Weitra

Weitra was granted the right to brew in 1321 and the privilege has been exercised continuously since, which is the basis of its claim as the oldest brewing town in Austria; at one point the town held dozens of house-brewing rights and the Bürgerspital brewery still operates, with a brewing museum in the castle. The town is small, walled in part, and its square carries a set of houses covered in sgraffito - scratched plaster decoration in geometric and figurative patterns from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, restored in the twentieth. The castle above began as a thirteenth-century fortress, was rebuilt as a Renaissance residence by Wolf Rumpf after 1581 and passed in 1607 to the Fürstenberg family, who still own it; it has an arcaded courtyard and a theatre used in summer.

History

Hadmar II of Kuenring, owner also of Dürnstein, began the first castle around 1201 on estates his family had acquired in 1185; the Kuenrings fell from favour for siding with Ottokar II of Bohemia, and Duke Albert I of Austria took Weitra in 1296, when a town wall is first recorded. The border fortress was besieged by the Hussites and in 1486 by Matthias Corvinus, in 1581 Emperor Rudolf II gave it to his chamberlain Wolf Rumpf, who rebuilt the castle in Renaissance style, and in 1607 it passed to Frederick IV of Fürstenberg, whose family still owns it, restored in 1994. Weitra counts as the oldest beer-making place in Austria, with breweries recorded since the 14th century, and a narrow-gauge railway to Gmünd reached it in 1903 (Wikipedia, Weitra).

The main sights

• A brewing right from 1321 - exercised continuously, with a museum in the castle.
• Sgraffito façades - scratched plaster decoration across houses on the square.
• A Renaissance castle - Fürstenberg-owned, with an arcaded courtyard and theatre.
• Fragments of the town wall - the medieval enclosure in part.

When to go

April to October; summer for the castle theatre. Half a day.

Good to know

Very small and quiet - half a day is plenty. Castle and museum opening is seasonal. The western Waldviertel is remote and public transport is thin; a car is easier.

Nearby

Gmünd and the Blockheide are north; the Czech border is west.

Key facts