Franzensfeste
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Franzensfeste (; it, Fortezza ) is a ''
comune The (; plural: ) is a local administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions ('' regioni'') and provinces (''province''). The can also ...
'' in
South Tyrol it, Provincia Autonoma di Bolzano – Alto Adige lld, Provinzia Autonoma de Balsan/Bulsan – Südtirol , settlement_type = Autonomous area, Autonomous Provinces of Italy, province , image_skyline = ...
in northern
Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
. It is named after the large
Franzensfeste Fortress Franzensfeste Fortress ( it, Forte di Fortezza; german: Festung Franzensfeste, literally "Franz's Fortress") is a fortress situated in the village of Franzensfeste, in South Tyrol, Italy. Emperor Francis I began constructing the fortress in 183 ...
erected from 1833 to 1838 and Franzensfeste station is also known as an important
railway hub A transport hub is a place where passengers and cargo are exchanged between vehicles and/or between transport modes. Public transport hubs include railway stations, rapid transit stations, bus stops, tram stops, airports and ferry slips. F ...
.


Geography

Franzensfeste is located in the southern
Wipptal The Wipp Valley (german: Wipptal) is an Alpine valley in Tyrol, Austria and in South Tyrol, Italy, running between Innsbruck and Franzensfeste. The Brenner Pass (1,374 m) at the Austro-Italian border divides it into the northern, Austrian Lower ...
valley on the Eisack river, about south of
Sterzing Sterzing (; it, Vipiteno ) is a comune in South Tyrol in northern Italy. It is the main town of the southern Wipptal, and the Eisack River flows through the medieval town. History Origin The town traces its roots to 14 B.C., when Nero Claudius ...
and north of
Brixen Brixen (, ; it, Bressanone ; lld, Porsenù or ) is a town in South Tyrol, northern Italy, located about north of Bolzano. Geography First mentioned in 901, Brixen is the third largest city and oldest town in the province, and the artistic an ...
. The settlement is situated on the western side of the valley, at the ''Sachsenklemme'' narrow where it is only a few hundred meters wide, along with the Brenner Railway line and the state road SS12 while the Autostrada A22 (Brenner Highway), running elevated on the same side, pass through the lake in its northern part entering a tunnel on the opposite side; the state road cross than the Eisack river nearby the railway station due north. The valley is confined by the
Zillertal Alps The Zillertal Alps ( it, Alpi Aurine; german: Zillertaler Alpen) are a mountain range of the Central Eastern Alps on the border of Austria and Italy. Name The range is named after the Zillertal (Ziller river valley) on its north. Geography The ...
in the northeast and the
Sarntal Alps Sarntal (; it, Sarentino ) is a valley and a ''comune'' (municipality) in South Tyrol in northern Italy, located about north of the city of Bolzano. The municipality comprises several towns and villages. The largest one, seat of the mayor and co ...
in the southwest, rising up to the Tagewaldhorn peak at .


History


Origin

Franzensfeste was founded recently. The village dates from the 19th century when the construction of the fortifications was begun, to which the site is also closely linked in name (into Italian language), and the railway. The parish was originally Mittewald, still the common land, with the two villages of Oberau and Unterau. Archeological findings have shown the area to be settled by 2500 B.C. as indicated by the finding of home pottery. The Wipptal has always played an important role in the transit of goods on the north-south bound, first as the Amber Road between Greece, Sicily and Northern Europe later in the Roman period, between Aquileia and the regions beyond the Alps; also a long stretch of the
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 lette ...
Via Claudia Augusta The Via Claudia Augusta is an ancient Roman road, which linked the valley of the Po River with Rhaetia (encompassing parts of modern Eastern Switzerland, Northern Italy, Western Austria, Southern Germany and all of Liechtenstein) across the A ...
has been unearthed. In the 17th century, where the station is now placed, there were a few farms, one of which, was turned into an inn with the name "Post-Reifer". It is still in operation today.


Fortress

The military importance of the place became evident during the
Tyrolean Rebellion The Tyrolean Rebellion (german: Tiroler Volksaufstand) is a name given to the resistance of militiamen, peasants, craftsmen and other civilians of the County of Tyrol led by Andreas Hofer supported by his wife Anna and a strategic council cons ...
in 1809 when General
François Joseph Lefebvre François Joseph Lefebvre ( , ; 25 October 1755 – 14 September 1820), Duc de Dantzig, was a French military commander during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and one of the original eighteen Marshals of the Empire created by Napoleon. Ea ...
, commander of 2500 Royal Saxon troopers, was defeated in an ambush by
Andreas Hofer Andreas Hofer (22 November 1767 – 20 February 1810) was a Tyrolean innkeeper and drover, who in 1809 became the leader of the Tyrolean Rebellion against the Napoleonic and Bavarian invasion during the War of the Fifth Coalition. He was subs ...
’s Tyrolean insurgents at the narrow which later was called ''Sachsenklemme'' ("Gorge of the Saxons”). In the 1830s, Emperor
Francis I of Austria Francis II (german: Franz II.; 12 February 1768 – 2 March 1835) was the last Holy Roman Emperor (from 1792 to 1806) and the founder and Emperor of the Austrian Empire, from 1804 to 1835. He assumed the title of Emperor of Austria in response ...
wanted to build a defensive system on the strategically-important Brenner route since he feared an invasion from the south. The village was settled for strategic purposes, was well protected by the surrounding mountainous and could block the entrance to the Eisack Valley. Work began on June 17, 1833, and the Franzensfeste Fortress was inaugurated by Franz' successor Emperor
Ferdinand I of Austria en, Ferdinand Charles Leopold Joseph Francis Marcelin , image = Kaiser Ferdinand I.jpg , caption = Portrait by Eduard Edlinger (1843) , succession = Emperor of AustriaKing of Hungary , moretext = ( more...) , cor-type = ...
on August 18, 1838. The construction of the fortress and later of the Brenner railway, helped thousands of workers who found accommodation in Franzensfeste contributing to the development and growth of the village. In 1867 with the opening of a station on the Brenner Railway, Franzensfeste consolidated its role as a transport hub not only on the north-south direction, but also with the eastern branch-off into the
Puster Valley The Puster Valley ( it, Val Pusteria ; german: Pustertal, ) is one of the largest longitudinal valleys in the Alps that runs in an east-west direction between Lienz in East Tyrol, Austria, and Mühlbach near Brixen in South Tyrol, Italy. The S ...
(the
Puster Valley Railway The Puster Valley Railway (German: ''Pustertalbahn''; Italian: ''Ferrovia della Val Pusteria'') is a standard gauge, single-track railway line in the Puster Valley between Franzensfeste (Italian: Fortezza) and Innichen (San Candido), South Tyrol ...
) to Carinthia and the Austrian Southern Railway line at Maribor in Styria, opened in 1871. The Franzensfeste Fortress, however, lost its strategic importance with the signing of the Triple Alliance military agreement by Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Kingdom of Italy in 1882. The fortifications were transformed into a military ammunition depot, which kept even when was transferred to Italy according to the 1919
Treaty of Saint-Germain A treaty is a formal, legally binding written agreement between actors in international law. It is usually made by and between sovereign states, but can include international organizations, individuals, business entities, and other legal pers ...
. In 1939 began the construction of the hydroelectric basin for the power plant in
Brixen Brixen (, ; it, Bressanone ; lld, Porsenù or ) is a town in South Tyrol, northern Italy, located about north of Bolzano. Geography First mentioned in 901, Brixen is the third largest city and oldest town in the province, and the artistic an ...
made necessary for the electrification of the railway; the work was completed the following year and the village of Unterau was flooded. Franzensfeste in 1940 was elevated to municipality, became an important railway junction and the infrastructure for the maintenance of the locomotives and housing the staff were built. Until the 1990s Franzensfeste was an important customs goods-station for cattle, but with the entry of Austria in the European Community has lost importance. In the summer of 2008 the fortress of Franzensfeste was opened to the public for the first time as one of the locations of
Manifesta Manifesta, also known as the European Nomadic Biennial, is a European pan-regional contemporary cultural biennale. History Manifesta was founded in 1994 by Dutch art historian Hedwig Fijen. The first edition took place in Rotterdam. One of t ...
7, the European Biennial of Contemporary art. In 2009 the location hosted the so-called "Landesausstellung", an event remembering the Bicentenaire of the Tyrolean riots in 1809. File:Franzensfeste-Mittewald, Pfarrkirche Sankt Martin Dm14805 IMG 1036 2019-08-03 13.22.jpg, St. Martin in Mittewald File:Franzensfeste-Grasstein, straatzicht IMG 1027 2019-08-03 12.50.jpg, Grasstein File:Franzenfeste, Pfarrkirche zum Heiligsten Herzen Jesu Dm14813 IMG 1039 2019-08-03 13.56.jpg, Sacred Heart Church in Franzensfeste


Coat-of-arms

The emblem of Franzensfeste consists of an
argent In heraldry, argent () is the tincture of silver, and belongs to the class of light tinctures called "metals". It is very frequently depicted as white and usually considered interchangeable with it. In engravings and line drawings, regions to ...
inverted
upsilon Upsilon (, ; uppercase Υ, lowercase υ; el, ''ýpsilon'' ) or ypsilon is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, grc, Υʹ, label=none has a value of 400. It is derived from the Phoenician waw . E ...
symbolizing the roads to the village. The gules area, on top left, symbolizes the rock; the azure, top right, the lake and the vert the meadows. The emblem was adopted in 1968.


Society


Linguistic distribution

According to the 2011 census, 59.63% of the population speak
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...
, 38.51% Italian and 1.86%
Ladin Ladin may refer to: * Ladin language, a language in northern Italy, often classified as a Rhaeto-Romance language *Ladin people, the inhabitants of the Dolomite Alps region of northern Italy See also *Laden (disambiguation) * Ladino (disambigua ...
as first language.


References


Bibliography

* Christoph Hackelsberger (1986). ''Die k.k. Franzensfeste: ein Monumentalwerk der Befestigungskunst des 19. Jahrhunderts''. Munich:
Deutscher Kunstverlag The Deutscher Kunstverlag (DKV) is an educational publishing house with offices in Berlin and Munich. The publisher specializes in books about art, cultural history, architecture, and historic preservation. History Deutscher Kunstverlag was fo ...
.


External links

*
Homepage of the municipality
{{Authority control Municipalities of South Tyrol