Von den "Naturalia" zum "Theatrum Machinarum" : Barocke Handsteine aus den mittelslowakischen Bergbaustädten

In an attempt to identify and characterize works of art with mining motifs created in Central Slovak mining towns, it is evident that individual artifacts in domestic and foreign collections do not usually have a common connection and have been interpreted in older literature only as solitary pieces based on the iconographic relation to so-called "mining motifs". These works historically created a characteristic visual mark of the region or of mining regions in general. If we are attempting to document works of art that refer in their form or subject to mining activity, there is nothing more representative than an exemplary artifact appropriated by Early-Modern "Kunstkammer" (Cabinets of Curiosities) called the "handstein". In both its German and Latin form (lapis manualis), the etymology of this name literally refers to selected pieces of ore the size of a human hand, that were valued for their rarity or quality in terms of the actual composition of the specimen or simply from a visual perspective alone. Source documents already in the 16th century give proof of the intentional search for handsteins or "stuffen", as these samples of ore were called in Central Slovak mining towns at the time. From the end of the 17th century, they served as the basis for creating larger objects that were further modified into a more fashionable form of "tafelaufsatz" or "milieu de la table".