The Frohnauer Hammer (hammer mill) consists of an iron hammer forge with a Flutergraben (ditch), a small workshop building and the associated manor house. The hammer mill was originally a grain mill, probably dating back to the earliest period of the village of Frohnau. Following the discovery of silver ores, a minting plant was established in 1498 in an outbuilding of the mill which in 1502 was moved to the mining office in Annaberg. At the end of the 16th century, the mill fell into ruin, and in 1621 a fundamental conversion into a hammer mill took place, in which silver (for a short period), later copper and finally iron were forged. In 1692 the hammer mill burnt down, but was rebuilt shortly afterwards, and in 1904 it closed. The Hammerbund association, founded in 1907, acquired the site a year later, enabling the museum to be opened there as soon as 1910. The hammer mill, operated by water power with an L-shaped layout, is a quarry stone walled building with a shingle hipped roof. The mill was driven by water from the Sehma (river), diverted some 300 m above the hammer mill via a weir into a separate leat.
