Bad Vigaun is a municipality and

spa town A spa town is a resort town based on a mineral spa (a developed mineral spring). Patrons visit spas to "take the waters" for their purported health benefits. Thomas Guidott set up a medical practice in the English town of Bath in 1668. H ...

in the district of

Hallein Hallein () is a historic town in the Austrian state of Salzburg. It is the capital of Hallein district. Geography The town is located in the ''Tennengau'' region south of the City of Salzburg, stretching along the Salzach river in the shadow of ...

, in the

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n state of

Salzburg Salzburg (, ; literally "Salt-Castle"; bar, Soizbuag, label=Bavarian language, Austro-Bavarian) is the List of cities and towns in Austria, fourth-largest city in Austria. In 2020, it had a population of 156,872. The town is on the site of the ...

Geography

Bad Vigaun, formerly known simply as ''Vigaun'', is located in the historic ''Tennengau'' region, about south of the state capital

. The municipal area stretches from the

Hagen Mountains The Hagen Mountains (german: Hagengebirge) are a subrange of the Berchtesgaden Alps. They lie mainly in the Austrian state of Salzburg, the western quarter is in the Bavarian county of Berchtesgadener Land. The steep western flanks of the Hagen ...

, the

Tennen Mountains The Tennen Mountains (german: Tennengebirge) is a small, but rugged, mountain range in the Northern Limestone Alps, which lies in front of the Eastern Alps for its entire length. It is a very heavily karstified high plateau, about 60 km² in ...

and the

Untersberg The Untersberg is the northernmost massif of the Berchtesgaden Alps, a prominent spur straddling the border between Berchtesgaden, Germany and Salzburg, Austria. The highest peak of the table-top mountain is the Berchtesgaden Hochthron at . T ...

massif in the west to the Osterhorn Group of the

Salzkammergut Mountains The Salzkammergut Mountains (german: Salzkammergut-Berge) are a mountain range of the Northern Limestone Alps, located in the Austrian states of Salzburg and Upper Austria. They are named after the Salzkammergut historic region, part of the Halls ...

in the east. It comprises the

cadastral communities A cadastral community or cadastral municipality, is a cadastral subdivision of municipalities in the nations of Austria,Cadastral Template for Austria, web-pageCT-AT Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, ...

of Rengerberg and Vigaun. The municipality has access to the

Salzburg-Tyrol Railway {{Infobox rail line , box_width = auto , name = Salzburg-Tyrol Railway , native_name = Salzburg-Tiroler-Bahn , native_name_lang = de , image ...

line and the S-Bahn Salzburg network at Bad Vigaun station as well as to the

Tauern Autobahn The Tauern Autobahn (A 10) is an Autobahns of Austria, autobahn (motorway) in Austria. It starts at the Salzburg junction with the West Autobahn (A1), runs southwards, crosses the Hohe Tauern, Tauern mountain range on the main chain of the Alps an ...

(A10) at the

junction.

History

The settlement of ''Vicone'' (''Figun'') was first mentioned in a 748 deed. Possibly derived from la,

vicus In Ancient Rome, the Latin term (plural ) designated a village within a rural area () or the neighbourhood of a larger settlement. During the Republican era, the four of the city of Rome were subdivided into . In the 1st century BC, Augustus r ...

, the place was already settled in

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

times, when the area was part of the

Noricum Noricum () is the Latin name for the Celts, Celtic kingdom or federation of tribes that included most of modern Austria and part of Slovenia. In the first century AD, it became a Roman province, province of the Roman Empire. Its borders were th ...

province. The local parish was documented in land register issued by Bishop

Arno of Salzburg Arno, Arn or Aquila (c. 750–821) was bishop of Salzburg, and afterwards its first archbishop. He preserved his voluminous correspondence from the scholar Alcuin of York. Early years He entered the church at an early age, and after passing s ...

in the late 8th century. The present-day Late Gothic church building, dedicated to

Saint Dionysius Pope Dionysius was the bishop of Rome from 22 July 259 to his death on 26 December 268. His task was to reorganize the Roman church, after the persecutions of Emperor Valerian I and the edict of toleration by his successor Gallienus. He also h ...

, was erected from 1488 to 1516.

Hot spring A hot spring, hydrothermal spring, or geothermal spring is a spring produced by the emergence of geothermally heated groundwater onto the surface of the Earth. The groundwater is heated either by shallow bodies of magma (molten rock) or by circ ...

s in Vigaun were drilled in 1976. The municipality was awarded the official status of a spa town (''Bad'') by resolution of the Salzburg state government in 2002.

References

Cities and towns in Hallein District Spa towns in Austria {{Salzburg-geo-stub