Giant bellows once used to superheat a furnace stand outside the Riepler Schmiede, a rare survival in Lienz, East Tyrol, Austria, of a traditional ‘hoof and nail’ forge or smithy. It once served a Dominican convent and also warmed a public bath-house, but closed in the 1600s after frequent fires. This view dates from 2006, after it was re-opened as a museum and working forge. The museum has since shut, but the rubble building of survives. In Austria and southern Germany, Riepler was an old term for locksmith.
Lienz, East Tyrol, Austria: giant bellows outside the Riepler Schmiede, a former forge or smithy , subsequently a museum (now closed), whose furnace used to warm the waters of an adjacent public bath-house before frequent fires led to the smithy’s closure in the 1600s. Lienz, at the confluence of the rivers Isel and Drava in the Eastern Alps, is a medieval town, chartered in the 1200s AD. Throughout the Middle Ages, its strategic position and access to trade routes made it important. In the late 1000s or early 1100s AD, it was purchased by a dynasty from Aquileia in Italy, the Counts of Gorizia, who, from about 1127, called themselves the Counts of Görz. When the House of Görz died out in 1500, the town went to the Habsburgs, then ruled by Archduke of Austria and future Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I. Today, Lienz lies in the District of East Tyrol (also known as East Tirol and in German as the Osttirol). East Tyrol is an exclave of the Austrian state of Tyrol, separated from the rest of Tyrol (known as North Tyrol) by Italy and the province of Salzburg: after the First World War, the province of South Tyrol (Alto Adige in Italian), part of Tyrol under the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was given to Italy.
Size: 2000px × 3008px
Location: Rieplerschmiede, Riepler Schmiede, Riepler-Schmiede, Lienz, East Tyrol, East Tirol, Osttirol, Austri
Photo credit: © Terence Kerr / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
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