Medulak: the strength of gold
In the section The Spectacular World, we have shown you places created by nature, or at most, created by nature and transformed by man. The place that we are going to show you today, however, is the result of human influence. Today it is completely naturalized, but it is innately the result of a violent gold exploitation. Beautiful and beautiful place, anyway. The importance of
gold is not a matter of yesterday morning. The area known as Las Médulas was the largest gold mine in the Roman Empire. This is what owes the particular appearance of the environment.
They used a technique called ‘Ruina montium’ to extract gold. First, they brought water to large reservoirs through a vast network of canals from the surrounding mountains. This water was suddenly blown into galleries on the ground, and the mountain, which was made of soft material, exploded under the pressure of the water and the air trapped in the gallery. The earth thus freed was washed with water, and gold was
obtained. The violent gold exploitation lasted only 200 years. The pastoralism of the following centuries has also come to an end, and the landscape has been naturalized. Today, it seems that the peaks with a height of almost 100 meters are of their own.
Las Médulas is located in the northwest of Spain, in the south of the province of León. It is a land of red conglomerates that, in addition to gold, also contains silver, iron and borax, among others. These red clusters are currently located in the sedimentary basin of Bierzo, but their origin is unknown. The main theory is that the conglomerates are sediments accumulated after the creation of the basin, but there are also indications that they are sediments transported to this place by
a large river before the creation of the basin. The mysterious geological origin, human history and the picturesque forms that have remained today give
a special charm to the place called Las Médulas. Maybe that's why it was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
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