JÁCHYMOV – gateway to the Ore Mountains

A commemorative plaque at the Church of the Saviour honours Johannes Mathesius, the Lutheran preacher and close associate of Martin Luther. The plaque was installed in 1965 to mark the 400th anniversary of his death and was donated by his native town of Rochlitz.

A commemorative plaque dedicated to the Lutheran preacher and chronicler Johannes Mathesius is mounted on the façade of the Jáchymov Town Hall. The plaque, dating from 1874, recalls his work in the town during the sixteenth century and forms part of the city’s historical memory.

The memorial to Georgius Agricola commemorates the renowned physician, humanist and founder of modern mineralogy who worked in Jáchymov between 1527 and 1531. The original plaque was stolen and has been replaced by a scarcely legible plastic substitute.

The memorial to Count Stephan Schlick, founder of the town, was erected in 1924 on the initiative of the municipal council. The monument experienced a dramatic fate – the original plaque was saved during the war, reinstalled in 1993 and stolen in 2006. Today, the monument bears only a poorly executed plastic plaque that does not correspond to the original.

Near the Church of All Saints in Jáchymov stands a memorial commemorating the victims of Nazi occupation and those who died during a death march in 1945. The site is located where the former miners’ hospital once stood.

The visits of the first President of the Czechoslovak Republic, Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, left a significant mark on Jáchymov. In addition to a commemorative plaque at the Radium Palace, a larger-than-life monument was unveiled in 1930, later dismantled and destroyed after the annexation of the border region by Nazi Germany.

At the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, a monumental memorial stood in Jáchymov commemorating the local men who fell in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866. The work of sculptor Karl Wilfert the Elder was removed in 1924 as a symbol of the former Austro-Hungarian monarchy.

In the municipal cemetery of Jáchymov there is a common grave of victims of the Second World War – Soviet prisoners of war, a Polish soldier and a man from a death march. Located directly among other graves, the site reflects post-war commemorative practices and later historical changes.

The “New History” Monument symbolises the transformation of Jáchymov after the Second World War. It commemorates the period when the town became a Czech town after 1945.

A symbolic grave commemorates political prisoners who were tortured to death or died during forced labour in the uranium mines of Jáchymov. It is located in the newer section of the municipal cemetery.