Current Exhibits

Georgius Agricola (Latin for ‘Georg Bauer’) was a German doctor, pharmacist and scientist who is regarded as the ‘father of minerology’ and founder of modern geology and mining engineering. His main work De re metallica libri XII, ‘12 books on mining’, appeared for the first time in Latin in 1556, a year after his death, in Basel.

Agricola’s work is the result of his travels through the mining regions of the Saxon and Bohemian Ore Mountains and demonstrates a systematic, technological investigation of mining and trade associations. Decorated with woodcuts, the entire mining knowledge of the day was compiled by the author, who in doing so became the founder of mountain scholarship. For two hundred years, Agricola’s books remained the decisive work on the subject.

Later, the famous mining book was translated into many different languages. Philippus Bechius (1521-1560), a friend of Agricola and a professor at the University of Basel, translated the manuscript into German and published it in 1557 under the title Vom Bergkwerck XII Bücher.

The cabinet of mountain curiosities at the Leogang Mining and Gothic Museum has three different editions of the famous work on display: the second Latin edition from 1561, the second German edition from 1580 and the first English edition from 1912, also called De re metallica.

The first English translation was published by Herbert Clark and Lou Henry Hoover, a married couple, who added commentary and footnotes. Herbert Clark Hoover was not only a trained mining engineer and successful entrepreneur, but the 31st president of the United States of America from 1929 to 1933.

The three editions of Georgius Agricola’s work on show at the Mining and Gothic Museum come from Achim and Beate Middelschulte’s famous private collection of mountain art in Essen.

A particularly valuable exhibit from the Gothic Room of the Mining and Gothic Museum in Leogang is the winged altarpiece from the Frey collection. The first item from the Frey collection, it was acquired by friends of the museum in 2008 and then donated to it. Carl von Frey (1826-1896) was a successful businessman who, in the second half of the 19th century, assembled Salzburg’s largest private collection of Gothic art.

The altarpiece was probably built around 1520 in Lower Bavaria. The shrine, predella and wings are made in spruce and the sculptures in lime wood. The wings are painted on both sides. The interior shows St. Barbara and St. Margaret, each on a gold brocade background. The exterior shows the Annunciation. Below it, on the predella, is Jesus making a blessing gesture and holding a globe, along with the 12 apostles.

The shrine or ‘retable’ has been preserved more or less in its original state. Mary is standing in the centre of the base with the Infant Jesus. At her feet is a crescent moon. To the left and right of the Mother of God are St. Mary Magdalene and St. Catherine.

Mary corresponds to the Apocalyptic style of Madonnas with the golden rays on the back wall of the shrine symbolising the sun. Mary carries the lively, cross-legged Infant Jesus on her right arm, who is reaching with both arms towards his mother. In her left hand the Madonna holds a fruit which her child is trying to grab.

The Blessed Mother’s robes consist of a golden dress gathered below the chest with a round neckline and golden sleeves. A golden mantle hangs on her shoulders, the blue lining of which is visible in the drapery.

Folds fall in long lanes down to the base. Her oval-shaped, harmonious face with its high forehead is framed by open strands of hair that spill loosely onto the shoulders. The Madonna is wearing a leafy crown.

St. Catherine, occupying the place of honour on the right side of the Mother of God, holds a sword in her left hand. There is a broken wheel at her feet – a symbol of martyrdom. In her right hand she is presenting an open book. On her head is a simple gold crown. The rich folds of her golden mantle reveal its green lining as if swept up by a gust of wind.

To the left of the Blessed Mother is St. Mary Magdalene. She is wearing a veil placed carefully on her shoulders and holding a golden, tapered anointing vessel with both hands.

The winged altarpiece from the Frey collection was exhibited in Salzburg in 1888 at the 40th anniversary of Emperor Franz Joseph I’s coronation.

The oldest representation of an Apocalyptic Madonna is the Crescent Moon Madonna in Hortus Delicarium by Herrad of Landsberg. The image of the Crescent Moon Madonna goes back to the account of John’s vision of a cosmic, pregnant woman crowned with stars and clothed by the sun with the moon beneath her feet, who is menaced by a dragon following an apocalyptic battle between the dragon and the Archangel Michael.

A miner’s toolset was known as ‘Gezäh’ (Old High German for ‘gizawa’, meaning ‘succeed’). This was basically a mallet and chisel. With the mallet in one hand the miner would strike one of several different kinds of chisel held in the other to score or scrape the rock.

The miner would place iron pieces in the so-called ‘kerf’, the hole made by the impact, with smaller and larger wedges in between. The wedges would then be hit with a ‘Schlenkerhammer’ or club mallet until the stone cracked. Another miner would loosen the rock mass with an iron crowbar.

This was an extremely hard and tedious job. If the miners failed to make progress they would use the age-old method of fire-setting, whereby the rock was make brittle by exposing it to heat and dousing it in cold water.

At the end of the 17th century these millennia-old mining techniques were replaced by blasting with gunpowder. Now, deep holes would be drilled and sprinkled with gunpowder. The gunpowder would be compressed with a ramrod, a fuse inserted, the hole closed with sand or wooden pegs and then detonated.

In order to work underground, the miners needed a light source. Initially kindling was used. This created a lot of soot, so towards the end of the 18th century, ‘Frösche’ or ‘frogs’ (tallow and oil lamps) came along, which were later replaced by acetylene and carbide lamps.

Although the latter provided more brightness, they still had a naked flame which, with the combustible mine gases, ran the risk of causing a fatal explosion.

It was not until the beginning of the 20th century that gasoline lamps were introduced, which burned brightly enough and did not soot. The miner finally had adequate and safe lighting at his disposal.