History of Hora Svaté Kateřiny

1. History of Hora Svaté Kateřiny

2. The town of Hora Svaté Kateřiny is located in 696 metres above sea level. The town is situated on the Czech side of The Ore Mountains. History of this town is closely connected with mining, especially silver and copper. The original name of this town should have been Hallberg, its origins were maybe in the word Kupferhall. The name of Hora Svaté Kateřiny comes from an old legend: a maid-servant found silver when she was cutting grass. Perhaps that is also the reason why Saint Catherine became the patron of this town.

3. In 1473, this manor was bought by Lorenz Gatz from Alterndorf. Here he started testing his mining skills which he had gained in Krupka. After his death in 1516 his property was inherited by his daughter Anna, the wife of Šebestián of Weitmülle, who was famous for his mining management. That helped to improve mining.

4. In 16th and 17th century, silver, copper and lead were not mined too much, but gold was still separated from soil and cleaned. Even this mining activity was affected by war of Saxony and Seven Year War.

5. In 18th century, in the beginning of 70´s, fast degradation of mining came and in 1786, mining was completely stopped. Then, many attempts for restoring mining activities were undertaken. The last attempt was done by Mostecká uhelná společnost between 1900 and 1904.

6. The economic importance of Hora Svaté Kateřiny decreased, especially after opening of an anthracite mine in Brandov. In 2008, Hora Sv. Kateřiny was promoted to the town and thanks to this status the town has become famous.

7. Authors PhamDuyCuong (Petr) Pham Van Quan (Martin) Láďa Procháska Míša Šaffová