Rote Grube mine (Red pit)

The area of the former Rote Grube Mine represents the largest early modern system of opencast mines and shaft depressions in the Ore Mountains and probably the largest one of its kind in the world. It is a unique example of extracting tin ore from wide greisen zones which were first mined by means of several shallow shafts and subsequently by open- cast mining in the 16th and early 17th centuries. The main, elliptically elongated depression is 230 m long, around 30 m wide and over 20 m deep. To this depression, another one is linked that is approximately 120 m long. Near the main depression, a number of smaller, though in the context of the Ore Mountains still huge depressions and open cuts from the 16th to the 18th centuries are preserved such as the Wildbahn opencast mine.