Banská Štiavnica in red
© Jan Petrik
Details
The city of Banská Štiavnica hosted a photo exhibition titled Chinesse Story - The Silk Road displayed in the premises of the Akademik Cinema on Holy Trinity Square.
The New Castle and the Old Castle, the most characteristic structures of Banská Štiavnica, were illuminated in red.
Banská Štiavnica is a town located in the middle of a volcano. Its explosions flung out rich, precious metals and minerals thus destining the place to a long and intense coexistence between humans and hills. For several centuries, Štiavnica (Schemnitz in German, Selmecbánya in Hungarian) was one of the richest cities in Europe. Vienna and Budapest,were both built on the silver and gold extracted here. Even the monarchy used the wealth from the ores to grow and expand their reach. Once the third largest city in the Hungarian Empire, Banská Štiavnica was a centre for miners and metallurgists, alchemists and mineralogists, land surveyors and cartographers, technical designers and builders. It was here that gunpowder was used to blast rock from the mines for the very first time ever; it was, here that the world’s first technical college was established. Palaces and burgher houses, statues and churches, were all built by famous architects and artists. Today, the town centre remains miraculously preserved in its original form; and since 1993, our historic town and the area’s technical monuments have been inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Once called the Silver Town, Banská Štiavnica is a textbook of history, architecture and landscaping. Those who want to read it will find a unique heritage of the remarkable creativity of the human spirit. Welcome to the Silver Town.

Old Castle, Banská Štiavnica, Slovakia – © Jan Petrik
MORE INFO: www.banskastiavnica.sk www.banskastiavnica.travel
When
March 2, 2018 - March 3, 2018
Where
Banská Štiavnica, Slovakia