Banská Štiavnica - mesto svetového dedičstva

Untill the 17th century

Banská Štiavnica, the oldest mining town in Slovakia, played an important role as early as before the second third of the 13th century, i.e. before the period when the first town privileges granted in the Hungarian Empire were bestowed by King Bela IV. The town acquired its privileges not later than in 1238 or 1237. The original documents have not been preserved, but its accorded privileges served as a model for those of subsequently established mining towns. However, an existing document dated 1275 in Banská Štiavnica contains the oldest town seal  known to exist in Europe, picturing the town coat of arms with archaic mining tools (especially a chisel without a handle), thereby, definitively linking mining and the town from its very beginning.

The richness of the minerals found here was the cause of the inhabitation of this hilly region and its subsequent development and growth. The oldest documents about the earliest settlement  connected with ore mining and processing are from the 10th to the 8th centuries B.C. (the late Bronze Age) - a hill-fort situated on Sitno Mountain. Indications of the prospecting activities of the Celts in the 3rd and 2nd centuries B.C. are settlement and production archeological finds in the village of Beluj (located south of Sitno). Their analysis, as well as that of ancient coins found in Levice, indicate that the raw materials were from the area of the Štiavnica Hills.

The ore district of Štiavnica became again the object of intense interest only in the Middle Ages. In brief document sources it is called as the territory of miners - „terra banesium" (1156). An agglomeration of settlements in this territory dating back to the 11th century has been confirmed by archeological finds in the town proper  as well as in the „Old Town" locality on Glanzenberg Hill. These finds also document further changes in settlements connected with intensification of mining and arrival of immigrants from the area of Tirol at the turn of the  13th century (the future town centre began to be urbanized, the fortified area guarded point was extened into a castle). In the 1330's the town of Banská Štiavnica was of considerable area. There were two churches - three-naved basilicas, 500 metres apart from each other, which exhibited a high degree of building mastery  and their artistic late Romanesque style is an evidence of the influence of Cistercian architecture from Low Austria in the 12th century. The parish Church of the Virgin Mary, with an independent chapel above an ossuary, was situated at the foot of Paradajz Hill high above the town. The location of the Church of St. Nicholas (Dominican, nowadays parish one) marked the south edge of the town in accordance with the rule of mendicant friars. The Dominicans, after more than  30 years of their stay out of the town due to the fear of the Tartar invasion, and when the town had further expanded, built a monastery near the church.

The character of the dispersed buildings around the main roads is documented by archeological finds in the ground plans of the one-room buildings as well as  those of production objects, incorporated into Gothic and Renaissance architecture.  At this time the only  fortified area of the entire ore district existed  on the top of Glanzenberg Hill and it was a castle. This residential structure represented the royal enclave, providing protection first of all for the rich profits flowing from the mining activities (Mining Chamber).

The great prosperity of the mines in the following two centuries, reflected by utulization of new progressive technologies of  mining and processing of precious metals, resulted in the densification of the town. The town developed on both slopes of later Trinity Square (respecting the  adits into the mining works) and along the road to Štiavnické Bane. The spread of the town southward towards Ilija and Svätý Anton is documented by the building of the hospital Church of St. Elizabeth in the poverty quarter as early as 1310.

In 1442 - 1443 the town suffered huge losses due to battles for the Hungarian throne and a subsequent earthquake. The churches, burgher houses, castle and mining works were damaged. These events spurred a building boom resulting not only in sacred and burgher architecture but also in new types of buildings on purpose such as the Town Hall (1488),  the fortification of the parish church (1486), the fortification of the toll station on the premises of the later Court Chamber and that of the building  Akademická Street 8.

In 1488 - 1492 the one nave Church of St. Catherine with late Gothic vaults was built in the town centre. This project was followed by the magnificent developing of Trinity Square, located below the old parish church, in the middle of  the 16th century. The church was rebuilt into its late Gothic form in 1497 - 1515.

From the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th centuries, a slow decline in the mining production began to occur in spite of  considerable yields from the mines. This happened due to the problems with pumping water from the mines as well as the slump in the prices of gold and precious metal ores on the European markets. This situation followed by social fracas in the entire central Slovak mining region, culminated in the mining revolt in 1525 - 1526. In 1526 the Hungarian army was defeated in the battle at Moháč by Turkish troops, which began moving towards the central Slovak mining towns.

In the building boom of the 16th century, the plans of the square developing and the town rebuilding overlapped with the defence safeguarding. The older burgher houses were rebuilt and enlarged, the pompous Renaissance palaces and the seats of the the Mining Chamber and the Head Chamber Earl's Office were built. Dispersed buildings lining the main streets and the square began to take the existing form. A widely ramified sewer system was built by the town during these times  and its main lines were preserved until nowadys.

In order to protect the town  against the Turks, the parish church was rebuilt into the fortification,  today known as the Old Castle.  The guard tower, the New Castle, was built in the western part of the town.

Due to the fact that the built-up area of Banská Štiavnica adjusted to the natural rugged terrain and so dispersed settlement did not enable to build a coherent fortification system, its walls instead were erected between single houses. However, the access to the town by main roads was closed by the town gates (Piargská, Roxerova, Belianska, Kammerhofská, Antolská and others). The older fortification of the castle on Glanzenberg, after demanding adaptations and being strengthened by an earthwork and a moat, also added to the system of anti-Turkish fortification.