Galería de Minerales FMF

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1885 – TERRANERA MINE SITE

This beautifully rendered 1885 map of the Terranera mine is a captivating window into a lost world, a masterpiece of 19th century cartography that documents the site just before its radical transformation. More than a mere survey, it is a historical chronicle etched in ink, detailing the general layout of the mine in its infancy. The most haunting feature is its depiction of a coastline that no longer exists, a ghost of a forgotten shoreline since devoured by industrial ambition. What was once part of the Tyrrhenian coast is now a vast, brackish lake occupying the void of an immense open-cut quarry, with the prominent rock outcrop visible in modern photographs still firmly connected to the mainland.

The map meticulously illustrates the embryonic stages of the operation: the first tentative terraces carved into the hillsides and the initial rudimentary open cuts. These features, though significant for their time, appear almost delicate compared to the gargantuan amphitheater that would dominate the landscape in the 20th century. This map is therefore an invaluable testament, capturing the precise moment before the mine’s expansion began to irrevocably reshape the very geography of the island, making it a poignant and beautiful record of a landscape on the precipice of profound change. (Author: silvia)