Vals is a municipality in the southern Innsbruck-Land District 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

Tyrol Tyrol (; historically the Tyrole; de-AT, Tirol ; it, Tirolo) is a historical region in the Alps - in Northern Italy and western Austria. The area was historically the core of the County of Tyrol, part of the Holy Roman Empire, Austrian Emp ...

Geography

Vals is located 26 km southeast of

Innsbruck Innsbruck (; bar, Innschbruck, label=Bavarian language, Austro-Bavarian ) is the capital of Tyrol (state), Tyrol and the List of cities and towns in Austria, fifth-largest city in Austria. On the Inn (river), River Inn, at its junction with the ...

in an incorporated valley with the same name (Valsertal), which branches off from the eastern side of Wipptal at Stafflach, is joined by the Schmirntal at Sankt Jodok, whose southern part also belongs to the municipality of Vals, and borders to Italy at its south end. The valley stretches out to the Ziller Valley Alps ( Zillertal) for about seven kilometers and ends with the peaks Kaser, Olperer,

Schrammacher The Schrammacher is a mountain in the Austrian state of Tyrol. At 3,410 or 3,411 m it is, after the Olperer, the second highest peak of the Tux ridge of the Zillertal Alps. With its horn shape and its steep and smooth northwest wall the mountain ...

and Hohe Wand. The valley is crossed by the stream Valser and its tributaries Alpeiner, Tscheisch and Paduaner.

History

Origin

The region was once used by Roman farmers as a pasture, and the first documented mention dates back to 1313, under the name "Valles" derived from the Latin "Vallis". From the Middle Ages, marble was extracted from here and used for the floors of the Imperial Palace and the Cathedral of Innsbruck. In 1809 the entire Wipptal and some adjacent valleys were the scene of the Battle of Bergisel between the Tyrolese against the

Kingdom of Bavaria The Kingdom of Bavaria (german: Königreich Bayern; ; spelled ''Baiern'' until 1825) was a German state that succeeded the former Electorate of Bavaria in 1805 and continued to exist until 1918. With the unification of Germany into the German E ...

and the

First French Empire The First French Empire, officially the French Republic, then the French Empire (; Latin: ) after 1809, also known as Napoleonic France, was the empire ruled by Napoleon Bonaparte, who established French hegemony over much of continental Eu ...

. In 1941 the entire valley was declared a nature reserve and despite this, in May 1942 during the Second World War, under the saddle Alpeiner at 2950 m., a tunnel system was bored for the extraction of molybdenum. Under the command of the Wehrmacht, prisoners of war and others were exploited for forced labour there. Republikanischer Club
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Coat-of-arms

The emblem of Vals consists of a red shield with a black V on the top including a golden crown, which is referred to as that of St. Jodok.

References

External links

Cities and towns in Innsbruck-Land District {{Tyrol-geo-stub