Špania Dolina is a peculiar mining village in the mountains northwards from the city of Banská Bystrica, between the Low Tatras and the Great Fatra mountains. Findings from Late Stone Age (eneolit) and the Bronze Age demonstrate surface mining of copper in this village. It was famous almost in the whole Europe especially due to its large deposit of copper.
The first written reference of the village is from the year 1263. After the deposits in Staré Hory were emptied, it became a centre of the mining industry in the region of Banská Bystrica in the 16. century. After the local mines were closed in 1888, the local population started to work as woodcutters and workers in local ironworks. Women produced bobbin laces, which became very popular within Slovakia.
Large village houses with shingle roofs irregularly built mainly on steep slopes remind us the mining history of this area.
In the village there were preserved: originally a renaissance knocking board from the 16. century (used for calling miners to work), a late-renaissance building of a presbytery from the first half of the 17. century, a gothic chapel from the end of the 15. century and a Roman-Catholic church, which arose as a reconstruction of an older, probably a roman church in the year 1593. Close to the village you can find a technical historical monument - original water duct of Špania dolina.
