The Piesau is a right

tributary A tributary, or affluent, is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem (or parent) river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage ...

of the river

Lichte 220px, Wallendorfer Porcelain Manufacture, Oct. 2006 220px, Leibis-Lichte Dam, 102.5 m high Lichte is a village and a former municipality in the district of Sonneberg in Thuringia, Germany, close to the Thuringian Rennsteig. Formerly in th ...

Thuringia Thuringia (; german: Thüringen ), officially the Free State of Thuringia ( ), is a state of central Germany, covering , the sixth smallest of the sixteen German states. It has a population of about 2.1 million. Erfurt is the capital and larg ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. It is approximately long. The name is derived from the municipality of

Piesau Piesau is a village and a former municipality in the district of Sonneberg in Thuringia, Germany, close to the Thuringian Rennsteig. Formerly in the district Saalfeld-Rudolstadt, it is part of the town Neuhaus am Rennweg since January 2019. It ...

Sources

The Piesau has its source close to the

Rennsteig The () is a ridge walk as well as an historical boundary path in the Thuringian Forest, Thuringian Highland and Franconian Forest in Central Germany. The long-distance trail runs for about from and the valley in the northwest to and the r ...

south of the municipality of Piesau in the

Thuringian Highland The Thuringian Highland, Thuringian Highlands or Thuringian-Vogtlandian Slate MountainsKohl, Horst; Marcinek, Joachim and Nitz, Bernhard (1986). ''Geography of the German Democratic Republic'', VEB Hermann Haack, Gotha, p. 7 ff. . (german: Thüring ...

Course

The Piesau rises as the ''Piesau Kieselbach'' and flows through the

Thuringian Forest Nature Park Thuringian Forest Nature Park (german: Naturpark Thüringer Wald) is one of two nature parks in the state of Thuringia, Germany. Founded in 1990, and expanded in 2018, the nature park now covers and area of more than . It extends around the Rennst ...

, first from the Rennsteig, to the municipality of Piesau. Then it merges with the ''Bärenbach'', becoming the ''Piesau River'', and flows north to the district Bock-und-Teich of the municipality of

, the so-called ''Piesauknie''. The Piesau then flows alongside the street ''Saalfelder Strasse'' in parallel to B 281. In Wallendorf, close to the Lichte East railway station, it flows under the rail viaduct over the ''Piesau Valley''. In the centre of Lichte (in the Wallendorf district) the Piesau joins the

Name

According to old written traditions, the original name of the river was ''Schmiedebach''. This referred to the lower reaches, in the area of Bock-und-Teich of the municipality of Lichte. The present-day name of the river appears only after the foundation of the municipality of Piesau in 1627, derived from the name of the founder, ''Pisa''.

Tributaries

Tributaries of the Piesau river are from the left the Kupfertalbach and from the right the Bärenbach, the Kulmbach, and the Taubenbach.

Particularity

The Piesau and Lichte have unusually steep and deep gorges, the difference between hilltops and valley bottoms often exceeding 100 m. The Piesau and Lichte and their tributaries in the surrounding valleys have been known for centuries for deposits of placer gold and are considered the most significant sources of gold in Germany. Recreational

placer mine Placer mining () is the mining of stream bed (alluvial) deposits for minerals. This may be done by open-pit (also called open-cast mining) or by various surface excavating equipment or tunneling equipment. Placer mining is frequently used for p ...

rs continue to find occasional gold nuggets.Rich. Christian Kreibich
Goldwäscherei

References