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FIEBERBRUNN is a market town in Tirol, Austria,
in the Kitzbühel district and has a
population of 4,180 (2001). It is the most
populous municipality in the Pillersee
valley.
Fieberbrunn is a winter sports resort and venue
of international snowboarding events (such as the
Lords of the Boards), as well as a hiking and
mountaineering resort in summer.
The Pillerseetal today comprises the five rural
municipalities of Waidring, St. Ulrich am
Pillersee, St. Jakob in Haus, Fieberbrunn and
Hochfilzen. At a very early stage in history, St.
Ulrich, St. Jakob, Fieberbrunn and Hochfilzen
were known as the ‘Hofmark
Pillersee’, which be-longed to the
Benedictine Order of Rott am Inn (Bavaria), while
Waidring was the ‘Urbar Waithering’
(or ‘cultivated land of Waithering’)
owned by the monastery of St. Peter in
Salzburg.
The probable reason for this geographical
division was the drawing up of the borders to
Bavaria and Salzburg, for the old salt road from
Bad Reichenhall and Hallein across the Strub
mountain used to pass through Waidring on its way
west.
The possessions which the Benedictine monastery
at Rott am Inn needed to secure its economic
livelihood were scattered around the area. The
documentary evidence in Latin states:
‘TOTUM BILLERSEE CUM ECCLESIA EIUSDEM LOCI,
DECIMIS ET APPEN-DICIS SUIS’ (‘All of
Pillersee with a church in the same place, with
tithes and appendices’). This refers to one
cohesive area of property, the Hofmark
Pillersee.
The area around Fieberbrunn was originally
called ‘Pramau’, which meant
blackberry bush in Old German. The name is a
typical term for cleared woodland and expresses
the infertile state of the area before it began
to be farmed. The place name of Fie-berbrunn
(literally: ‘fever well’) was only
coined after 1354, when according to legend
Margarethe Maultasch, princess of the province of
Tyrol, was healed from a fever by taking the
waters at the Kirchhügel spring.
The parish church was built in 1689 but since
1855 the entire exterior has been changed three
times.
In 1855 it was rebuilt in the Romanesque style;
in 1954 the form was simplified. The last rebuild
occurred in the 1980s. But the church retains its
original baroque character even after all these
'modernisations'.
The patron saints of the church are the Roman
martyrs Saint Primus and Saint Felizian.
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The parish church, decorated for Christmas
services (left)
At the midnight mass on Christmas Eve the church
was packed with local residents and Christmas
visitors including some from our hotel. The music
was provided by a choir and soloists, a small
orchestra and the parish organist.
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During the day, following a morning visit to
Kitzbühel, tour group was entertained in the
late afternoon at a concert by the local brass
band, a harpist, and a trio specialising in local
folk songs and yodelling.....
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