Wieliczka and Bochnia Royal Salt Mines

Salt made kings rich here for 700 years. Mined continuously from the 13th century into the 20th, the royal Wieliczka and Bochnia mines are Europe's oldest enterprise of their type, their hundreds of kilometres of galleries transformed by miners into underground chapels, statues and artworks carved from the salt itself, administered from the medieval Saltworks Castle. UNESCO inscribed the mines in 1978, in the List's inaugural cohort.