Although the use of cast iron in our territory dates back to the 15th century, ironworking in the Blana region has a much older tradition dating back to the middle of the 1st millennium BC. BC. Perhaps the most famous evidence of ancient ironworking in the Blansko region is the famous discovery of Jindřich Wankel, a doctor of the Salm ironworks and amateur archaeologist, in the Bull Rock cave, where he uncovered an ironworking workshop in addition to a so-called Hallstatt burial. The continuity of iron processing in the Blansko region, which is rich in ore and wood resources, is also documented in the early Middle Ages. Especially the period of the Great Moravian Empire is connected with the further development of the iron industry, as evidenced by the findings in the vicinity of the villages of Olomučany and Rudice. Water resources also enabled the establishment of ironworking mills. One of the most famous, the foundation of later ironworks, was located in Adamov. In Blansko itself, the supposed establishment of the ironworks dates back to around 1698, when the then owner of Blansko, Count Arnošt Leopold Ferdinand of Gellhorn, established a smelting plant with an iron hammer on the Punkva River. The Gellhorns drew on their experience from their own ironworks in Silesia, where they came from. Their enterprise, which included a blast furnace, operated for seven decades with varying success. In the second half of the 18th century, however, the last of the Gellhorns of Blansko had to sell their estate to the owners of the neighbouring estate of Rájek, the Salms, due to considerable debts. The rapid development of the iron industry in Blansko is mainly connected with the Salm-Reifferscheidt family. In 1766, Karel Josef Salm-Reifferscheidt bought the Blansko estate for 100,694 guilders and merged it with the Rájec estate. After the merger of the two estates, the Salms had two blast furnaces and became one of the leading representatives of the iron industry in Moravia, although most of their production was used to meet the needs of their own estate. The iron industry on the Rájecko-Blansko estate developed and improved considerably after 1807, when the old count Hugo František Salm-Reifferscheidt took over the management of the company. This remarkable nobleman had a wide range of scientific and social fields of study and gained a great deal of experience, e.g. in the production of iron, during his travels in Europe. As one of the leading iron experts, he applied his experience in his own company, which he gradually transformed into a modern industrial production facility. One of the impetuses for these major changes in the Blanken ironworks was the granting of the c. k. factory privilege (in 1810), which outlined the production profile of the Salm Ironworks, which at that time produced the widest range of utilitarian cast iron products, ranging from water pipes to kitchen utensils to house gates and various types of grilles. In 1811, Salm was granted an eight-year exclusive right to produce cast iron standpipes. However, the ironworks were not limited to utilitarian goods. The period after the end of the Napoleonic Wars became a time when, in addition to "ordinary cast iron", artistic cast iron also appeared in the offer of Blansko Ironworks. The technical prerequisites for it were created in 1812, when a new cupola was opened, which made it possible to cast non-commercial objects separately from the regular production. However, it was not until after the end of the wars that plagued the European continent for more than twenty years at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, in the form of the Revolutionary and then Napoleonic Wars, that the casting of art objects became more widespread. An important impulse for the development of the Blansko ironworks and casting was the work of the famous German chemist Karl Ludwig Reichenbach, among others the discoverer of paraffin or crystalline, who became the director of the Blansko ironworks in 1823. Under his leadership, the production of cast iron goods developed greatly, and in addition to utilitarian cast iron, the casting of artistic cast iron began, especially large statues based on ancient, biblical or Germanic mythology. Several new furnaces were built during his era and this trend continued after Reichenbach's departure from Blansko. The most famous of the newly built furnaces was the coke oven from 1857 in Klamova hut, which was the fourth furnace in the Czech lands operating on mineral fuel. For the second half of the 19th century, we can say that Blansko artistic cast iron conquered practically the whole world. The cast iron products from the Blannen ironworks did not only appear in the Austrian Empire, but reached America, Russia, Singapore, Syria and Sudan, and were often compared to English cast iron in terms of quality. Towards the end of the 19th century, however, the Salm Ironworks gradually began to decline and the production of art cast iron was reduced. Therefore, in 1896, Prince Hugo Leopold František Salm-Reifferscheidt sold the Blansko ironworks to Breitfeld-Daněk a. s. With the new owners, the Blansko ironworks underwent a major restructuring, but artistic casting, which was infiltrated by the new artistic element of Art Nouveau, was the only one in the Czech lands to develop further. The First World War, however, was a major blow to artistic casting. Foundry production had to be subordinated to the military machine, and it was only after the end of the war that artistic cast iron found its place. In 1927, the company was taken over by Českomoravská Kolben-Daněk a. s. in Prague and, apart from mechanical production, its production profile was oriented more towards commercial and building cast iron. The final decline of artistic casting in Blansko occurred during and after the Second World War. After the liberation, the whole enterprise was nationalised, producing mainly industrial cast iron and artistic creation was limited to apprenticeship workshops. In the early 1960s, however, interest in artistic cast iron increased, among other things because of the Art Nouveau elements that came back into fashion. Blanenské železárny also had to take care of the reconstruction of historical buildings with cast iron decoration, such as the National Theatre in Prague or the spa colonnade in Mariánské Lázně. Even after the revolution in 1989, the production of artistic cast iron in Blanenské železárny did not cease, but it is mainly the reconstruction of older artistic cast iron works, not only in the Czech Republic, but also abroad. Old Count Hugo František Salm began to fulfil his "English dream" at the end of 1806, when he took over the administration of the Rájec estate and the Blansko ironworks from his father. In 1807, Zacharias Winzler was the first in all of Europe to build a charcoal kiln in Blansko and in 1811 Ignatz Veith von Pantz began to build the Mariánská hut with a cupola, the first in the Czech lands. However, the smelting of fine grey cast iron was only sufficient for the casting of crosses, tomb steles, decorative grilles and vases, but not for the production of the larger quantities of grey cast iron needed for the casting of statues. Nevertheless, in 1814 Salm bought the first model of the ancient statue of Illioneus from the Viennese anatomist Joseph Barth, and by 1817 he had bought further plaster models from the Viennese banker Fries and from the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Under Barth's direction, the Viennese sculptor Johann Martin Fischer modified them according to their anatomical proportions. On 3 June 1817, the Old Count donated these first models to the newly established Francis Museum, later the Moravian Museum. The Old Count Hugo Franz Salm participated in its creation together with the Viennese historian and politician Josef von Hormayer. On the recommendation of Josef Prechtl, director of the Polytechnic Institute in Vienna, Old Count Hugo Franz Salm hired Karl Reichenbach, an outstanding Württemberg chemist and metallurgical expert, as metallurgical engineer of the Blannen Ironworks in September 1821. With his arrival, the time approached when the Old Master could fulfil his long-standing wish to cast ancient statues. Immediately after his arrival, Reichenbach set about building a second charcoal furnace and the general rebuilding of the Mariánské Hut. Did you see the red glow in the sky last night?, it seemed as if the Jedovnice was on fire again, but no, it was the first flame that burst out of the Mariánské hut in the Arnost Valley, he wrote to the old Count. In the spring of 1823, they both gained the hope of participating in the plan for the perimeter of Vienna, designed by the imperial architect Pietro Nobile. The latter kept his promise and the following year, 1824, the Blannen Ironworks decorated Nobile's Castle Gate with a monumental statue of Victory, cast after a model by Johann Nepomuk Schaller. And then the long-delayed monumental antiques and "iron houses" began to be cast with great success. In May 1829, he wrote to Old Count Reichenbach: The architect Förster, a most talented architect, was with me today and wishes to cast architectural ornaments for houses. Förster introduced the pioneering method of prefabricated parts of products, assembled into units according to the individual wishes of the customer, into the foundry production in Blansko. The gold prizes at the industrial exhibitions in Vienna and Prague were mainly won by antique sculptures. When the antiquary was about to receive the gold medal at the Vienna exhibition in 1834, he asked Reichenbach: How should I dress for the glory, should I wear a black suit like a factory worker, or should I go as a nobleman in the uniform of a chamberlain? Together, the old count Hugo Franz Salm and the engineer Karl Reichenbach built up the Blanken company into an Austrian iron empire with markets in Turkey, Asia and America. English scholars consider the Old Count Hugo Franz Salm to be the most significant figure of the Austrian Industrial Revolution. Obsah Front page Images from Moravian Switzerland Museum of Blansko Region Moravian Karst Cave divers Henry Wankel Czechoslovak Lion History of the chateau Hugo Franz Old Count Salm Olomučany pottery Archeology Treasure of silver coins The Mystery of "Býčí Skálal" Cave Princess of "Býčí Skála" Cave Funeral carriage Blansko artistic cast iron Blansko Art Cast Iron Karl Ludwig von Reichenbach