Idrija Municipal Museum

The Idrija Municipal Museum was founded in 1953 as the Museum of Idrija and Cerkno. It is housed in Gewerkenegg Castle, which dominates the old centre of the town Idrija. The 16th-century castle had been mostly a seat of management and administration for many centuries of the second oldest and largest mercury mine in the world. The history of mining in Idrija dates back to the year 1490. The importance of mercury was greatly influenced by the 1554 discovery of amalgamation in America. The process used mercury in acquiring silver and gold from ore and sparked a major increase in the demand for mercury from Idrija and Almadén that was mainly exported to Mexico.

The museum's main aim has been to preserve, present and research the rich technical heritage of the mercury mine, which is of European significance, and the ethnological features of the life of miners and peasants of this region that lies on the borderline between the Karst and the pre-Alpine hills. The museum is responsible for the area's natural sights and technical, ethnological, historical and cultural monuments, as well as for the major monuments of the National Liberation Struggle from the Second World War. At first the museum was founded to protect Partisan monuments and important sites from the Second World War, but was soon occupied with the rich heritage of the mining town of Idrija and its culture.

In 1997 the Idrija Municipal Museum received the Luigi Micheletti Award, as the best European museum of industrial and technical heritage. The museum works closely with the Idrija Mine Museum and the town of Idrija, they run geological, technological and ethnological sites – including tours of mining shafts – that are together with other monuments in the town (theatre, warehouse, the city hall, the old town square, secondary school, Gewerkenegg Castle, miners' houses, the water barriers Klavže, etc.) have been nominated in 2007 to become a UNESCO world heritage protected site with the name Idrija on the Mercury Route of the Intercontinental Camino Real.

Organisation

The Idrija Municipal Museum administers also the Cerkno Museum where is important ethnological collection of Laufarija Cerkno carnival masks. Near Cerkno in the village of Zakojca is the France Bevk Homestead that is also under the administration of the Idrija Municipal Museum.

Exhibitions

Gewerkenegg Castle

The central museum exhibition with the title Five Centuries of the Mercury Mine and the Town of Idrija presents the development of the town of Idrija and 500 years of second oldest and largest mercury mine in the world. Which while operating produced one eight of all mercury in the world. Exhibition is thematically divided in 11 sections with 25 exhibition rooms covering a total area of more than 1,300 square metres.

Collection of Rocks, Fossils, Mercury Ores and Minerals, with nearly 3,000 different specimens is held to be the biggest exhibited collection of its kind in Slovenia. Documents Tell the Story and View of the Town in the front tower of the castle exhibits a selection of significant archival sources from all over Europe along with documents of the Idrija cartographers and mine maps, from the 18th and 19th centuries.

Mercury Tower, is highlight of exhibition and is designed like a shaft with three levels. Each level presents different symbolic values in the work of the miner. Equipment, ways and customs before entering the shaft. The second level are work, working conditions, tools, miners at work in 17th century, etc. And in the lowest part, there is a treasure here hanging in the air on iron wires, represented by a 320kg transparent Plexiglass cube with drops of mercury inside.

Famous Personalities, show portraits and documents relating to the activities of all those workers, intellectuals and mining experts that came, or were living in Idrija influencing Slovene and Europe's science and culture at large. For instance in Idrija were naturalists as Scopoli, Hacquet and Paracelsus.

The process of extracting mercury and cinnabar is illustrated in the room with the massive millstone that was used for grinding cinnabar, the clay retorts for blasting ore and original mercury scales from 1830. Important back up industry for mining is foresting, and Idrija is surrounded by hills and forests, that were cut for centuries for shaft support and mining architecture. Wood was also exported and river Idrijca with mouthing streams were transport routes. Architectures and technical solutions are vividly presented by various models of water dams, barriers and water rakes to pool incoming wood. Facilities that models show can still be visited in town Idrija or in surrounding areas.

Witnesses of Life's Beat presents the lively social and culture life in the Idrija of the past. The mining operation was responsible for the establishment of several very good local schools as well as craft traditions such as lace-making. Bobbin-lace making was introduced into Slovenia from the Czech and German lands of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy more than 300 years ago; the first mention goes back to the year 1696. Idrija gradually developed its own techniques and design patterns. In 1876 a lace school was established and its activities achieved European dimensions. Lace was exported worldwide the same as mercury.

A part of the museum is the Memorial Room of Dr. Aleš Bebler (1907–1981), a Slovene politician, diplomat, ecologist and participant in the Spanish Civil War. There is a permanent gallery collection, donated by Idrija-born translator and Rome gallery owner Valentina Orsini Mazza, which comprises 33 paintings and prints by renowned Slovene and Italian artists. There is also the Memorial Room of France Bevk, the famous Slovene writer, that was donated by his wife after his death in 1971. His study was moved from Ljubljana to the museum's permanent exhibition at Gewerkenegg Castle the same year.

On display in the Idrija Municipal Museum is a relief model of the Partisan Hospital Bolnica Pavla, the less-known, but no less important hospital where more than 1600 Partisans were treated.

Satellite locations

The museum oversees the activities of various satellites showing works which were necessary to maintain mine shafts, wood cutting and transport, the Flood Dams, Klavže in Idria, built in 1772; Franci's Shaft, the museum`s technical department, mine shaft that has 15 of the most modern battery and steam machines for pumping water out of the mine from the 19th century to the early 20th cenury. It has the biggest water pump, known as Kley's Pump, made by the E. Škoda Pilsen factory (Plžen, Czech Republic) in 1893 and operated until 1948. After being repaired and renovated, the pump was opened again for the public in 2009. The Idrija Kamšt (from the German word Wasserkunst – "water art"), the largest wooden water wheel in Europe which pumped water from the mine from the time of the French Revolution all the way till 1948. It was restored and reopened for public viewing in September 2009.

Another site is the Idrija Miner's House dating from the end of the 19th century which was renovated in 1990. Natural heritage is represented by the Wild Lake Natural Museum, located two kilometres south of Idrija; the Franja Partisan Hospital (huge floods in September 2007 demolished the monument, repairs are underway).

The Slovenia Partisan Printing Shop in Vojsko is one of the best preserved monuments in the region from the Second World War. The Printing House operated from 1944 till the end of the war, and Partizanski dnevnik ("The Partisan's Daily") was the only daily newspaper in occupied Europe printed by a resistance organisation.

External links

Idrija Municipal Museum

Contents

Organisation

Exhibitions

Gewerkenegg Castle

Satellite locations

See also

External links

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