The Bundenbach Fossil Museum showcases Bundenbach fossils of world renown. Right next to the historic show mine of the Herrenberg slate quarry, geologically interested visitors will find the treasure chamber of the Hunsrück slate. The Bundenbach collection displays the entire diversity of the Hunsrück slate fauna from around 400 million years ago in the geological period of the Lower Devonian – including crabs, trilobites, brittle stars, sea lilies, and armored fish. The fossil museum also presents the results of the international research project 'Nahecaris'. The project, named after the typical fossil of the Hunsrück slate, the leaf crab from the Nahe, aimed to decode the Devonian marine life in the Bundenbach slate. A spectacular fossil find was made known in the spring of 2009: Bonn researchers discovered an arthropod that belongs to the family of Anomalocaridids ('unusual shrimp'). The newly discovered fossil was named Schinderhannes bartelsi and is in the possession of the Natural History Museum in Mainz.
Formation of Fossils in the Hunsrück Slate
408 million years ago, where today the Hunsrück stretches between the Rhine, Saar, Moselle, and Nahe, was the southern part of the Devon Sea. Under the unimaginably high pressure of both the overburden and the tectonic plates during the retreat of the sea, the seabed and the dead animals trapped within it were compressed into slate layers in the absence of any oxygen. The animals fossilized, were transformed into pyrite ('fool's gold'), and have been preserved for us in complete integrity and fascinating diversity.
Discovery, Research, and Exhibition of Fossils in the Bundenbach Hunsrück Slate About 500 years ago, the slate began to be mined above and below ground for use as wall stones and roof tiles. Slate mining and trade developed into a significant source of income in the southern Middle Hunsrück. About 100 years ago, the fossilized organisms trapped in the slate were not discovered for the first time but were first noted and admired. Paleontologists from all over the world gathered in Bundenbach, conducted intensive research, published their findings, and thus established Bundenbach's scientific-paleontological reputation worldwide.
Meanwhile, Bundenbach fossils are represented in museums, exhibitions, and universities all over the world.
