The Valleys of Tirol: Their traditions and customs and how to visit them

Hier half kein Sprung,Kein Adler-SchwungDenn unter ihm senkt sich die MartinswandDer steilste Fels im ganzen Land.Er starrt hinabIn ’s WolkengrabUnd starrt hinaus in ’s WolkenmeerUnd schaut zurück, und schaut umher.Wo das Donnergebrüll zu Füssen ihm grolltWo das Menschengewühl tief unter ihm rollt:Da steht des Kaisers MajestätDoch nicht zur Wonne hoch erhöht.Ein JammersohnAuf luft ’gem ThronFindet sich Max nun plötzlich alleinUnd fühlt sich schaudernd, verlassen und klein.175

But the singers of the high deeds of Kaiser Max could not bring themselves to believe that so signal a danger could have befallen their hero by mere accident. They must discover for it an origin to connect it with his political importance. Accordingly they have said that the minions of Sigismund der Münzreiche, dispossessed at his abdication, had plotted to lead Max, the strong redresser of wrongs, the last flower of chivalry, the hope of the Hapsburg House, the mainstay of his century, into destruction; that it was not that the innocent chamois led the Kaiser astray, but that the conspirators misled him as to the direction it had taken.

Certainly, when one thinks of the situation of the empire at that moment, and of Hungary, the borderland against the Turks, suddenly deprived of its great King Matthias Corvinus, even while yet at war with them, only four days before176; when we think that the writers of the ballad had before their eyes the great amount of good Maximilian really did effect not only for Tirol, but for the empire and for Europe, and then contemplated the idea of his career being cut short thus almost at the outset, we can understand that they deemed it more consonant with the circumstances to believe so great a peril was incurred as a consequence of his devotion to duty rather than in the pursuit of pleasure.

Here, then, he hung; a less fearless hunter might have been overawed by the prospect or exhausted by the strain. Not so Kaiser Max. He not only held on steadfastly by the hour, but was able to look round him so calmly that he at last discerned behind him a cleft in the rock, or little cave, affording a footing less precarious than that on which he rested. The ballad may be thought to say that it opened itself to receive him. The rest of the hunting party, even those who had nerve to follow him to the edge of the crag, could not see what had become of him. Below, there was no one to think of looking up; and if there had been, even an emperor could hardly have been discerned at a height of something like a thousand feet. The horns of the huntsmen, and the messengers sent in every direction to ask counsel of the most experienced climbers, within a few hours crowded the banks on both sides with the loyal and enthusiastic people; till at last the wail of his faithful subjects, which could be heard a mile off, sent comfort into the heart of the Kaiser, who stood silent and stedfast, relying on God and his people. Meantime, the sun had reached the meridian; the burning rays poured down on the captive, and gradually as the hours went by the rocks around him grew glowing hot like an oven. Exhausted by the long fast, no less than the anxiety of his position, and the sharp run that had preceded the accident, he began to feel his strength ebbing away. One desire stirred him – to know whether any help was possible before the insensibility, which he felt must supervene, overcame him. Then he bethought him of writing on a strip of parchment he had about him, to describe his situation, and to ask if there was any means of rescue. He tied the scroll to a stone with the cord of his hunting-horn, and threw it down into the depth. But no sound came in answer.

In the meantime all were straining to find a way of escape. Even the old Archduke Sigismund who, though he is never accused of any knowledge of the alleged plot of his courtiers, yet may well be supposed to have entertained no very good feeling towards Maximilian, now forgot all ill-will, and despatched swift messengers to Schwatz to summon the cleverest Knappen to come with their gear and see if they could not devise a means for reaching him with a rope; others ran from village to village, calling on all for aid and counsel. Some rang the storm-bells, and some lighted alarm fires; while many more poured into the churches and sanctuaries to pray for help from on High; and pious brotherhoods, thousands in number, marching with their holy emblems veiled in mourning, and singing dirges as they came, gathered round the base of the Martinswand.

The Kaiser from his giddy height could make out something of what was going on, but as no answer came, a second and a third time he wrote, asking the same words. And when still no answer came – I am following Collin’s imaginative ballad – his heart sank down within him and he said, ‘If there were any hope, most surely my people would have sent a shout up to me. So there is no doubt but that I must die here.’ Then he turned his heart to God, and tried to forget everything of this earth, and think only of that which is eternal. But now the sun sank low towards the horizon. While light yet remained, once more he took his tablet and wrote; he had no cord left to attach it to the stone, so he bound it with his gold chain – of what use were earthly ornaments any more to him? – ‘and threw it down,’ as the ballad forcibly says, ‘into the living world, out of that grave high placed in air.’

One in the crowd caught it, and the people wept aloud as he read out to them what the Kaiser had traced with failing hand. He thanked Tirol for its loyal interest in his fate; he acknowledged humbly that his suffering was a penance sent him worthily by heaven for the pride and haughtiness with which he had pursued the chase, thinking nothing too difficult for him. Now he was brought low. He offered his blood and his life in satisfaction. He saw there was no help to be hoped for his body; he trusted his soul to the mercy of God. But he besought them to send to Zirl, and beg the priest there to bring the Most Holy Sacrament and bless his last hour with Its Presence. When It arrived they were to announce it to him by firing off a gun, and another while the Benediction was imparted. Then he bid them all pray for steadfastness for him, while the pangs of hunger gnawed away his life.

The priest of Zirl hastened to obey the summons, and the Kaiser’s injunctions were punctually obeyed. Meantime, the miners of Schwatz were busy arranging their plan of operations – no easy matter, for they stood fifteen hundred feet above the Emperor’s ledge. But before they were ready for the forlorn attempt, another deliverer appeared upon the scene with a strong arm, supported the almost lifeless form of the Emperor – for he had now been fifty-two hours in this sad plight – and bore him triumphantly up the pathless height. There he restored him to the people, who, frantic with joy, let him pass through their midst without observing his appearance. Who was this deliverer? The traditions of the time say he was an angel, sent in answer to the Kaiser’s penitential trust in God and the prayers of the people. Later narrators say – some, that he was a bold huntsman; others, a reckless outlaw to whom the track was known, and these tell you there is a record of a pension being paid annually in reward for the service, if not to him, at least to some one who claimed to have rendered it.177

The Monstrance, which bore the Blessed Sacrament from Zirl to carry comfort to the Emperor in his dire need, was laid up among the treasures of Ambras.

Maximilian, in thanksgiving for his deliverance, resolved to be less reckless in his future expeditions, and never failed to remember the anniversary. He also employed miners from Schwatz to cut a path down to the hole, afterwards called the Max-Höhle, which had sheltered him, to spare risk to his faithful subjects, who would make the perilous descent to return thanks on the spot for his recovery; and he set up there a crucifix, with figures of the Blessed Virgin and S. John on either side large enough to be seen from below; and even to the present day men used to dangerous climbing visit it with similar sentiments. It is not often the tourist is tempted to make the attempt, and they must be cool-headed who would venture it. The best view of it is to be got from the remains of the little hunting-seat and church which Maximilian afterwards built on the Martinsbühl, a green height opposite it, and itself no light ascent. It is said Maximilian sometimes shot the chamois out of the windows of this villa. The stories are endless of his hardihood and presence of mind in his alpine expeditions. At one time, threatened by the descent of a falling rock, he not only was alert enough to spring out of the way in time, but also seized a huntsman following him, who was not so fortunate, and saved him from being carried over the precipice. At another he saw a branch of a tree overhanging a yawning abyss; to try his presence of mind he swung himself on to it, and hung over the precipice; but crack! went the branch, and yet he saved himself by an agile spring on to another tree. Another time, when threatened by a falling rock, his presence of mind showed itself in remaining quite still close against the mountain wall, in the very line of its course, having measured with his eye that there was space enough for it to clear him. But enough for the present.

Zirl affords a good inn and a timely resting-place, either before returning to Innsbruck, or starting afresh to visit the Isarthal and Scharnitz. The ascent of the Gross Solstein is made from Zirl, as may also be that of the Martinswand. In itself Zirl has not much to arrest attention, except its picturesque situation (particularly that of its ‘Calvarienberg,’ to form which the living rocks are adapted), and its history, connecting it with the defence of the country against various attacks from Bavaria. Proceeding northwards along the road to Seefeld, and a little off it, you come upon Fragenstein, another of Maximilian’s hunting-seats, a strong fortress for some two hundred years before his time, and now a fine ruin. There are many strange tales of a great treasure buried here, and a green-clad huntsman, who appears from time to time, and challenges the peasants to come and help him dig it out, but something always occurs to prevent the successful issue of the adventure. Once a party of excavators got so far that they saw the metal vessel enclosing it; but then suddenly arose such a frightful storm, that none durst proceed with the work; and after that the clue to its place of concealment was lost. Continuing the somewhat steep ascent, Leiten is passed, and then Reit, with nothing to arrest notice; and then Seefeld, celebrated by the legend my old friend told me on the Freundsberg.178 The Archduke Ferdinand built a special chapel to the left of the parish church, called die Heilige Blutskapelle, in 1575, to contain the Host which had convicted Oswald Milser, and which is even now an object of frequent pilgrimage. The altar-piece was restored last year very faithfully, and with considerable artistic feeling, by Haselwandter, of Botzen. It is adorned with statues of the favourite heroes of the Tirolese legendary world, St. Sigismund and St. Oswald, and compartment bas-reliefs of subjects of Gospel history known as ‘the Mysteries of the Rosary.’ The tone of the old work has been so well caught, that it requires some close inspection to distinguish the original remains from the new additions. The Archduchess Eleonora provided the crystal reliquary and crown, and the rich curtains within which it is preserved. At a little distance to south-west of Seefeld, on a mountain-path leading to Telfs, is a little circular chapel, built by Leopold V. in 1628, over a crucifix which had long been honoured there. It is sometimes called the Kreuz-kapelle, but more often the zur-Seekapelle, though one of the two little lakes, whence the appellation, and the name of Seefeld too, was derived, dried out in 1807. There is also a legend of the site having been originally pointed out by a flight of birds similar to that I have given concerning S. Georgenberg.

The road then falls more gently than on the Zirl side, but is rugged and wild in its surroundings, to Scharnitz, near which you meet the blue-green gushing waters of the Isar. Scharnitz has borne the brunt of many a terrible contest in the character of outpost of Tirolean defences: it is known to have been a fortress in the time of the Romans. It was one of the points strengthened by Klaudia de’ Medici, who built the ‘Porta Klaudia’ to command the pass. Good service it did on more than one occasion; but it succumbed in the inroad of French and Bavarians combined, in 1805. It was garrisoned at that time by a small company of regular troops, under an English officer in the Austrian service named Swinburne, whose gallant resistance was cordially celebrated by the people. He was overwhelmed, however, by superior numbers and appliances, and at Marshal Ney’s orders the fort was so completely destroyed, that scarcely a trace of it is now to be found.179

It is the border town against Bavaria, and is consequently enlivened by a customs office and a few uniforms, but it is a poor place. I was surprised to be accosted and asked for alms by a decent-looking woman, whom I had seen kneeling in the church shortly before as this sort of thing is not common in Tirol. She told me the place had suffered sadly by the railway; for before, it was the post-station for all the traffic between Munich and Innsbruck and Italy. The industries of the place were not many or lucrative; the surrounding forests supply some employment to woodmen; and what she called Dirstenöhl, which seems to be dialectic for Steinöhl or petroleum, is obtained from the bituminous soil in the neighbourhood; it is obtained by a kind of distillation – a laborious process. The work lasted from S. Vitus’ Day to the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin; that was now past, and her husband, who was employed in it, had nothing to do; she had an old father to support, and a sick child. Then she went on to speak of the devotion she had just been reciting in the church to obtain help, and evidently looked upon her meeting with me as an answer to it. It seemed to consist in saying three times, a petition which I wrote down at her dictation as follows: – ‘Gott grüsse dich Maria! ich grüsse dich drei und dreizig Tausend Mal; O Maria ich grüsse dich wie der Erzengel Gabriel dich gregüsset hat. Es erfreuet dich in deinen Herzen dass der Erzengel Gabriel den himmlischen Gruss zu dir gebracht hat. Ave Maria, &c.’ She said she had never used that devotion and failed to obtain her request. I learnt that the origin she ascribed to it was this: – A poor girl, a cow-herd of Dorf, some miles over the Bavarian frontier, who was very devout to the Blessed Virgin, had been in the habit while tending her herds of saying the rosary three times every day in a little Madonna chapel near her grazing-ground. But one summer there came a great heat, which burnt up all the grass, and the cattle wandered hither and thither seeking their scanty food, so that it was all she could do to run after and keep watch over them. The good girl was now much distressed in mind; for the tenour of her life had been so even before, that when she made her vow to say the three rosaries, it had never occurred to her such a contingency might happen. But she knew also that neither must she neglect her supervision of the cattle committed to her charge. While praying then to Heaven for light to direct her in this difficulty, the simple girl thought she saw a vision of our Lady, bidding her be of good heart, and she would teach her a prayer to say instead, which would not take as long as the rosary, and would please her as well, and that she should teach it also to others who might be overwhelmed with work like herself. This was the petition I have quoted above. But the maid was too humble to speak of having received so great a favour, and lived and died without saying anything about it. When she came to die, however, her soul could find no rest, for her commission was unfulfilled; and whenever anyone passed alone by the wayside chapel where she had been wont to pray, he was sure to see her kneeling there. At last a pious neighbour, who knew how good she had been, summoned courage to ask her how it was that she was dealt with thus. Then the good girl told him what had befallen her long ago on that spot, and bid him fulfil the part she had neglected, adding, ‘But tell them also not to think the mere saying the words is enough; they must pray with faith and dependence on God, and also strive to keep themselves from sin.’

In returning from Zirl to Innsbruck, the left bank may be visited by taking the Zirl bridge and pursuing the road bordering the river; you come thus to Unterperfuss, another bourne of frequent excursion from Innsbruck, the inn there having the reputation of possessing a good cellar, and the views over the neighbourhood being most romantic, the Château of Ferklehen giving interest to the natural beauties around. Hence, instead of pursuing the return journey at once, a digression may be made through the Selrainthal (Selrain, in the dialect of the neighbourhood, means the edge of a mountain); and it is indeed but a narrow strip bordering the stream – the Melach or Malk, so called from its milk-white waters – which pours itself out by three mouths into the Inn at the debouchure of the valley. There is many a ‘cluster of houses,’ as German expresses180 a settlement too small to be dignified with the name of village, perched on the heights around, but all reached by somewhat rugged paths. The first and prettiest is Selrain, which is always locally called Rothenbrunn, because the iron in the waters, which form an attraction to valetudinarian visitors, has covered the soil over which they flow with a red deposit. Small as it is, it boasts two churches, that to S. Quirinus being one of the most ancient in Tirol. The mountain path through the Fatscherthal, though much sought by Innsbruckers, is too rough travelling for the ordinary tourist, but affords a fine mountain view, including the magnificent Fernerwand, or glacier-wall, which closes it in, and the three shining and beautifully graduated peaks of the Hohe Villerspitz. At a short distance from Selrain may be found a pretty cascade, one of the six falls of the Saigesbach. Some four or five miles further along the valley is one of the numerous villages named Gries; and about five miles more of mountain footpath leads to the coquettishly perched sanctuary of St. Sigismund, the highest inhabited point of the Selrainthal. It is one of the many high-peaked buildings with which the Archduke Sigismund, who seems to have had a wonderful eye for the picturesque, loved to set off the heaven-pointing cones of the Tirolese mountains. Another opening in the mountains, which runs out from Gries, is the Lisenthal, in the midst of which lie Juvenau and Neurätz, the latter much visited by parties going to pick up the pretty crystal spar called ‘Andalusiten.’ Further along the path stands by the wayside a striking fountain, set up for the refreshment of the weary, called the Magdalenenbründl, because adorned with a statue of the Magdalen, the image of whose penitence was thought appropriate to this stern solitude by the pious founder. The Melach is shortly after crossed by a rustic bridge, and a path over wooded hills leads to the ancient village of Pragmar. Hence the ascent of the Sonnenberg or Lisens-Ferner is made. The monastery of Wilten has a summer villa on its lower slope, serving as a dairy for the produce of their pastures in the neighbourhood; a hospitable place of refreshment for the traveller and alpine climber, and with its chapel constituting a grateful object both to the pilgrim and the artist. The less robust and enterprising will find an easier excursion in the Lengenthal, a romantically wild valley, which forms a communication between the Lisenthal and the Œtzthal.

The Selrainthalers are behind none in maintaining the national character. When the law of conscription – one of the most obnoxious results of the brief cession to Bavaria – was propounded, the youths of the Selrain were the first to show that, though ever ready to devote their lives to the defence of the fatherland, they would never be enrolled in an army in whose ranks they might be sent to fight in they knew not what cause – perhaps against their own brethren. The generous stand they made against the measure constituted their valley the rendezvous of all who would escape from it for miles round, and soon their band numbered some five hundred. During the whole of the Bavarian occupation they maintained their independence, and were among the first to raise the standard of the year 1809. A strong force was sent out on March 14 to reduce them to obedience, when the Selrainers gave good proof that it was not cowardice which had made them refuse to join the army. They repulsed the Bavarian regulars with such signal success, that the men of the neighbourhood were proud to range themselves under their banner, which as long as the campaign lasted was always found in the thickest of the fight. No less than eleven of their number received decorations for personal bravery. In peace, too, they have shown they know how to value the independence for which they fought; though their labours in the field are so greatly enhanced by the steepness of the ground which is their portion, that the men yoke themselves to the plough, and carry burdens over places where no oxen could be guided. Their industry and perseverance provide them so well with enough to make them contented, if not prosperous, that ‘in Selrain hat jeder zu arbeiten und zu essen’ (in Selrain there is work and meat enough for all) is a common proverb. The women, who are unable for the reason above noted to take so much part in field-labours as in some other parts, have found an industry for themselves in bleaching linen, and enliven the landscape by the cheerful zest with which they ply their thrifty toil.

The path for the return journey from Selrain to Ober-Perfuss – or foot of the upper height – is as rugged as the other paths we have been traversing, but is even more picturesque. The church is newly restored, and contains a monument, with high-sounding Latin epitaph, to one Peter Anich, of whose labours in overcoming the difficulties of the survey and mensuration of his country, which has nowhere three square miles of plain, his co-villagers are justly proud. He was an entirely self-taught man, but most accurate in his observations, and he induced other peasants to emulate his studies. Ober-perfuss also has a mineral spring. A pleasant path over hills and fields leads in about an hour to Kematen, a very similar village; but the remains of the ruined hunting-seat of Pirschenheim, now used as an ordinary lodging-house, adds to its picturesqueness. Near by it may also be visited the pretty waterfall of the Sendersbach. A shorter and easier stage is the next, through the fields to Völs or Vels, which clusters at the foot of the Blasienberg, once the dwelling of a hermit, and still a place of pilgrimage and the residence of the priest of the village. The parish church of Vels is dedicated in honour of S. Jodok, the English saint, whose statue we saw keeping watch over Maximilian’s tomb at Innsbruck. Another hour across the level ground of the Galwiese, luxuriantly covered with Indian corn, brings us back to Innsbruck through the Innrain; the Galwiese has its name from the echo of the hills, which close in the plain as it nears the capital; wiese being a meadow, and gal the same form of Schall– resonance, which occurs in Nachtigall, nightingale; and also, strangely enough, in gellen, to sound loudly (or yell). At the cross-road (to Axams) we passed some twenty minutes out of Völs, where the way is still wild, is the so-called Schwarze Kreuz-kapelle. One Blasius Hölzl, ranger of the neighbouring forest, was once overtaken by a terrible storm; the Geroldsbach, rushing down from the Götzneralp, had obliterated the path with its torrents; the reflection of each lightning flash in the waste of waters around seemed like a sword pointed at the breast of his horse, who shied and reared, and threatened to plunge his rider in the ungoverned flood. Hölzl was a bold forester, but he had never known a night like this; and as the rapidly succeeding flashes almost drove him to distraction, he vowed to record the deliverance on the spot by a cross of iron, of equal weight to himself and his mount, if he reached his fireside in safety. Then suddenly the noisy wind subsided, the clouds owned themselves spent, and in place of the angry forks of flame only soft and friendly sheets of light played over the country, and enabled him to steer his homeward way. Hölzl kept his promise, and a black metal cross of the full weight promised long marked the spot, and gave it its present name.181 The accompanying figures of our Lady and S. John having subsequently been thrown down, it was removed to the chapel on Blasienberg. Ferneck, a pleasant though primitive bath establishment, is prettily situated on the Innsbruck side of the Galwiese, and the church there was also once a favourite sanctuary with the people; but when the neighbouring land was taken from the monks at Wilten, who had had it ever since the days of the penitent giant Haymon, it ceased to be remembered.