Banská Štiavnica — Maximilián šachta Banská Štiavnica · Banskobystrický kraj · Slovakia

The site of Maximilián šachta was formally selected on 14 May 1612. At that stage its intended purpose was to serve as a ventilation shaft for the štôlňa Matej, which had already in 1608 intersected the Ján and Gräfi ore veins and in subsequent years extended a crosscut towards the Špitaler vein, for which the Maximilián shaft was a necessary auxiliary structure. The level of štôlňa Matej in the vicinity of the shaft was recorded on some mine maps as the first working level.

In the following decades the shaft was deepened as mining advanced. By 1771 only six metres separated the shaft bottom from the dedičná štôlňa cisára Františka, and the shaft was extended to intersect that drainage adit. The shaft expanded its productive scope over time, with the Ján, Gräfi, Špitaler, Bieber, Terézia, and Wolf veins all accessible from it at various periods.

For vertical transport the shaft was originally served by a horse whim (konský gápeľ). In 1837 a water-column hoisting machine was installed at the level of the Svätotrojičná dedičná štôlňa; this machine remained in service until 1926. By 1865 the shaft had reached a depth of 352 metres, and by 1885 it had been connected to the twelfth working level — then the deepest in the entire Banská Štiavnica ore field, coinciding with the level of the Voznická dedičná štôlňa. The final recorded depth of the shaft was 427.1 metres.

In the early twentieth century the shaft was maintained but operated only minimally. In 1917–1918 work began on an underground hydroelectric plant to be situated at the twelfth level. Power water was to be drawn from the Windšachta, both Richňava, and Bakomi reservoirs. A Pelton turbine was ordered from the Ganz company in Budapest with a capacity of 100 litres per second, a water head of 419 metres, and an output of 430 horsepower. The space for the powerhouse was excavated underground at the twelfth level, a new surface shaft building with a headframe was erected, and a concrete water channel was laid. In 1919, however, a revised engineering assessment found that the available water supply would be sufficient to power the turbine for only 81 days per year. Further construction was halted and the hydroelectric project was abandoned. Operations at the shaft contracted as a result.

In 1933 the shaft was brought back into full production. New lining was installed from the surface down to the fifth level — the level of the dedičná štôlňa cisára Františka — and an electric hoisting engine transferred from the Ferdinand shaft at Kremnica was commissioned. After the Second World War, Maximilián šachta became one of the main production sections of the Rudné bane enterprise at Banská Štiavnica. Mining concentrated on the Bieber and Terézia vein structures, and ore from the shaft was transported overland to the flotation processing plant at František šachta. A remnant (torzo) of the headframe built during the 1917–1918 works survives at the surface. The complex of mine buildings is noted in the management plan of the UNESCO World Heritage property "Historic Town of Banská Štiavnica and the Technical Monuments in its Vicinity", inscribed in December 1993.