe.ch .
  10. ↑ Chorographia Bavariae ad illustriss et seneness principem ... (Latin) , Berchtesgaden (spelling on map: "Berchtolsgaden") to be found on the zoomable map at the bottom right between scale and Bavaria, Weinerus, Petrus, 1579, signature: ark: / 12148 / btv1b72000983, Bibliothèque nationale de France, online at gallica.bnf.fr .
  11. ↑ salzbergwerk.de story: Reichenbach builds the brine pipeline to Bad Reichenhall
  12. ↑ a b technical , information u. a. to the mine railway, online at salzbergwerk.de
  13. ↑ Report in Berchtesgadener Anzeiger about the opening of the SalzZeitReise in the mine in 2007
  14. ↑ Opening times information and a. opening times for visitors and the duration of the tour, at salzbergwerk.de
  15. ^ Website of the Berchtesgaden salt healing tunnel

Web links

Commons : Berchtesgaden Salt Mine  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 47 ° 38 ′ 18 ″  N , 13 ° 1 ′ 3.2 ″  E