Maria Taferl
Encyclopedia
Maria Taferl is an Austria
n market municipality of 872 people in the District of Melk
and the most important pilgrimage site in all of Lower Austria
. After Mariazell
, Maria Taferl is the most important pilgrimage destination in all of Austria
.
. 47.48 percent of the municipality is forested. As the Maria Taferl Market, which takes place on the so-called "Taferlberg" (Taferl Mountain), the remaining districts are found in the hilly surrounding area. To the south, the basilica is widely visible throughout the town.
Little is known about the early settlement of Maria Taferl. The Celt
ic Kingdom of Noricum was located on the northern shore of the Danube. During Roman times, the Danube served as the border of the Province of Noricum
. Even today in the church plaza, there is a stone of Celtic origin, on which heathen sacrifices were made. This attests to Maria Taferl's long tradition as a place of religious activity.
Maria Taferl and the surrounding countryside belonged to the territory of the Ostarrichi
during the time of the Bamberg
s in the Middle Ages
. It then became part of the Habsburg
holdings. For a long time, it was part of the land of the Lords of Weißenberg, whose seat lay in the nearby town of Münichreith
. It is assumed that the various districts of the town were already established during the Middle Ages. The history of the modern market of Maria Taferl begins in the 17th century.
The first church was built around a shrine to the Holy Mother, which is the origin of the name "Maria Taferl." The legends say that the statue of the Pietà
at the shrine was an offering from Alexander Schinagel, a forester, who had a miraculous recovery from a serious illness. It replaced a crucifix there, which had also been the site of a miracle, for when local shepherd Thomas Pachmann tried to chop down the oak on which it was placed, he gravely injured both his legs. After a prayer to the Virgin Mary, his almost fatal wounds stopped bleeding. The old oak was destroyed by fire in 1755, which also damaged the statue.
The church building was built from 1660 to 1710. Its construction was begun under the imperial architect Georg Gerstenbrand and the Italian Carlo Lurago
. Its famous cupola
was built by Jakob Prandtauer
from 1708 to 1710. He also designed the current appearance of Melk Abbey
. The Maria Taferl church is built in the baroque
style with ample amounts of gold leaf
and a fresco
ed ceiling. In the center of the high altar is the namesake Marian stature. The building's rear houses its crypt
.
According to an inscription in the building's interior, the building of the church gave the local inhabitants new courage after the Plague
, the Turkish Wars
, and the Thirty Years' War
had all taken their toll. It also supported the ideas of the Counter-Reformation
in the heartland of the Catholic House of Habsburg. All this speaks to Maria Taferl as an important manifestation of the Catholic faith on the main traveling route of the Danube.
There are many traditional stories of angelic processions here, which come from the 17th century. The tradition of pilgrimage to Maria Taferl also dates back to that time. In 1760 alone, there were 700 pilgrimage processions and over 19,000 mass
es said there. The church is also a kind of information treasure chest about its pilgrims, their origins, and their number. Within it are the gifts of the pilgrims, who came on account of illness and were cured. Another reason for Maria Taferl's importance as a pilgrimage destination was the stone cross, a gift from the citizens of Freistadt
for pilgrims who died on the journey. It is also evidence of the exhausting nature of pilgrimage in those days. The murdered Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria
and his family lived in the nearby Artstetten
Castle and is known to have regularly attended mass at Maria Taferl.
Maria Taferl became a Basilica minor
in 1947.
By 2010, the basilica's interior should have undergone a complete restoration. It will then celebrate a double jubilee: 350 years since the laying of its conerstone in 1660, and 300 years since its completion in 1710. The interior's last restoration was around 50 ago; the exterior was restored in 1982, and in 1998, the domes of the two towers were re-covered.
Besides the basilica, in Maria Taferl there is also a monument for the Fallen of both World Wars. These men are honored annually at meeting of veteran's groups.
There is a folk belief that the water from the well at Maria Taferl can help with eye complaints.
Other landmarks in the town are the Elementary School Museum, as well as the mechanical nativity, which tells the story of Maria Taferl's origins.
10 and SPÖ
5.
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n market municipality of 872 people in the District of Melk
Melk (district)
Bezirk Melk is a district of the state of Lower Austria in Austria.-Municipalities:Suburbs, hamlets and other subdivisions of a municipality are indicated in small characters.*Artstetten-Pöbring...
and the most important pilgrimage site in all 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...
. After Mariazell
Mariazell
Mariazell is a small city in Austria, in Styria, well known for winter sports, 143 km N. of Graz. It is picturesquely situated in the valley of the Salza, amid the north Styrian Alps....
, Maria Taferl is the most important pilgrimage destination in all of Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
.
Geography
Maria Taferl is located in the Nibelungengau in Lower Austria on a bank over the DanubeDanube
The Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....
. 47.48 percent of the municipality is forested. As the Maria Taferl Market, which takes place on the so-called "Taferlberg" (Taferl Mountain), the remaining districts are found in the hilly surrounding area. To the south, the basilica is widely visible throughout the town.
History
Celt
The Celts were a diverse group of tribal societies in Iron Age and Roman-era Europe who spoke Celtic languages.The earliest archaeological culture commonly accepted as Celtic, or rather Proto-Celtic, was the central European Hallstatt culture , named for the rich grave finds in Hallstatt, Austria....
ic Kingdom of Noricum was located on the northern shore of the Danube. During Roman times, the Danube served as the border of the Province of Noricum
Noricum
Noricum, in ancient geography, was a Celtic kingdom stretching over the area of today's Austria and a part of Slovenia. It became a province of the Roman Empire...
. Even today in the church plaza, there is a stone of Celtic origin, on which heathen sacrifices were made. This attests to Maria Taferl's long tradition as a place of religious activity.
Maria Taferl and the surrounding countryside belonged to the territory of the Ostarrichi
Ostarrîchi
The German name of Austria, , derives from the Old High German word . A variant is recorded in the Ostarrîchi Document of 996. This word is thought to be a translation of Latin Marchia Orientalis into a local dialect. This was a march, or borderland, of the Duchy of Bavaria created in 976. Reich...
during the time of the Bamberg
Bamberg
Bamberg is a city in Bavaria, Germany. It is located in Upper Franconia on the river Regnitz, close to its confluence with the river Main. Bamberg is one of the few cities in Germany that was not destroyed by World War II bombings because of a nearby Artillery Factory that prevented planes from...
s in the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
. It then became part of the Habsburg
Habsburg
The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...
holdings. For a long time, it was part of the land of the Lords of Weißenberg, whose seat lay in the nearby town of Münichreith
Münichreith-Laimbach
Münichreith-Laimbach is a town in the district of Melk in the Austrian state of Lower Austria....
. It is assumed that the various districts of the town were already established during the Middle Ages. The history of the modern market of Maria Taferl begins in the 17th century.
Pietà
The Pietà is a subject in Christian art depicting the Virgin Mary cradling the dead body of Jesus, most often found in sculpture. As such, it is a particular form of the Lamentation of Christ, a scene from the Passion of Christ found in cycles of the Life of Christ...
at the shrine was an offering from Alexander Schinagel, a forester, who had a miraculous recovery from a serious illness. It replaced a crucifix there, which had also been the site of a miracle, for when local shepherd Thomas Pachmann tried to chop down the oak on which it was placed, he gravely injured both his legs. After a prayer to the Virgin Mary, his almost fatal wounds stopped bleeding. The old oak was destroyed by fire in 1755, which also damaged the statue.
Carlo Lurago
Carlo Lurago was an Italian architect, who was most active in Prague.He was born in Pellio Superiore in the Val d'Intelvi, near Como. At the age of 23, as an already an accomplished plasterer, he moved to Prague...
. Its famous cupola
Cupola
In architecture, a cupola is a small, most-often dome-like, structure on top of a building. Often used to provide a lookout or to admit light and air, it usually crowns a larger roof or dome....
was built by Jakob Prandtauer
Jakob Prandtauer
Jakob Prandtauer was an Austrian Baroque architect....
from 1708 to 1710. He also designed the current appearance of Melk Abbey
Melk Abbey
Melk Abbey or Stift Melk is an Austrian Benedictine abbey, and one of the world's most famous monastic sites. It is located above the town of Melk on a rocky outcrop overlooking the river Danube in Lower Austria, adjoining the Wachau valley....
. The Maria Taferl church is built in the baroque
Baroque architecture
Baroque architecture is a term used to describe the building style of the Baroque era, begun in late sixteenth century Italy, that took the Roman vocabulary of Renaissance architecture and used it in a new rhetorical and theatrical fashion, often to express the triumph of the Catholic Church and...
style with ample amounts of gold leaf
Gold leaf
right|thumb|250px|[[Burnishing]] gold leaf with an [[agate]] stone tool, during the water gilding processGold leaf is gold that has been hammered into extremely thin sheets and is often used for gilding. Gold leaf is available in a wide variety of karats and shades...
and a fresco
Fresco
Fresco is any of several related mural painting types, executed on plaster on walls or ceilings. The word fresco comes from the Greek word affresca which derives from the Latin word for "fresh". Frescoes first developed in the ancient world and continued to be popular through the Renaissance...
ed ceiling. In the center of the high altar is the namesake Marian stature. The building's rear houses its crypt
Crypt
In architecture, a crypt is a stone chamber or vault beneath the floor of a burial vault possibly containing sarcophagi, coffins or relics....
.
According to an inscription in the building's interior, the building of the church gave the local inhabitants new courage after the Plague
Bubonic plague
Plague is a deadly infectious disease that is caused by the enterobacteria Yersinia pestis, named after the French-Swiss bacteriologist Alexandre Yersin. Primarily carried by rodents and spread to humans via fleas, the disease is notorious throughout history, due to the unrivaled scale of death...
, the Turkish Wars
Ottoman wars in Europe
The wars of the Ottoman Empire in Europe are also sometimes referred to as the Ottoman Wars or as Turkish Wars, particularly in older, European texts.- Rise :...
, and the Thirty Years' War
Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Years' War was fought primarily in what is now Germany, and at various points involved most countries in Europe. It was one of the most destructive conflicts in European history....
had all taken their toll. It also supported the ideas of the Counter-Reformation
Counter-Reformation
The Counter-Reformation was the period of Catholic revival beginning with the Council of Trent and ending at the close of the Thirty Years' War, 1648 as a response to the Protestant Reformation.The Counter-Reformation was a comprehensive effort, composed of four major elements:#Ecclesiastical or...
in the heartland of the Catholic House of Habsburg. All this speaks to Maria Taferl as an important manifestation of the Catholic faith on the main traveling route of the Danube.
There are many traditional stories of angelic processions here, which come from the 17th century. The tradition of pilgrimage to Maria Taferl also dates back to that time. In 1760 alone, there were 700 pilgrimage processions and over 19,000 mass
Mass (liturgy)
"Mass" is one of the names by which the sacrament of the Eucharist is called in the Roman Catholic Church: others are "Eucharist", the "Lord's Supper", the "Breaking of Bread", the "Eucharistic assembly ", the "memorial of the Lord's Passion and Resurrection", the "Holy Sacrifice", the "Holy and...
es said there. The church is also a kind of information treasure chest about its pilgrims, their origins, and their number. Within it are the gifts of the pilgrims, who came on account of illness and were cured. Another reason for Maria Taferl's importance as a pilgrimage destination was the stone cross, a gift from the citizens of Freistadt
Freistadt
Freistadt is a small Austrian town in the state of Upper Austria in the region Mühlviertel. With a population of approximately 7,500 residents, it is a trade centre for local villages. Freistadt is the economic centre of a district of the same name District Freistadt...
for pilgrims who died on the journey. It is also evidence of the exhausting nature of pilgrimage in those days. The murdered Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria
Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria
Franz Ferdinand was an Archduke of Austria-Este, Austro-Hungarian and Royal Prince of Hungary and of Bohemia, and from 1889 until his death, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne. His assassination in Sarajevo precipitated Austria-Hungary's declaration of war against Serbia...
and his family lived in the nearby Artstetten
Artstetten-Pöbring
Artstetten-Pöbring is a town in the district of Melk in the Austrian state of Lower Austria....
Castle and is known to have regularly attended mass at Maria Taferl.
Maria Taferl became a Basilica minor
Basilica
The Latin word basilica , was originally used to describe a Roman public building, usually located in the forum of a Roman town. Public basilicas began to appear in Hellenistic cities in the 2nd century BC.The term was also applied to buildings used for religious purposes...
in 1947.
By 2010, the basilica's interior should have undergone a complete restoration. It will then celebrate a double jubilee: 350 years since the laying of its conerstone in 1660, and 300 years since its completion in 1710. The interior's last restoration was around 50 ago; the exterior was restored in 1982, and in 1998, the domes of the two towers were re-covered.
Besides the basilica, in Maria Taferl there is also a monument for the Fallen of both World Wars. These men are honored annually at meeting of veteran's groups.
There is a folk belief that the water from the well at Maria Taferl can help with eye complaints.
Other landmarks in the town are the Elementary School Museum, as well as the mechanical nativity, which tells the story of Maria Taferl's origins.
Municipal divisions
The municipality of Maria Taferl is divided into seven districts:- Maria Taferl Market
- Obererla
- Untererla
- Reitern
- Oberthalheim
- Unterthalheim
- Wimm
Politics
The mayor of Maria Taferl is Herbert Gruber and the Chief Officer is Daniela Lahmer. In the Municipal Council the 15 seats went to the following parties: ÖVPOVP
OVP is a three-letter abbreviation that may refer to:*The Office of the Vice President of the United States*The Office of the Vice President of the Philippines*OVP , a light sub-machine gun developed in Italy...
10 and SPÖ
SPO
- Technology :SPO: Microsoft SharePoint Online, Microsoft Cloud Computing, Office 365. See Microsoft Online Services-Economics:* Secondary Public Offering, an equity capital market instrument...
5.