Mestni muzej Idrija - Idrija Municipal Museum - Museo Municipale di Idria

SI-5280 Idrija, Slovenia

The central museum exhibition with the title Five Centuries of the Mercury Mine and the Town of Idrija presents the development of the town of Idrija and 500 years of the second oldest and the largest mercury mine in the world. While operating, the mine produced one-eighth of all mercury in the world. The exhibition is thematically divided into 11 sections with 25 exhibition rooms covering a total area of more than 1,300 square metres.

The Collection of Rocks, Fossils, Mercury Ores and Minerals, with nearly 3,000 different specimens is the biggest exhibited collection of its kind in Slovenia. Documents Tell the Story and View of the Town in the front tower of the castle exhibit a selection of significant archival sources from all over Europe along with documents of Idrija cartographers and mine maps from the 18th and 19th centuries.

Mercury Tower, is highlight of the exhibition and is designed like a shaft with three levels. Each level presents different symbolic values in the work of the miner. Equipment, ways, and customs before entering the shaft. The second level presents work, working conditions, tools, miners at work in the 17th century, etc. And in the lowest part, a treasure here hangs in the air on iron wires, represented by a 320kg transparent Plexiglass cube with drops of mercury inside.

Famous Personalities, show portraits and documents relating to the activities of all those workers, intellectuals, and mining experts who came to or lived in Idrija and influenced Slovenia's and Europe's science and culture at large. For instance in Idrija were the naturalists Scopoli, Hacquet, and Paracelsus.

The process of extracting mercury and cinnabar is illustrated in a room with a massive millstone used for grinding cinnabar, clay retorts for blasting ore, and original mercury scales from 1830. An important support industry for mining is foresting, and Idrija is surrounded by hills and forests that were cut for centuries for shaft support and mining architecture. Wood was also exported and the Idrijca River and its mouthing streams were used as transport routes. Architecture and technical solutions are vividly presented by various models of water dams, barriers, and water rakes to pool incoming wood. The facilities shown in the models can still be visited in the town of Idrija or in surrounding areas.

Witnesses of Life's Beat presents the lively social and cultural life in the Idrija of the past. The mining operation was responsible for the establishment of several very good local schools as well as craft traditions such as lace-making. Bobbin-lace making was introduced into Slovenia from the Czech and German lands of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy more than 300 years ago; the first mention goes back to the year 1696. Idrija gradually developed its own techniques and design patterns. In 1876 a lace school was established and its activities achieved European dimensions. Lace was exported worldwide the same as mercury.

A part of the museum is the Memorial Room of Dr. Aleš Bebler (1907–1981), a Slovene politician, diplomat, ecologist and participant in the Spanish Civil War. There is a permanent gallery collection, donated by Idrija-born translator and Rome gallery owner Valentina Orsini Mazza, which comprises 33 paintings and prints by renowned Slovene and Italian artists. There is also the Memorial Room of France Bevk, the famous Slovene writer, that was donated by his wife after his death in 1971. His study was moved from Ljubljana to the museum's permanent exhibition at Gewerkenegg Castle the same year.

On display in the Idrija Municipal Museum is a relief model of the Partisan Hospital Bolnica Pavla, the less-known, but no less important hospital where more than 1600 Partisans were treated.

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