The Neulengbach earthquake of 1590 occurred on September 15, 1590 shortly before midnight amidst a long series of much weaker seismic activity starting on June 29, 1590 and with aftershocks reported until November 12. It was the strongest historically documented earthquake in what today is Northeastern Austria.

Epicenter and seismology

Earthquake Facts
Date	September 15, 1590
Epicenter	SE of Neulengbach Neulengbach Neulengbach is a municipality in the district of Sankt Pölten-Land in Lower Austria, Austria.Artist Egon Schiele was put in prison for three days in Neulengbach for creating "pornographic" drawings of his girlfriend Wally Neuzil....
Magnitude Richter	5.5-6.0
Magnitude Mercalli	VII-IX
Deaths	unknown

The epicenter is believed to have been located southeast of Neulengbach

Neulengbach

Neulengbach is a municipality in the district of Sankt Pölten-Land in Lower Austria, Austria.Artist Egon Schiele was put in prison for three days in Neulengbach for creating "pornographic" drawings of his girlfriend Wally Neuzil....

, about 30–40 km west of Vienna

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

, in a flat dipping and North-South striking thrust fault that is part of the Vienna Transform fault zone. This moderately active fault system extends over a distance of some 300 km from the Northern Limestone Alps

Northern Limestone Alps

The Northern Limestone Alps are the ranges of the Eastern Alps north of the Central Eastern Alps located in Austria and the adjacent Bavarian lands of southeastern Germany. The distinction from the latter group, where the higher peaks are located, is based on differences in geological composition...

 through the Vienna Basin

Vienna Basin

The Vienna Basin is a sedimentary basin between the Alps and the Carpathian Mountains...

 into the West Carpathian Mountains

Carpathian Mountains

The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians are a range of mountains forming an arc roughly long across Central and Eastern Europe, making them the second-longest mountain range in Europe...

. The temblor's energy release is estimated at 5.5-6.0 on the Richter magnitude scale

Richter magnitude scale

The expression Richter magnitude scale refers to a number of ways to assign a single number to quantify the energy contained in an earthquake....

 and it had class VII intensity on the modified Mercalli intensity scale

Mercalli intensity scale

The Mercalli intensity scale is a seismic scale used for measuring the intensity of an earthquake. It measures the effects of an earthquake, and is distinct from the moment magnitude M_w usually reported for an earthquake , which is a measure of the energy released...

 in most of Lower Austria

Lower Austria

Lower Austria is the northeasternmost state of the nine states in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria since 1986 is Sankt Pölten, the most recently designated capital town in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria had formerly been Vienna, even though Vienna is not officially part of Lower Austria...

.

Damage

Significant destruction occurred in Vienna, which at this time had about 50,000 inhabitants living within a fortified and densely urban area that covered what today is the innermost city center. The upper half of St. Michael's

Michaelerkirche (Vienna)

St. Michael's Church , dedicated to the Archangel Michael, is one of the oldest churches in Vienna, Austria, and also one of its few remaining Romanesque buildings. Over time, there have been many alterations, resulting in its present day aspect, unchanged since 1792...

 church tower collapsed in spite of its steel reinforcements, the Scottish Abbey

Schottenstift, Vienna

The Schottenstift or Scottish Abbey is a Roman Catholic monastery founded in Vienna in 1155 when Henry II brought Irish monks to Vienna. The monks did not come directly from Ireland, but came instead from St Jakob's, the Irish monastery in Regensburg, Germany...

 was severely damaged, and the Southern tower of St. Stephen's Cathedral suffered as well. At this time it was not customary to document damage to property that did not serve sacral purposes or was directly used by the aristocracy, and very little information has survived concerning the destruction and harm inflicted on ordinary citizens. Therefore, the fact that the death of nine people in a collapsing traveller's hostel was specifically mentioned in the chronicles suggests that the number of urban casualties cannot have been significant.

At Zwentendorf

Zwentendorf

Zwentendorf an der Donau is a small market municipality in Lower Austria, Austria, with 3,280 inhabitants. It is located at , in the Tullnerfeld on the southern bank of the Danube. The place attained celebrity as the site of the only Austrian nuclear power station, which was established here, but...

, 40 km to the North of the presumed epicenter, the local parish church was so heavily damaged that it became unusable. (Exposure of this particular area to seismic risk played a significant role in the public debate that erupted in the 1970s concerning plans for a nuclear power plant near Zwentendorf.) Vaults and roofs collapsed at the Mauerbach Charterhouse West of Vienna, and many fortifications in Lower Austria (e.g., at Sieghartskirchen

Sieghartskirchen

Sieghartskirchen is a municipality in the district of Tulln in Lower Austria, Austria....

 and Altlengbach

Altlengbach

Altlengbach is a town in the district of Sankt Pölten-Land in the Austrian state of Lower Austria.There are the following localities in the town:...

) needed substantial repair.

Apparently the seismic event propagated far along the Vienna Transform fault but did not extend southward of the Alps. Strong shocks were reported from up to 300 km to the North of the epicenter, at places such as Abertham

Abertamy

Abertamy is a town in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic. It is located in Ore Mountains about north of Karlovy Vary and has a population of 1,413...

 in the westernmost part of Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

 and Frankenstein

Zabkowice Slaskie

Ząbkowice Śląskie is a town in Lower Silesian Voivodeship in south-western Poland. It is the seat of Ząbkowice Śląskie County, and of the smaller administrative district called Gmina Ząbkowice Śląskie....

 in Silesia

Silesia

Silesia is a historical region of Central Europe located mostly in Poland, with smaller parts also in the Czech Republic, and Germany.Silesia is rich in mineral and natural resources, and includes several important industrial areas. Silesia's largest city and historical capital is Wrocław...

 where the slightly disfigured city tower can still be seen.

Implications for current seismic risk

Today the area that was most heavily affected by the 1590 Neulengbach earthquake has a population of over 2.5 million and accounts for almost half of Austria's economic output. A 2007 study by the reinsurance company Munich Re

Munich Re

Munich Re Group is a reinsurance company based in Munich, Germany. It is one of the world’s leading reinsurers. ERGO, a Munich Re subsidiary, is the Group’s primary insurance arm....

has estimated a damage potential of EUR 10-15 bn. in private property alone should a comparable event occur again.