Laa an der Thaya is a town in the

Mistelbach District Bezirk Mistelbach 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. * Altlichtenwarth *Asparn an der Zaya **Altmanns, Michelstetten, ...

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 ...

, near the Czech border. The population in 2016 was 6224.

Geography

The town is located in the northern Weinviertel region, near the

Thaya The Thaya ( cs, Dyje ) is a river in Central Europe, the longest tributary to the river Morava. Its drainage basin is . It is ( with its longest source river German Thaya) long and meanders from west to east in the border area between Lower ...

river, directly at the border with South Moravia. The municipal area includes the cadastral communities of Hanfthal, Kottingneusiedl, Pernhofen, Ungerndorf, and Wulzeshofen.

History

A settlement at a ford across the Thaya existed already in the 12th century, before the estates were acquired by the

Babenberg The House of Babenberg was a noble dynasty of Austrian Dukes and Margraves. Originally from Bamberg in the Duchy of Franconia (present-day Bavaria), the Babenbergs ruled the imperial Margraviate of Austria from its creation in 976 AD until its ...

dukes of

about 1190. Duke Leopold VI of Austria about 1230 had the walled town of Laa laid out as a strategic outpost at the border with the

Kingdom of Bohemia The Kingdom of Bohemia ( cs, České království),; la, link=no, Regnum Bohemiae sometimes in English literature referred to as the Czech Kingdom, was a medieval and early modern monarchy in Central Europe, the predecessor of the modern Czec ...

in the north. His successor Duke

Frederick the Warlike Frederick may refer to: People * Frederick (given name), the name Nobility Anhalt-Harzgerode *Frederick, Prince of Anhalt-Harzgerode (1613–1670) Austria * Frederick I, Duke of Austria (Babenberg), Duke of Austria from 1195 to 1198 * Frederic ...

used it as a military base for his Bohemian campaigns, until he was finally killed in battle in 1246. The erection of the St Vitus parish church was begun about 1240, it is today one of the largest preserved Romanesque church buildings in Lower Austria. Laa's

town privileges Town privileges or borough rights were important features of European towns during most of the second millennium. The city law customary in Central Europe probably dates back to Italian models, which in turn were oriented towards the traditio ...

were confirmed when the Austrian lands had passed to King

Ottokar II of Bohemia Ottokar II ( cs, Přemysl Otakar II.; , in Městec Králové, Bohemia – 26 August 1278, in Dürnkrut, Lower Austria), the Iron and Golden King, was a member of the Přemyslid dynasty who reigned as King of Bohemia from 1253 until his dea ...

, and again in 1281 by the

Habsburg The House of Habsburg (), alternatively spelled Hapsburg in Englishgerman: Haus Habsburg, ; es, Casa de Habsburgo; hu, Habsburg család, it, Casa di Asburgo, nl, Huis van Habsburg, pl, dom Habsburgów, pt, Casa de Habsburgo, la, Domus Hab ...

ruler King

Rudolph I of Germany Rudolf I (1 May 1218 – 15 July 1291) was the first King of Germany from the House of Habsburg. The first of the count-kings of Germany, he reigned from 1273 until his death. Rudolf's election marked the end of the Great Interregnum whic ...

after his victory in the Battle on the Marchfeld. Nevertheless, the town's significance decreased over the following decades, it was devastated by the troops of Margrave Jobst of Moravia in 1407 and again in 1426 by

Hussite The Hussites ( cs, Husité or ''Kališníci''; "Chalice People") were a Czech proto-Protestant Christian movement that followed the teachings of reformer Jan Hus, who became the best known representative of the Bohemian Reformation. The Huss ...

forces. According to legend, the later

Pope Pius II Pope Pius II ( la, Pius PP. II, it, Pio II), born Enea Silvio Bartolomeo Piccolomini ( la, Aeneas Silvius Bartholomeus, links=no; 18 October 1405 – 14 August 1464), was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 19 Augu ...

(Enea Silvio Piccolomini) worked as a priest at the Laa parish church from 1442, actually he served as

papal legate 300px, A woodcut showing Henry II of England greeting the pope's legate. A papal legate or apostolic legate (from the ancient Roman title '' legatus'') is a personal representative of the pope to foreign nations, or to some part of the Catholic ...

to the Imperial Diet and counsellor of Emperor Frederick III. To improve Laa's economy, the citizens were granted the privilege of

brewing Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with yeast. It may be done in a brewery by a commercial brewer ...

in 1454. During the

Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history, lasting from 1618 to 1648. Fought primarily in Central Europe, an estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians died as a result of batt ...

, the town was first occupied by Bohemian troops until the 1620 Battle of White Mountain, later by Swedish forces, who left Laa in a desolate condition. It remained a sedate county town when

Napoleon Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader wh ...

marched through in 1809 during the

War of the Fifth Coalition The War of the Fifth Coalition was a European conflict in 1809 that was part of the Napoleonic Wars and the Coalition Wars. The main conflict took place in central Europe between the Austrian Empire of Francis I and Napoleon's French Empir ...

. However, Laa's development was promoted by the opening of a railway connection to Austria's capital

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

in 1869, with a branch line of the Eastern Railway which led on to Hevlín and

Brno Brno ( , ; german: Brünn ) is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno has about 380,000 inhabitants, making it the second-largest city in the Czech Republic ...

(Brünn) in Moravia. Another branch via Pulkau to Zellerndorf which connected to the Vienna-

Znojmo Znojmo (; german: Znaim) is a town in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 33,000 inhabitants. Znojmo is the historical and cultural centre of southwestern Moravia and the second most populated town in the South Moravian ...

railway line opened in 1873. Laa again became a

border town A border town is a town or city close to the boundary between two countries, states, or regions. Usually the term implies that the nearness to the border is one of the things the place is most famous for. With close proximities to a different cou ...

after

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

with the establishment of the

First Czechoslovak Republic The First Czechoslovak Republic ( cs, První československá republika, sk, Prvá česko-slovenská republika), often colloquially referred to as the First Republic ( cs, První republika, Slovak: ''Prvá republika''), was the first Czechoslo ...

; at the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

it bordered the "

Iron Curtain The Iron Curtain was the political boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. The term symbolizes the efforts by the Soviet Union (USSR) to block itself and its ...

" dividing Europe. In June 2005, about 250 townspeople and 80 visitors from the US, Israel and Europe with historical family links to former Jewish citizens of Laa an der Thaya assembled with Mayor Fass to dedicate a memorial to the members of 33 Jewish families of Laa murdered by the SS in Auschwitz. This memorial was only the second official memorial dedicated to the memory of Austria's Jews.

Politics

Since October 7, 2015 Brigitte Ribisch is the mayor of Laa an der Thaya. Seats in the municipal assembly (''Gemeinderat'') elections: *

Austrian People's Party The Austrian People's Party (german: Österreichische Volkspartei , ÖVP ) is a Christian-democratic and liberal-conservative political party in Austria. Since December 2021, the party has been led provisionally by Karl Nehammer. It is curre ...

(ÖVP): 13 *

Social Democratic Party of Austria The Social Democratic Party of Austria (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei Österreichs , SPÖ), founded and known as the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Austria (german: link=no, Sozialdemokratische Arbeiterpartei Österreichs, SDAPÖ) unti ...

(SPÖ): 6 *proLAA (

Independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independe ...

): 8 * Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ): 2

Twin towns — sister cities

Laa an der Thaya is twinned with: * Garching an der Alz,

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, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwee ...

, since 2003 *

Świętochłowice Świętochłowice (; german: Schwientochlowitz; szl, Świyntochłowice) is a town in Silesia in southern Poland, near Katowice. It is also the central district of the Upper Silesian Metropolitan Union metropolis, with a population of 2 million, a ...

, Poland, since 2004 * Chrlice district of

, Czech Republic, since 2005

Notable people

Paul Löwinger Paul Löwinger (10 November 1904 – 17 December 1988) was an Austrian actor, theatre manager and writer. While still a child, he performed on his parents' stage, the Löwinger Bühne. In 1938 they were probably the first theatre ensemble which p ...

(1904–1988), actor *Michael Bindlechner (born 1957), director * Gerd Wimmer (born 1977), footballer

References

External links

In German. {{DEFAULTSORT:Laa An Der Thaya Cities and towns in Mistelbach District Holocaust locations in Austria