The Lauta mining landscape is situated 2 km north of Marienberg. The historic town centre and the Lauta mining landscape are connected by a today’s road which was once used by the miners living in the town to get to the mines at Lauta.
Lauta mining landscape is a fine example of the mining technology of the 16th to the 19th centuries following the ore lodes of the main Marienberg deposit. It is characterised first and foremost by the criss-crossing lines of heaps on the Bauer Morgengang and the Elisabeth Flachen lodes which distinctively influence the landscape. The line of heaps to the south of Lauta extends along the historically significant northeast - southwest trending Bauer Morgengang lode. This lode is crossed to the southwest by the Elisabeth Flachen lode which stretches many kilometres. Both groups of lodes, due to the waste heaps which are aligned with them like strings of pearls, are impressive monuments to Marienberg’s mining past. Each of the waste heaps marks the location of one or more shafts, the distance between them corresponding to the sizes of the former mine fields regulated by mining law. The majority of the waste heaps originate from the mining period of the 16th century, whilst in the 17th century there were various interesting technical projects for the shafts to be drained again and hence for mining to be activated once again on this lode group. Locally, individual waste heaps were remodelled through the subsequent mining of bismuth, cobalt, nickel and uranium ores as well as fluorspar.
The Wasserlochschacht (shaft), sunk between 1552 and 1568 to a depth of 110 m and since 1839 known as the Rudolph-Schacht (shaft) after the mining master Rudolph Hering, situated on the Bauer Morgengang lode, became since the 18th century the most important main shaft of the area. The waste heap of the Rudolph shaft differs from other waste heaps with respect to its considerable size. From the 19th century onwards the Rudolph shaft had developed into the centralized shaft installation of the Vater Abraham mine. With the end of silver mining at Lauta in 1904 the shaft was closed. Between 1947 and 1954 the shaft was reopened as survey shaft for uranium ore by the SAG Wismut. A working horse gin was reconstructed in 2005/06, modelled after the original from 1838/39. The walling of the shaft is preserved in its original form.
