Small park around the spoil heap of the Rudolphine shaft, where silver and lead ores were discovered in 1784, with monumental lime trees.
Kunszt Park, also called the Miners' Park or Rudolfina, is a small park in Bobrowniki Śląskie, a district of Tarnowskie Góry, on ul. Parkowa, next to the former Kunszt mining colony. It lies on the site of the former Fryderyk lead and silver ore mine, and the commemorative spoil heap of the Rudolphine shaft is its centre.
The park grew up around the Rudolphine shaft, where on 16 July 1784, after a long search, the first deposits of silver and lead ores were found. This began the second period of mining in Tarnowskie Góry. The Fryderyk mine operated from the 1780s on the initiative of Friedrich Wilhelm von Reden, and in 1788 one of the first Newcomen steam engines on the European continent was installed here. You can see the whole mine at the Royal Fryderyk Mine, only a few hundred metres away.
In the 1820s the shaft's spoil heap was heaped up to a height of 10 m and a spiral path was made to the top, where a commemorative tree was planted. Small-leaved limes were planted around it, and the neighbouring washery heap was turned into a dancing circle. A stone bridge to the Kunszt colony was thrown across the Stoła. The park served as a place of rest for the mine's workers and residents, and the Miners' Fraternity (Spółka Bracka) organised annual Bergfests here.
On the hundredth anniversary of the discovery of the ores, in 1884, a three-metre sandstone obelisk with a crown, a mining emblem and a medal bearing the likeness of Frederick the Great was unveiled at the top of the heap. In 1910 the obelisk was moved to the City Park in Tarnowskie Góry.
About 200-year-old small-leaved limes have survived around the heap to this day. The park was recognised as a collective natural monument by a City Council resolution of 2004, and the heap is entered in the municipal register of monuments. The park was one of the sites nominated for inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage List, which took place on 9 July 2017. Around 16 July, the anniversary of the discovery of the ores, a summer Barbórka (St Barbara's Day, the miners' holiday) is held here.
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