The mining industry leaves behind a large number of tangible or intangible remains. A part of them can be used by different actors as a mining heritage. Specific cultural or social values and meanings, which remind of the importance of mining in the past and today, are represented through this mining heritage. To preserve them, the heritage must be passed to future generations. One of the ways is mining tourism. However, the relation between the mining heritage and tourism is not simple as the complex mining heritage has many specific features that differ from the traditional tourist attractions and conceal many pitfalls. The aspects of authenticity or approaches to heritage interpretation are also important.

Mining heritage refers to a complex of both tangible and intangible features and values whose formation was associated with the development of mining activities in the given region. After mining activities are completed, original industrial and related subsidiary structures either fall into dereliction or are subject to conversion. One of frequent modes of transformation of objects is their presentation as heritage and utilization for the needs of tourism. The way of its interpretation and presentation to the public plays a very important role in mining heritage preservation, since it may be attributed not only historical and architectural values, but may also reflect political or ideological background of the period in which it was formed. The paper discusses the definition of mining heritage and the questions concerning its origin, recognition, protection, management and interpretation in the case of the Jáchymovsko area, part of the cross-border mountainous region in Czech-German borderland which is being proposed to be included into the UNESCO heritage list. The Jáchymovsko area is distinguished by the fact that it combines a 500-year-old history of mineral extraction and therefore local mining heritage is very diverse. Thus, different types of local mining heritage and its conversion for other purposes (e.g., tourism) are analysed, ways of local mining heritage identification, management and interpretation are discussed.

Historical cultural landscapes represent numerous values and meanings that are important for today’s society. These cultural landscapes document the specific development of local communities and may reflect their approaches or attitudes toward the environment. Man-made landscape elements are created for special purposes and represent specific values (historical, cultural, environmental, economic, etc.). The analysis of these landscape elements allows us to find out for what purposes the society decided to use the landscape, respectively what functions the landscape performs and what historical or cultural values it represents. The following text presents a typology of historical cultural landscapes based on a cluster analysis of cultural landscape features. Using this method, a typology of landscapes is created that reflects the functional use and values of landscapes based on the analysis of cultural-historical elements and differentiates the rates and methods of land use by human beings. The output of the cluster analysis is visualized in a dendrogram, based on which seven basic landscape categories were defined and described.

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The article deals with the perception and methods of management of the mining heritage and mining the landscapes from the perspective of individual stakeholders, entities and interest groups. The first part deals with the conceptualization of heritage in general, discussing various ways of defining and looking at heritage; later, the general discussion focuses on a specific group of heritage, which is the mining heritage. The following is an introduction to the area of interest of the Jáchymov region (part of the Ore Mountains, i.e., an area characterized by a long mining history and a number of mining monuments). It is important, mainly, because it is part of the world heritage; the Mining Cultural Landscape of the Krušnohoří/Erzgebirge was added to the UNESCO list in 2019. The second part of the article is devoted to field research in the Jáchymov region. The aim of the research was to find out how the mining heritage in the Jáchymov region is treated, and how and for what purposes it is used. Representatives of the public, private and non-profit sectors from the local, regional and national levels were involved in the research. Research is a comprehensive view of the process of heritage formation and management.