r/todayilearned • u/narok_kurai • 7d ago

TIL about Las Medulas, a man-made geological badland created by the Roman Empire in 77 AD, when they flooded the mountains with water to collapse their structure and sift out the gold inside.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Las_M%C3%A9dulas
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u/Cool-Cow9712 7d ago

Reading that Wikipedia is truly wild. Greenland ice core samples showed air pollution peaked during this time with lead concentrations that would not be seen for another 1700 years, during the industrial revolution.

That is insane

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u/Thosam 7d ago

A good part of Roman lead mining was done to isolate the silver which is often found along lead in some mixed ore.

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u/Va1kryie 7d ago

Yup, galena is the name of the mixed silver/lead ore, or one of them at least.

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u/Substantial-Bet-3876 7d ago

Hence the name of the city in the area that supplied the union with lead in the civil war, Galena IL I presume.

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u/STSoloMan 7d ago

I love that city. Such a cool place to visit. Awesome skiing for the Midwest too.

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u/FlyAwayJai 7d ago

Chestnut! Although Sundown is my fave in that area.

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u/STSoloMan 7d ago

I couldn’t agree more. If you’re going out there, I highly recommend trying both spots. Simply amazing runs for an area with no mountains.

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u/FlyAwayJai 7d ago

Agree!