Diving in the Opal mines of Dubnik
Posted By David Cani & Petr Vaverka on 30 August 2006
THROUGH THE LABYRINTH OF THE OPAL MINES
Only a few places in the world have a thousand year old history of human activity connected with diving. The opal mines in Dubnik - located close to Presov city on eastern part of Slovakia is one of them, and we chose that place for our dive site because they are unique.
ALIVE UNDERGROUND
The first mining of opals in this place around Dubnik was in the 11th century.
At that time they were already extracting the precious opal and because of that a Dubnik is the oldest and the largest opal mine in the world.
Additionally these are the deepest mines to acquire opals.
In the 18th century there were about 800 workers and they built over thirty galleries with a total length of over 22km (13.75 miles) by hand.
If we want to find something similar, we have to go to Australia to places like Lightning Ridge, Coober Pedy or Mexico’s Zimapan.
The other locations are in the Americas especially in Honduras and in USA, Brasil, Russia and Germany.
However, the quality of their minerals is not that good as that of Dubnik’s stones.
One of the Dubnik rarities is the “Vienna Imperial Opal” also known as a “Harlekyn” which is the biggest opal in the world with a weight of 594 grams (20.952 oz) and its value is estimated at 500,000,- US Dollars.
The next valuable stone is “Burning of Troy” (about 50,000,- USD) which is now a part of France’s coronation treasure collection.
In spite of the tremendous output from these mines, they were shut down in 1922.
Shortly after the mine closed, opal thieves entered and destroyed what was left.
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