Caves Discovered by Mining Activities and Mined Caves

Abstract

Evidences show humans must have entered caves in Romania prior to 65,000 years ago. Their interest in mining activities came, however, much later, with the first documented signs predating the arrival of Romans in Dacia (present-day Romania), in the second century BC. Although writings about minerals in Romanian caves date back to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the first scientific texts on minerals found in caves discovered during mining and quarrying activities only appeared after 1850s. From a mineralogical point of view, two distinct categories are recognizable: (1) caves displaying speleothems of ordinary carbonate mineralogy and (2) caves with unusual mineral paragenesis. The latter group could further be subdivided into: (i) cavities located near or within nonmetalliferous or polymetallic ore fields, (ii) skarn-hosted caves, and (iii) caves in which H2S-rich thermo-mineral waters discharge. The study of these caves resulted in the discovery of minerals, either new for science (ardealite) or to the cave environment (anhydrite, burbankite, foggite, ikaite, konyaite, etc.). However, the scientific relevance of those caves discovered in mines and quarries, along with the mined caves, is not restricted to mineralogy but also encompasses anthropology, archeology, Quaternary geology, biospeleology, karst science (speleothems, speleogenesis, etc.), and tourism.