Tyrol and its People Part 1

Tyrol and its People.

by Clive Holland.

PREFACE

In the following pages, which in addition to being a record of travel in a delightful and too little known portion of the great Austro-Hungarian Empire, are also an attempt to present within a reasonable compa.s.s an account of the national history of a singularly interesting people, the author has sought to deal more fully than is usually the case in books of the kind, with the romance and legend which is closely interwoven with the past of "the land within the mountains," as Tyrol has not inaptly been described.

It is truly a land of mountains, valleys, lakes, and rushing torrents that may well have bred the race of romance-loving, poetic, and hardy people who dwell in it. In the minds of those who know it there arises almost inevitably a comparison with the nowadays overcrowded and over-exploited Switzerland--and the comparison is, both as regards scenery and general interest, greatly in favour of Tyrol. The tourist and holiday-maker who frequent Pontresina or St. Moritz will find in this comparatively new "playground for Europe" beautiful counterparts of those places in Innsbruck, Meran, Botzen, Kitzbuhel, and other delightful towns; whilst the more strenuously inclined who delight in mountain ascents will find the Dolomite region especially attractive, and in many other districts also interesting climbs. By the sh.o.r.es of the placid, translucent lakes, and in many a happy, secluded valley, those in search of rest and quietude will find their desire fully satisfied. And in such old-world towns as Innsbruck (of many historical memories), beautiful Salzburg, charming Bregenz, Botzen, and Meran the traveller with more artistic, literary, or antiquarian tastes will delight.

That Tyrol deserves to be better known few who have once come under the spell of its charms of scenery, and the frank hospitality and friendliness of its people, or have wandered amidst its lovely valleys and mountains, will deny.

The early history of this interesting country is shrouded in much mystery, and to place accurately and date many events is a matter of very considerable difficulty, and in some cases of well-nigh impossibility, owing to the fragmentary nature of many of the existing records, and the contradictory nature of the accounts and evidence afforded by these. The greatest care, however, has been taken to make the dates given as accurate as possible, and the best authorities and descriptions of events have been consulted. Amongst others the works of Dr. Franz Wieser, Hans Semper, Von Alpenburg ("Mythen und Sagen Tirols"), Perini ("Castles of Tyrol"), Weber ("The Land of Tyrol"), an excellent and interesting anonymous guide to Salzburg, Scherer, Albert Wolff, V. Zingerle, Steub ("Die Verfa.s.sung Tirols"), Miller, and the excellent publications of the Tirol and Salzburg Landesverbaende fur Fremdenverkehr, and other organizations.

The spelling of names has presented much the same difficulty as the correct dating of events. There are several, and in some cases many, ways of spelling a large number of these. That of the latest edition of Baedeker has been adopted where this has been the case and doubt has existed.

The author's especial thanks are due to Herr L. Sigmund, the Secretary of the Austrian Travel and Information Bureau, not only for much valuable information, but also for practical a.s.sistance whilst travelling in Tyrol, facilities afforded for research, and the use of some excellent photographs.

To W. Baillie Grohman, Esq., of Schloss Matzen, Brixlegg, the well-known authority upon Tyrol, for the settlement of several disputed dates and accounts of historical events. Also for permission to make use of information (not otherwise easily procurable) contained in his exhaustive work "Tyrol, the Land in the Mountains," and for the beautiful photograph of Schloss Matzen reproduced as one of the ill.u.s.trations in this present volume.

To Dr. Richard Muendl, Imperial Councillor, Chief Inspector of the Imperial Southern Railway, and a member of the German and Austrian Alpine Society, for many valuable notes upon the Dolomite Region incorporated in Chapter X.

To Dr. Otto Rosenheim the author's thanks are given for permission to reproduce some beautiful photographs of Tyrol scenery and Tyrolese subjects in place of less pictorial work by the author himself.

To many others, who gave information to the author during his travels in Tyrol, relating to many interesting matters, acknowledgment is also here gratefully made.

C. H.

_June, 1909_

CHAPTER I

THE ROMANCE AND HISTORY OF TYROL FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES DOWN TO THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

As early as the eighth century Tyrol received a name which could not be bettered as descriptive of its scenery and inst.i.tutions--"das Land im Gebirge," the Land in the Mountains. Fascinating alike is the scenery of Tyrol and its history. When one crosses the Swiss frontier by the Arlberg route one at once enters upon a land of mountains, rivers, and pleasant valleys. And with equal truth it may be said that when one crosses the frontier of Tyrolese history one is at once plunged in the midst of stirring, romantic, and gallant deeds enacted throughout the centuries from that far-off age, when the Cimbri penetrated and traversed the country and swept into north-eastern Italy, down almost to our own time.

That Tyrol should have proved the battle-ground of nations is, of course, largely due to its geographical position. In early days it formed a "buffer state" between the Roman empire and the territory of the Cimbri and Alemanni.

The question of the original inhabitants of Tyrol is still a much debated one, and appears to be as far off final settlement as ever; and this notwithstanding the enormous amount of interest which has been manifested in the subject by scientists, archaeologists, and students during the last two centuries. Whether they were Cimbri, Etruscans, or Celts is still doubtful, although many learned authorities--more especially linguists--incline to the view that the earliest inhabitants were mainly of the Ligurian race, who were followed by Illyrians and Etruscans.

And also regarding the manners, customs, and general characteristics of these early inhabitants, whoever they may have been, very little conclusive evidence is yet available. By both Greek and Roman writers they were referred to as Rhaetians, in common with the inhabitants of Eastern Switzerland; and Horace himself speaks of "The Alpine Rhaeti, long unmatched in battle." Thus it is that the most ancient name by which Tyrol is known is that of Rhaetia.

[Sidenote: INVASION OF THE CIMBRI]

To the Romans, however, all-conquering though they were, little was known of the country until the Cimbri penetrated its mountains and traversed its valleys and pa.s.sed on their way to the north-eastern frontier of Italy about 102 B.C.

By what route these barbarians crossed the Alps on their march to invade north-eastern Italy there has been as much discussion as over the question of the original inhabitants of Tyrol. And, although the event to which we refer occurred scarcely a century prior to the conquest of Tyrol by the Romans there is little information other than of a speculative character to throw light upon the question at issue.

For many years the weight of opinion was in favour of the contention that the Cimbri entered Southern Tyrol and eventually reached the Venetian plains by the Reschen Scheideck and the Vintschgau, but the later researches of Mommsen have served to give additional, if not absolutely conclusive, weight to the view that the Brenner was the route taken by the Cimbri[1] on their way southward from their Germanic fastnesses, just as it was undoubtedly the route, but, of course, reversed, chosen by the Romans under Drusus by which to enter Tyrol on their march of conquest.

One piece of evidence which would appear to be of considerable weight, and as conclusively favouring Mommsen's view, is the fact that the Brenner route forms not only the one of lowest alt.i.tude, but also the only one by which the whole Alpine system and its parallel chains can be crossed by pa.s.sing over one chain alone, and in no other spot in the range do two valleys on either side cut so far into the centre of the princ.i.p.al chain of the Alps.

Moreover, from Plutarch's "Marius" one learns the spot where the Roman general, Quintus Lutatius Catullus, and his legions, which were sent from panic-stricken Rome to check the advance of the invaders, first encountered the Cimbri on the banks of the River Adige between Verona and near the foot of the Brenner. The encounter ended in the triumph of the host of skin-clad invaders who descended the snow-slopes of the mountains with an onslaught so terrible that even the trained and well-armed hosts of Rome had to give way before them. But the power of Rome was not easily shaken, and the triumph of the Cimbri was but brief. Their southward march was destined very soon to meet with so severe a check that further advance on Rome, or into the heart of Italy, was rendered impossible. In 101 B.C., the year following their appearance in the beautiful province of Venetia, where they created, so historians tell us, a terrible panic, the Roman arms triumphed at Vercelli, when the invaders, led by Bojorich, suffered a crushing defeat in one of the bloodiest battles ever fought, in which it is said 320,000 were slain, and were driven out of Italy.

The moral effect of this invasion upon the Rhaetians, through whose territory the Cimbri had pa.s.sed, bore fruit a few years later, when they attempted the same tactics, making frequent raids into Roman territory. Some sixty years after the incursion of the Cimbri they were defeated and driven back into their valleys and mountains by the Roman general, Munatius Plancus; and a few years later, in 36 B.C., not only was a fresh raid repulsed, but the invaders were followed home, and a considerable portion of the district in the neighbourhood of what is now known as Trent was taken possession of by the Roman forces.

[Sidenote: ROMAN CONQUEST OF TYROL]

The Rhaetians, however, were a hardy, valorous, and pugnacious tribe, and so frequent were their attacks upon the Roman forces left to hold the conquered country that the Emperor Augustus, about twenty years after the subjection of the Trent district, decided as a measure of self-protection on the conquest of the whole of Rhaetia, as far as the River Danube.

And for this work he deputed his two stepsons, Drusus and Tiberius.

The campaign, historians are agreed, was planned with great skill, and probably by the Emperor himself. The Roman forces were divided, one portion, under Drusus, entering Tyrol from the south, having Tridentum (Trent) as its base; and the other, under Tiberius, delivering its attack from the west across what is now Switzerland. Tiberius took this route (the most direct, though a difficult one) because at that time he was absent from Italy, in Gaul, as governor. Drusus had a more easy task, and pushed his way up the wide valley of the River Adige[2]

to the present site of Bozen. His objective was the Pa.s.s of the Brenner, which, once seized, would give him the command of the country. His advance was not, however, made without opposition, for the Breones and Genones, who dwelt in the vicinity of the Brenner, attacked the Roman forces, and a fierce battle and series of skirmishes ensued. Horace, in Book IV., Ode 14 and 4, gives a vivid if, possibly, highly coloured account of the struggle which took place in the gorge near Bozen. The river Icarous ran red with the blood of both conquerors and conquered. And--as has been the case on many subsequent occasions when fighting has had to be done by the Tyrolese--the women played a valorous part, even, according to the historian, Florus, throwing their infant children into the faces of the Roman soldiery when other weapons failed.

The campaign of the two stepsons of Augustus resulted in the complete and final conquest of Tyrol. The victory, won in the narrow gorge of the Eisack, was commemorated in the name of the bridge _Pons Drusi_ spanning the river, hard by which now stands the interesting mediaeval town of Bozen.

Successful as Drusus' forces were, none the less so were those of Tiberius. There, however, is less record of his battles, and the actual ground on which they were fought forms still matter for conjecture. And equally uncertain is the exact spot where the two victorious generals ultimately met. It is, however, thought by several reliable authorities to have been somewhere in the valley of the Inn, and probably not far distant from the present site of Innsbruck. This view is made the more probable from the circ.u.mstance that a Roman post was established at Wilten (now a suburb of Innsbruck) then known as Veldidena.

Here probably both armies rested after a campaign of great fatigue and severity owing to the nature of the ground over which it was fought and the stubborn resistance offered by the inhabitants.

Soon Veldidena, from a halting-place of armies, became a town with houses of considerable size, temples, baths, and surrounding _vallae_, or earthen fortifications formed to defend the inhabitants from sudden attack. Although precautions of the nature we have indicated were taken wherever a Roman post or station was placed, there is no historical data to show that the Breones and other adjacent tribes who were thus brought under the Roman sway did not very speedily accommodate themselves to the new condition of things and become good and peaceful citizens of Rome. It appears probable, however, that the Rhaeti did not adapt themselves to the altered conditions as speedily as did their northern neighbours, the inhabitants of Noric.u.m, with whom certain Roman habits and customs (including the system of munic.i.p.al government) already obtained.

From the evidence adduced by several diligent historians and from that of one comparatively modern writer[3] in particular it is almost certain that after the sanguinary and decisive battle on the banks of the Eisack Tiberius set his face once again westward to resume his governorship of Gaul, leaving his brother, Drusus, to continue the subjection of Tyrol, and ultimately to found the important settlement of Augusta Vindelicorum, now known as Augsburg. Here the Roman general not only threw up a fortified camp, but also built a forum to encourage commerce; and soon the settlement became the most important Roman station to the north of the Central Alps.

Some writers, doubtless bearing in mind the hardihood and bravery of the native inhabitants and the mountainous and thus easily defended nature of the ground the Roman legions had to traverse and fight over, have expressed some surprise at the comparative ease with which Drusus and Tiberius appear to have accomplished the conquest of the country.

More perfect discipline and arms of greater effectiveness will not, however, we think, altogether account for this, for history has over and over again proved that knowledge of the ground by the defenders and mountainous regions count heavily against successful attacks on the part of an invader. It can only therefore be supposed that the various tribes who formed the inhabitants of Rhaetia were either antagonistic to one another or at least were not welded together in a common cause against the invading Roman hosts, and thus the country was conquered and kept in subjection with greater ease than would otherwise have been the case.

As a result of the invasion by Drusus and Tiberius and the Roman legions the tract of country then and for some considerable time afterwards known as Rhaetia, but now known as Tyrol and the Vorarlberg, ultimately became Romanized, and by the making of the Brenner Post Road, which was constructed by the direction of the Emperor Augustus between Verona and Augsburg (Augusta Vindelicorum), communication between the Germanic Empire and Italy was opened up. Thus was the lowest and most accessible of the pa.s.ses over the mountains which separated Italy from the barbaric regions beyond crossed by one of those splendid military roads, which has endured nearly two thousand years until the present day.

[Sidenote: ROMAN OCCUPATION]

The Roman occupation of Rhaetia lasted for five centuries. Under the rule of Rome the inhabitants learned much of those arts which remained the heritage of conquered races long after the sway of the great Roman Empire had come to an end. And traces of that rule, in the form of weapons, ornaments, articles of jewelry and the toilet, and other relics have from time to time come to light throughout the portions of Tyrol settled by the Romans.

Soon along the great Brenner Road, which formed a highway from Italy to the northern lands beyond Tyrol, activity evinced itself. One of the most important of the early stations upon it was Veldidena (Wilten), where the road after crossing the main range of mountains emerges from the Alpine gorge on the northern side into a wide and pleasant valley. From this point--close to which, later on, the capital of Tyrol was destined to be founded--the great Brenner Post Road branched. One fork led by two divergent ways to the same objective--Augsburg. The other led in a north-westerly direction by way of Masciac.u.m (Matzen) and Albianum (Kufstein) to Pons Aeni, which in all probability closely approximates to the present-day site of Rosenheim. This road ran down the wide Inn valley, nowadays known as the Unter Innthal to differentiate it from the valley of the Upper Inn which runs from the frontier of Switzerland to Innsbruck.

It was along the great military road leading from Verona to Augsburg that the chief Rhaeto-Roman stations were placed. Amongst these were Tridentum (Trent), Pons Drusi (Bozen), Vilpetenum (Sterzing), Matrejum (Matrei), Scarbio (Scharnitz), Veldidena (Wilten).

At first, doubtless, these outposts of Roman civilization were little more than isolated fortresses, or even perhaps merely _speculae_ or watch towers, and of these many examples still remain, from which not only could the road and its approaches be reconnoitred, but also signals both by day and by night could be made. In the first case by means of smoke or semaph.o.r.es, and in the second by bonfires kindled in cressets or on the hillside itself.

[Sidenote: THE BRENNER Pa.s.s]

Another highway into Tyrol through the Vintschgau came to be known as the Via Claudia Augusta, which name was also improperly applied to a portion of the Brenner Road. After much contention we think it is now generally accepted that Mommsen, who has investigated and weighed the evidence with astonishing care, is correct in a.s.suming that the only portion of the road via the Reschen-Scheideck Pa.s.s which should be called the Via Claudia Augusta is that traversing the Vintschgau Valley. The road was constructed not in the reign of Augustus, who initiated the Brenner Road, but in that of his grandson, the Emperor Claudius, about A.D. 46-47. It was intended to connect up the River Po with the River Danube by the Reschen-Scheideck route, and along it at various times since the middle of the sixteenth century milestones of Roman origin have been discovered. Though from the fact that little reference is made to it by the better-known Roman writers of the period, one may a.s.sume that the Via Claudia was of quite secondary importance to the Brenner Road. But nevertheless it seems probable that it was the route used for the transportation of stores for the Roman forces of occupation during the fifth century not long prior to the evacuation of the country. The Brenner Road for a considerable period after its construction appears to have been rather a highway for commerce than a military road in the usual sense of the term.

The chief article exported from Tyrol was salt from the still famous salt mines at Hall, near Innsbruck, on the northern bank of the Inn.