Rosia Montana is the oldest documented mining settlement in Romania (about 1,870 years old). To date, Rosia Montana is threatened to be destroyed by Gabriel Resource's mining project proposal. Nevertheless, the Save Rosia Montana Campaign manages to win the day-by-day fight for the salvation of the region with the support and solidarity of people from all over the world. 

Moreover, the Alburnus Maior Association initiated a series of alternative development projects for the area. They include the hay festival - FânFest - which is the largest and most important environmental event in the country and The Golden Way a greenways initiative which invites visitors to discover Rosia Montana, the neighbouring village of Bucium, and the story of gold.

The history of Rosia Montana

Wax tablets discovered in the galleries of Rosia Montana represent one of the sources of the Roman Law and the “birth certificate of the Roman nation”, as Ion Baltariu testifies in his work “Tripticele din Transilvania.” Tablet no. XVlll, dated February 6, 131 AD, contains the first mention of the name Alburnus Maior – the place where the Dacians and later the Romans extracted gold. These historic tablets are now held in museums all around Europe.

The riches of the Apuseni Mountains was another reason for the Roman emperor, Traian, to conquer Dacia (106 AD). The age of the Dacian-Roman mining works from Rosia Montana were confirmed by a C14 analysis made by the mining museum in Bochus, Germany. The first mines from Europe existed here, even from the times when Rome, the eternal city, was not built.

The village of Rosia Montana contains hundreds of households, a historical centre with beautiful architecture, various administrative and social-cultural buildings, memorial houses, a mining museum with a unique collection of ancient artifacts, an archaeological reservation and many geological wonders and the incredible deep roots of our history.

Archaeological Discoveries

The ancient mausoleum
This double circular grave monument was discovered in the Hop – Gauri area of Rosia Montana and dates back to Roman Dacia times. It represents the only one of its kind in Romania to be discovered so well preserved. Due to pressure from the international archeological community and the citizens of Rosia Montana, the mausoleam was preserved on-site through a special program. It remains unclear how successful this program will be, considering the mausoleum is located between a sterile dump and an open pit which would leave it exposed to explosions from the mining project.

The hydraulic wheel
Discovered at the start of the 20th century in the Păru-Carpeni area of Rosia Montana, the hydraulic wheel is the first of this kind to be found after similar discoveries in antique mining sites from Spain and Portugal. The hydraulic wheel from Păru Carpeni was used to drain water from the subterranean antique galleries. More

The Roman Galleries
You may also visit Roman galleries. Their entrances can be easily identified due to their trapezoid shapes – a mining technique that was practised during the Roman and pre-Roman age. Also available to view are other historical monuments, ancient mining equipment like “cradles,” which used water to separate gold from the rocks. The “cradles” functioned with the help of water supplies taken from artificial lakes (called “tauri”) built a long time ago. More