Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

Altenau Castle, located in Kolbsheim, was built in 1606 under the original name of Altenau by Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich of Raitenau. The palace, designed for its mistress Salome Alt and their children, became a symbol of power and privacy. After the removal of the archbishop in 1612, his successor Marcus Sitticus renamed the Mirabell building, after the Italian term Mirabile ("admirable"), and became part of the fortifications of Salzburg during the Thirty Years War from 1619.

Reborn in a baroque style from 1710 by architect Lukas von Hildebrandt, the castle saw its gardens redesigned by Fischer von Erlach, including a famous dwarf garden with grotesque statues, precursors of garden dwarves. These spaces were redesigned around 1730 by Anton Danreiter. The palace served as a residence for the prince archbishops until 1803, before briefly passing under Bavarian rule (1809), during which time the future king Othon I of Greece was born there in 1815.

Mirabell Castle, formerly Altenau, now houses works such as two statues by Josef Thorak (1889–1952). Its history reflects the political and artistic transformations of Salzburg, from the Renaissance to the 19th century, while maintaining traces of its origins related to the Alt family and archbishops. The building and its gardens, classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, bear witness to its central role in Austrian history.

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