Collections of the Idrija Municipal Museum
More than museum 23,000 items are arranged in 11 collections. We’ve picked the largest, the smallest, the oldest and the most interesting ones for you. We invite you to find them in our exhibitions!
The Mining Collection
The collection and storage of mining heritage objects is closely linked to the idea of the foundation of the Idrija Municipal Museum (1953). Its original mission was a concern for saving the technical heritage of the Idrija Mercury Mine, so the mining collection of our Idrija Municipal Museum is very specific. It is based on the objects from the mercury mine in Idrija, the second largest such mine in the world. It has 784 units – from the 1790 mining pump called the “Kamšt” that weights tens of tonnes of kilos to the miner’s identification mark that measures 3.29cm in diameter.
The collection displays machines, devices, tools and equipment, which were necessary for working in a pit and at outdoor plants. We keep the water pump called the “Kamšt”, hand tools for working in the pit, such as a “šlenger, pek, krotca, tirgl”, carts called “trugca”, digging and drilling hammers, protective masks, breathing apparatus, various drills for machine drilling in the pit, mining clothing, pit lamps, barrels and steel flasks for mercury transport, pit explanatory boards, clay vessels for ore burning, vessels for mercury and cinnabar and objects for its production, as well as other objects from the mining laboratory. In the field of forestry, we keep a mobile measuring device for measuring logs, hammers and stamps.
The biggest object:
Idrija “Kamšt”
The smallest object:
The marks from a death watch
The representative object:
The oldest pit lamps – oil lamps
The most interesting object:
“Trugca”, the Hungarian cart
