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Mines/Spain

Las Medulas mine

Las Medulas mine, Spain. Heritage site, placer, mining gold.

Why Las Medulas is famous

Roman interest began about 27 BC, and over the next 150 years or so it was the most important gold source for Rome. Worked by hydraulic ruina montium with canals up to 100 km long and up to 10,000 miners. Nuggets up to 3 kg are recorded.1,2,3

Story cards

Timeline

  1. 22 to 24 January 1903Goldfields Water Supply Scheme opens4

Las Medulas today

Where gold is mined todayMining in Spain

Where next

People

Investigated byPliny the ElderAs procurator of Hispania Tarraconensis from AD 73 he knew Spain's mines.5

Mines

An example ofDolaucothi Gold MinesRome mined gold at Las Medulas from about 27 BC and at Dolaucothi from AD 70.1ExamplesRiotinto mining districtRio Tinto's silver peaked in Roman times. Las Medulas was Rome's main gold source.6

Events

An example ofGoldfields Water Supply Scheme opensRoman gold-miners dug canals up to 100 km long. Kalgoorlie's pipeline ran 566 km.4

Sources

  1. Las Medulas article (2017) Mercian Geologist
  2. Wikidata entity Q696803
  3. Wikidata item Q696803 (Las Medulas) Wikidata (CC0)
  4. Building a Pipeline (WA Goldfields) Western Australian Museum
  5. Pliny the Elder Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th edition, 1911 (public-domain text on Wikisource), article by J. E. Sandys
  6. Riotinto mining district study Onoba (journal article, 2021)

Pictures on this page: Grande Illustrazione del Lombardo Veneto Vol 3 Plinio Secondo 300dpi.jpg, Geoffrey (Public domain).

From the Prospector Trails mining history dataset: each fact links to the source it was checked against. Figures are as the source gives them, in the money of their day. Not investment advice.

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Cover photos from Wikimedia Commons: Super Pit, Kalgoorlie by Kgbo, CC BY-SA 4.0. Pictures: Timna in de Negevwoestijn; rotspartij "de zuilen van Salomo", Poll, Willem van de / Europeana (Public Domain Mark 1.0).