Glorenza

Seven Hundred Years Young

The Name

The village, which rose on a marshland, has had a name of pre-Roman or Rhaeto-Romanic origin since 1163 (the Rhaetians were the native population, later subjugated to the Romans): Glurnis, or Glurns, meaning “marshland of the hazelnuts”, or rather “flood bed of the alders” or “of the hazelnuts”.

History

• 1163: the name Glurnis appears for the first time. The village is already quite important as a trade junction between Austria, Switzerland and Lombardy.
• 1223: the counts of the Tyrol extend their control as far as the extreme territories of Venosta Valley (Vinschgau in German) and, in order to counterbalance Malles, the ancient judgment seat of the Bishop of Coira, they install a court of law in Glurns.
• 1294: duke Mainardo transfers the market of Saint Bartholomew here, while in 1317 his son, king Arrigo, issues safe-conduct certificates to Bormio and other northern Italian towns in order to enlarge Glorenza’s market. What was once a humble cluster of houses is by now a fortified village, a cross-roads and a trading center.
• 1304: in a letter of concession written by duke Otto on the 30th of April, specific reference is made to “our town of Glorenza”: thus it is possible to suppose there was an elevation to the rank of town in this year if not previously.
• 1332: in the valley the “Glorenza measurement” is imposed in the weighing of goods, testifying to the great importance of this town which, thanks to the right it enjoys to store goods, collects storage and toll taxes and possesses the monopoly on the sale of the salt coming from the Tyrolese town of Hall. Merchants arrive in Glorenza from Lombardy, Trentino, Switzerland and Bavaria: in its most prosperous period during the Medieval Ages the town registers six inns and many notaries.
• 1363: through Margherita Maultasch the town passes from the counts of the Tyrol to the lords of Matsch and their heirs, the Trapp counts, who hold it until 1824.
• 1423: the town has its own representative in the Diet of Tyrol which is held in Merano, and its rank places it in seventh position among the 18 towns of the Tyrol county.
• 1496: the duke of Milan, Ludovico il Moro and his ally, the Emperor Maximilian I, meet in Glorenza. It is probable that Leonardo da Vinci was also present as a member of the Milan delegation.
• 1499: involved in the war of the Engandina, on May 22nd Glorenza is destroyed by the Swiss troops. It is said that Maximilian I cried over the smoking ruins. The town we see today is in large part fruit of the reconstruction ordered by Maximilian and continued under Ferdinand I of Hapsburg. The walls are completed in 1555, the entire fortified complex in 1580.
• 1799: on March 25th stray French troops penetrate the undefended town and engage in all kinds of violence: the houses and barns are set on fire, and the women raped.
• 1855: on June 16th the two and one-half meter-high waters of the lake of Muta break violently against the town walls. In 1930 the commercial crisis and the transfer of the courts lead to a general decline in Glorenza, which has been rediscovered and reawakened today thanks to tourism.

Time is suspended in the little town loved by the Emperor

With its 885 inhabitants, Glorenza is one of the smallest towns in Europe.

The city walls, the only town fortification in South Tyrol that remained intact, embrace an urban plan whose medieval origin is apparent, although the architectural 16th-century style prevails.

After the destruction resulting from the battle of Calven (1499), the military architect Jörg Kölderer presented the emperor Maximilian with a plan to enlarge the city walls with gateways and semicircular towers. This restructuring, which took many years, was completed around 1580. The walls as they are today, with their parapet walk and 350 embrasures, their seven towers with spires and three gates with original hinges and imposts, give the town a late-medieval appearance.

The Porta di Tubre, probably erected for residential use, was used as a gateway after the new walls were constructed.

The former law court was constructed around 1510 by order of the jurisdiction officer Jörg von Liechtenstein (his tombstone is located inside the parish church) in the western garden of the Flurin tower.

Castel Glorenza is the name given to a noble residence of the 18th century. With its internal courtyard, tower and residential wing, it was added to a pre-existing medieval rampart and incorporated into the new fortified walls in 1510.

Splendid with its bow-window (in German Erker) and internal frescoes, Casa Frölich is a refined corner house which assumed its present-day appearance in 1570, after a long period as the property of the counts of Matsch. The lovely sundial is decorated with the blazons of Balthasar Frölich and his two wives. The painting on the rear façade is a medieval allegory of the seven deadly sins, of which only pride and avarice have survived.

The adjacent edifice, whose lovely Renaissance-style main door shows entwined sea horses, once belonged to the Charterhouse of the Angeli delle Val Senales, who also owned a second construction in Piazza Città. In its place the knight Reinprecht von Hendl ordered the construction of his 3-story town residence in 1562. Today, completely restored, it houses the Corona Hotel.

Other lovely dwellings include Casa Gebhard in Via Argento, with its graffito-decorated windows, and the Hössische Behausung next to the Malles gate, with its delicate erker on the external façade.
At no. 2 via Portici rises Torre Flurin, which from 1499 to 1931, together with the attached constructions, was the tribunal seat. The tower has a long history: in 1382 it was sold by Flurin von Thurn, a Glorenza judge, to the lords of Matsch, and until 1950 it continued to belong to their descendants, the Trapp counts. From 1825 to 1931 it also housed the prison.

At no. 14 via Portici stands the Casa del Balivo, (bailiff’s house), an elegant scalloped dwelling. Its Gothic doors are admirable, with their tufa cornices, as are the arched ceilings of the three stories.

Torre Kolben, already cited in feudal registers in 1330, belonged to noble families until 1793, when it passed to the town miller.

The present-day town hall, promoted to noble residence in 1604 with the name Ansitz Hendlspurg, was constructed between 1573 and 1591. The Church dell’Ospedale, dedicated to the Madonna, was erected between 1665 and 1669 after the fire which destroyed the ancient Church of the Spirito Santo in 1664.

Immediately outside, beyond the Adige river, stands the parish church of Saint Pancrazio, whose current style dates back to the late 15th century, although it is of Romanesque origin, as testified by the bell-tower, to which the baroque onion-shaped dome was added in 1664. On the northern wall of the bell-tower we can admire a large fresco representing the Last Judgment, a 1496 work influenced by the Michael Pacher style.

Outside the walls, among vast extensions of cultivated fields, stands the church of S. James al Maso Söles, a late-Gothic construction of 1570-80 erected by the Bishop Prince of Salzburg Johannes Khuen-Belasi in a sign of friendship towards the local feudal lords.

Local Products

An excellent locally-produced speck (Tyrol smoked ham), a rye bread called Calva bread made with spelt flour and the apples of the Val Venosta are typical Glorenza products.

Local dishes

Glorenza’s menu is exquisitely Tyrolese: it might start with a fragrant appetizer of speck, cheeses and rye and buckwheat bread, followed by a tasty country soup or by the typical canederli, or knödeln (dumplings).

Main courses are based on pork or lamb, served with very sweet potatoes.

Home-made soft fruit tarts, krapfen filled with jam and strudel complete our meal.