A few images of a recent visit to this astonishing world heritage landscape in El Bierzo, north west Spain. The area was the largest gold mine in the Roman Empire and vast tracts of land were carved out by a dramatic process of 'hydraulic mining', through flooding tunnels bored under mountains. The landscape this has created today is a deep forested bowl, overlooked by gigantic red sandstone teeth. Vast, hollowed out tree skeletons add to the sense of invading a lost world.
"What happens is far beyond the work of giants. The mountains are bored with corridors and galleries made by lamplight with a duration that is used to measure the shifts. For months, the miners cannot see the sunlight and many of them die inside the tunnels. This type of mine has been given the name of 'ruina montium'. How dangerous we have made the Earth!"
From: 'Natural History', Pliny the Elder
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