:''This page is about Dunkelsteinerwald, the municipality. For the region of the same name see

Dunkelsteinerwald The Dunkelsteinerwald is a hill country south of the Danube in the Mostviertel region of Lower Austria. It is located at the shore of the Danube between Melk and Mautern, south of Krems. The principal towns of the region are Bergern im Dunk ...

.'' Dunkelsteinerwald is a market municipality with 2,289 inhabitants in the district Melk in

Lower Austria Lower Austria (german: Niederösterreich; Austro-Bavarian: ''Niedaöstareich'', ''Niedaestareich'') is one of the nine states of Austria, located in the northeastern corner of the country. Since 1986, the capital of Lower Austria has been Sankt P ...

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 ...

Geography

Dunkelsteinerwald lies in the

Mostviertel (English: ''Most Quarter'') is the southwestern quarter of the four quarters of Lower Austria (the northeast state of the 9 states in Austria). It is bordered on the north by the Danube and to the south and west by the state borders of Styria ...

in Lower Austria. The surface of the market municipality covers 54.19 square kilometers. 46.73 percent of the area is wooded. The municipality includes the

cadastral A cadastre or cadaster is a comprehensive recording of the real estate or real property's metes-and-bounds of a country.Jo Henssen, ''Basic Principles of the Main Cadastral Systems in the World,'/ref> Often it is represented graphically in a cad ...

districts of Eckartsberg, Gansbach, Gerolding, Geroldinger Wald, Häusling, Heitzing, Hessendorf,

Himberg Himberg am Wald () is a municipality in the district of Bruck an der Leitha in the Austrian state of Lower Austria. It belonged to Wien-Umgebung District Bezirk Wien-Umgebung was a district of the state of Lower Austria in Austria. The district ...

, Hohenwarth,

Kicking A kick is a physical Strike (attack), strike using the leg, in unison usually with an area of the knee or lower using the foot, heel, tibia (shin), ball of the foot, blade of the foot, toes or knee (the latter is also known as a knee (strike), ...

, Kochholz, Krapfenberg, Lanzing, Lerchfeld, Lottersberg, Mauer bei Melk,

Neuhofen Neuhofen is a municipality in the Rhein-Pfalz-Kreis, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is situated approximately 7 km south of Ludwigshafen. History Starting point of Neuhofen was the declined village Medenheim, east of Neuhofen. Being pro ...

, Nölling, Ohnreith,

Pfaffing Pfaffing is a municipality in the district of Rosenheim in Bavaria in 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, an ...

Thal Thal may refer to: Places * Thal, Lower Austria, Austria * Thal, Styria, Austria * Thal, Ruhla, Germany * Thal, Uttarakhand, Didihat district, India * Thal, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan ** Thal railway station * Thal, St. Gallen, Switzerla ...

, Umbach und Ursprung.

History

In the antiquity the area was part of the

Roman province The Roman provinces (Latin: ''provincia'', pl. ''provinciae'') were the administrative regions of Ancient Rome outside Roman Italy that were controlled by the Romans under the Roman Republic and later the Roman Empire. Each province was rule ...

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 ...

. Lying in the Austrian heartland of Lower Austria, the place took part in the eventful

history of Austria The history of Austria covers the history of Austria and its predecessor states. In the late Iron Age Austria was occupied by people of the Hallstatt Celtic culture (c. 800 BC), they first organized as a Celtic kingdom referred to by the Romans ...

Inhabitant development

After the result of the census of 2001, there were 2289 inhabitants. In 1991, the market municipality had 2025 inhabitants, up from 1941 in 1981 and 1911 in 1971.

Politics

The mayor of the market municipality is Franz Penz from the christ-democratic ÖVP, the office manager Erich Galander. The 21 seats in the municipal council are currently assigned to the following parties: SPÖ 5, GREENs 1, ÖVP 15.

Culture and sights

Buildings

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 ...

bridge at Lanzing, which was probably built in the 3rd or 4th centuries. *Mauer parish church at Mauer bei Melk, with its carved altar from 1509, a masterpiece of the late

gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

. In the wings of the church, there are images showing the life of Lady Mary. Furthermore, the gothic Sakramenthäuschen is of artistic interest. *Military church in Gerolding. The most interesting sights are the gothic

pulpit A pulpit is a raised stand for preachers in a Christian church. The origin of the word is the Latin ''pulpitum'' (platform or staging). The traditional pulpit is raised well above the surrounding floor for audibility and visibility, access ...

, a fresco from the 17th century, and the gothic

presbyterium Presbyterium is a modern term used in the Catholic Church and Eastern Catholic Churches after the Second Vatican Council in reference to a college of priests, in active ministry, of an individual particular church such as a diocese or eparchy. T ...

with a "session niche". *Parish church at Gansbach. The church probably originates from the 14th century. The side altar piece of the famous painter

Kremser Schmidt Martin Johann Schmidt, called ''Kremser Schmidt'' or ''Kremserschmidt'', (25 September 1718 – 28 June 1801), was one of the outstanding Austrian painters of the late Baroque/Rococo along with Franz Anton Maulbertsch. He was born at Grafenwör ...

and the high altarpiece, which was painted by one of his students, are worth seeing. Mauer Kirche 01.jpg, Church Mauer Altardetail 01 carving altar.jpg, Carving altar Sakramentshaus 001.jpg, Sakramenthäuschen Jagdschloss_Wolfstein.jpg, Jagdschloss Wolfstein in Kochholz

References

{{authority control Cities and towns in Melk District