Monat: Juni 2023

On the occasion of the redesign of the staircase in front of the church Maria am Gestade in the Inner City, the Hannaken Fountain designed by Rudolf Schmidt was opened in 1937. The term Hannaken refers to an ethnic group from the Hanna region in Moravia (now the Czech Republic), who inhabited a plain between the Haná and Morava rivers and developed their own style of dress as well as a specific folk culture.

The fountain represents the legend of a „Hannakenkönig“ who lived in the adjacent inn „Zum Wolf in der Au“ and is said to have thrown a beating at the feet of passing passers-by at night in order to earn money from the treatment required afterwards. Popularly known as „Hanake“, he is said to have worked as a bather, offering all kinds of physical services such as bloodletting, dental treatment or wound care.

The scene is shown of helpers taking the wounded man – often well-heeled drunks who had just left the inn – to the place of treatment. Also the winged word „throwing a beating at the feet“ is said to have originated from this. Incidentally, the fountain is made of Lindabrunn stone, which was already popular with the Romans in Vienna.

The City Hall on Vienna’s Ringstrasse in the historicist neo-Gothic style was completed in 1883 after 11 years of construction according to the plans of Friedrich von Schmidt. The location is due to the initiative of the Viennese mayor Cajetan Felder, who rejected the originally planned building site opposite today’s Stadtpark and was finally able to convince Emperor Franz Josef I. to build on the former parade ground.

The monumental building, modeled on Flemish Gothic town halls, bears a multitude of reliefs, statues of historical figures, artists, representatives of civic professions, citizen soldiers and shield bearers with the coats of arms of the suburbs, both inside and out. The building is crowned by a 5.4 m high and 1.8 t heavy town hall man in the form of a standard bearer, which is placed on the 98 m high main tower.

The building, which was severely damaged during WWII, was then renovated until the 1970s, the last general renovation taking place in 2012-2014. In addition to the mayor, the municipal council, the city senate, the provincial government and various municipal departments, including the director of the magistrate’s office, also reside in the building.

The Jewish cemetery in the 18th district of Währing was the main burial place of the Jewish Community in Vienna from 1784 to 1879. After its closure, some people were transferred to other cemeteries, and with the Nazi invasion, more skeletons were exhumed to protect them from desecration of corpses.

Further, in 1942 a number of remaining bones were excavated for „racial surveys“ and then buried in the new Jewish section of the Central Cemetery after WWII. In spite of the fact that many graves do not contain any mortal remains today, the cemetery also shows a tour through the upper middle class of the Ringstrasse era, which has shaped Vienna until today, because of the prominent Jewish citizens.

The cemetery, which is currently open once a month and has around 8,000 remaining graves, is being renovated step by step with the help of donations, sponsors, volunteers and the City of Vienna by the association „Rettet den jüdischen Friedhof Währing“ (Save the Jewish Cemetery Währing). Two themed paths and a permanent exhibition in the Tahara House provide information about history and current developments.

The Minoritenkirche (Friars Minor Conventual Church) in downtown Vienna, remarkable in many respects, houses a replica of Leonardo da Vinci’s „The Last Supper,“ probably the world’s most famous wall fresco, made by the Roman mosaic artist Giacomo Raffaelli starting in 1805/06.

Originally commissioned by Napoleon Bonaparte for the Louvre Museum, the Roman mosaic was also intended to serve as a safeguard for the original, already in poor condition, in the refectory of the Dominican monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan from 1497.

After the fall of Napoleon, Emperor Franz II/I originally purchased the 9.2×4.5m work for the Belvedere. Due to its size, it was installed in the Minorite Church above the Cenacolo side altar and inaugurated in 1847. The world’s largest reproduction of the 20-ton mural on twelve 24cm thick stone slabs between 2 inscriptions captivates to this day by the detailed execution and high artistic quality.