Prejudice and racism toward immigrants were and are common practice in Innsbruck, as in all societies. Whether Syrian refugees since 2015 or Turkish guest workers in the 1970s and 80s, what is foreign generally evokes little goodwill among the average Tyrolean. Today, Italy may be the favorite travel destination of Innsbruck’s residents and pizzerias an integral part of everyday gastronomy, but for a long time our southern neighbors were the group viewed with the greatest suspicion. What Jews and “brick-Bohemians” were to Viennese around 1900, “Walsche” were to Tyroleans. Aversion toward Italians in Innsbruck can look back on a long tradition. Although Italy did not yet exist as an independent state, the political landscape was shaped by many small counties, city-states, and principalities between Lake Garda and Sicily. Linguistically and culturally, the individual regions also differed from one another. Nevertheless, over time people began to see themselves as Italians and were also perceived as such abroad. Most of those with whom Innsbruck’s residents came into contact belonged to the upper class, which automatically generated a certain level of resentment. During the Middle Ages and the early modern period, they lived in Innsbruck as members of the administrative apparatus, the court, as bankers, wholesale merchants, or spouses of various territorial princes. The hostility between Italians and Germans was mutual. Each side regarded the other, depending on perspective, as dishonorable, unreliable, arrogant, vain, morally corrupt, and lazy, or conversely as uncivilized, barbaric, uneducated, and porcs.

With the wars between 1848 and 1866, hatred toward everything Italian reached a new peak in the “Holy Land of Tyrol,” although many “Walsche” served in the imperial and royal army and much of the rural population among the Italian-speaking Tyroleans remained loyal to the monarchy. Italians—especially Garibaldi’s troops—were seen as godless agitators and republicans and were denounced from church pulpits between Kufstein and Riva del Garda, both in Italian and in German. The Tyrolean press played a major role in the conflict. After the liberalization of the press in 1867, newspapers achieved a new level of reach. What social media contributes to social division today was in many ways performed by newspapers at that time. Conservatives, Catholics, Greater Germans, liberals, and socialists each had their own press organs, and loyal readers of these hardly neutral publications lived within their own opinion bubbles. The Innsbrucker Nachrichten, with a circulation of about 15,000 copies, was the medium with the widest reach in Tyrol around the turn of the century. Although it did not have an explicitly stated political alignment, it was considered to be Greater German-liberal in outlook. On the Italian side, Cesare Battisti (1875–1916), who was executed by the Austrian military during the war for high treason by hanging, stood out in particular. The publicist and politician from Trento had initially begun studying at the German-speaking university in Vienna, but later transferred to the University of Florence. With a sharp pen, he repeatedly fueled the conflict of nationalities within the borders of the province in the Italian newspapers Il Popolo and L’Avvenire. Owing to his combination of socialist convictions and Italian patriotism, he was regarded by many Tyroleans as the number one enemy of the state and a traitor.

Associations also played a crucial role in the hardening of fronts. In 1867, not only press law but also the law governing associations was liberalized, triggering a veritable boom in new foundations. Sports clubs, gymnastics societies, theater groups, marksmen’s associations, or the Innsbrucker Liedertafel often served not only for leisure but functioned as political pre-organizations. Members met in their own venues and regularly organized club evenings, often also open to the public. Particularly politically active and extreme in their views were the student fraternities. The young men who gathered there came from the upper bourgeoisie or the aristocracy and were accustomed both to giving orders and to bearing arms. One third of the students in Innsbruck belonged to a fraternity, nearly half of them with a German nationalist orientation. Unlike today, it was not unusual for them to appear in public in full regalia—in their colors, that is, in uniform complete with saber, beret, and sash—often also armed with walking sticks and revolvers. Opposing them were the Italian-speaking students, who were inferior not only in numbers but also in organization. After the loss of Padua, Tyroleans of Italian descent no longer had the possibility of completing their studies in their mother tongue within the country; many therefore oriented themselves toward Innsbruck, where they were met with little sympathy. One of the greatest political points of contention between Italian- and German-speaking students was the establishment of an Italian university. The discussion about whether such a university should be located in Trieste (the preferred location of Italian-speaking representatives), Innsbruck, Trento, or Rovereto dragged on for years. Although attending university was essentially a matter for a small elite, irredentist and anti-Austrian Tyrolean deputies from the Trentino repeatedly succeeded in emotionally charging the issue as a symbol of the desired autonomy, given that, since 1867, all language groups within the monarchy were legally to be treated equally. German nationalist politicians such as Innsbruck’s mayor Wilhelm Greil—who was repeatedly reprimanded by the imperial governor of Tyrol for his improper conduct toward the Italian population—used the emotions surrounding the issue to stir up fears of foreign infiltration. Alongside ethnic and racist resentments toward their southern neighbors, conservatives in particular were also influenced by fear of figures such as Cesare Battisti, who as a socialist was seen as embodying absolute evil.

How great the supposed danger of an “Italianization” of Innsbruck by students from Trentino actually was is illustrated by demographic data. Even at that time, facts in public discourse were often replaced by gut feeling and racially motivated populism. After the incorporation of Pradl and Wilten in 1904, Innsbruck had just over 50,000 inhabitants. The proportion of students, at a little over 1,000, was under 2%. Of the roughly 3,000 people of Italian origin—most of them “Welsch Tyroleans” from the Trentino—just over 100 were enrolled at the university. The majority of the “Walsche” consisted of workers, innkeepers, traders, and soldiers. Many had long lived in and around Innsbruck. In somewhat more affordable Wilten, something akin to a “Little Italy” had emerged. Anton Gutmann sold Italian wines in his cellar cooperative “Riva” at Leopoldstraße 30, and across the street one could eat well and cheaply at the Steneck inn. Most of the immigrants, as subjects of the monarchy, spoke excellent German; only a small proportion came from Dalmatia or Trieste and were in fact foreign-language speakers. The differences were of a socio-cultural nature. There were their own associations such as the Club Ciclistico and the Unione Ginnastica, socialist-oriented workers’ and consumer organizations, music societies, and student fraternities.

Although students also made up only a small proportion among Italians, they and the demand for an institute with Italian as the language of instruction and examination received disproportionate attention. After considerable back and forth, it was decided in September 1904 to establish a provisional faculty of law in Innsbruck. This was intended to separate the students without alienating either group. From the outset, however, the project was ill-fated. No one wanted to rent the university the necessary premises. Eventually, the enterprising builder Anton Fritz made an apartment in one of his rental buildings at Liebeneggstraße 8 available. At the inaugural lecture and the festive evening event at the “Gasthaus zum Weißen Kreuz” on 3 November, prominent figures such as Battisti and the later Italian prime minister Alcide De Gasperi were present. As the evening progressed, the mood became increasingly exuberant. When jeering slogans such as “Porchi tedeschi” and “Abbasso Austria” (note: “German pigs” and “Down with Austria”) were shouted, the situation escalated. A crowd of German-speaking students armed with sticks, knives, and revolvers besieged the Weißes Kreuz, in which the Italians—also largely armed—had barricaded themselves. A unit of Kaiserjäger succeeded in dispersing the initial tumult; several Italians were arrested. In the process, the painter August Pezzey (1875–1904) was mistakenly fatally wounded by a bayonet thrust from an overly nervous soldier.

Following the night’s events, the Innsbrucker Nachrichten appeared on November 4 with the headline: “German blood shed!” The reporter present wrote of 100 to 200 revolver shots fired by the Italians at the “crowd of German students,” and of Pezzey’s death. The news of what had happened triggered a wave of acts of revenge and violence. As in any uprising, onlookers and rioters joined the politically motivated participants, people who enjoyed overstepping boundaries in the anonymity of the crowd without holding a genuine political conviction. While the Italians taken into custody sang the martial Inno di Garibaldi in the overcrowded city prison, serious riots broke out in the city against Italian establishments and businesses. The premises of the Weißes Kreuz were completely devastated in a display of loyalty to the monarchy, except for a portrait of Emperor Franz Joseph. Rioters threw stones at the residence of the already unpopular governor in Palais Trapp, because his wife had Italian roots. The building on Liebeneggstraße made available to the university by Anton Fritz was destroyed, as was his private residence.

Once the initial turmoil had subsided, a process of myth-making quickly began around the events. August Pezzey, who had died amid the chaos and came from a Ladin family, was declared a “German hero” in a wave of nationalist fervor by politicians and the press. He was given an honorary grave at the Innsbruck West Cemetery. At his funeral, attended by thousands of mourners, Mayor Greil delivered a pathos-laden speech:

"...A gloriously beautiful death was granted to you on the field of honour for the German people... In the fight against impudent acts of violence you breathed your last as a martyr for the German cause..."

Reports of the Fatti di Innsbruck reached the international press and contributed significantly to the resignation of the Austrian Minister-President Ernest von Koerber. Depending on the medium, Italians were portrayed either as dishonorable bandits or as courageous national heroes, while Austrians were depicted as pangermanist barbarians or as a bulwark against the “Welsch.” On 17 November, just two weeks after its ceremonial opening, the Italian faculty in Innsbruck was dissolved again. A university of their own remained denied to this linguistic group within Austria-Hungary until the end of the monarchy in 1918. The long tradition of viewing Italians as dishonorable and lazy was further intensified by Italy’s entry into the war in 1915 on the side of France and England. To this day, many Tyroleans continue to maintain negative prejudices toward their southern neighbors with great persistence.

1669 is considered the official founding year of one of the most important institutions in the history of the city of Innsbruck. On 15 October of that year, Emperor Leopold I granted the Tyroleans the privilege of the so‑called “Hall salt surcharge.” This tax levied on the highly sought‑after trading commodity produced in the state-owned saltworks made it possible to finance a university. The foundations for an institution of higher education had thus already been laid. The university emerged from the Latin school that had been founded just over a hundred years earlier by the Jesuits under Ferdinand I. The curriculum at the gymnasium focused on classical humanist education. Latin and Greek were essential core subjects, as they were necessary for participation in intellectual and political discourse. Scholarly books and many other written documents were still composed in Latin during the Early Modern period. Latin was also a prerequisite for holding senior positions in public service. The university brought new opportunities for education to Innsbruck. The first faculty to begin teaching was philosophy; theology, law, and medicine followed shortly thereafter. When Pope Innocent XI gave his blessing to the university in 1677, academic life was already fully underway. Professors and students of many different nationalities populated Innsbruck. The Jesuit order held several professorships, while other professors were appointed by the Diocese of Brixen. This led to tensions within the university, as the Jesuits primarily represented the interests of the territorial prince and the monarch, whereas the professors appointed by the diocese aimed to safeguard the political interests of the bishop. At this early stage of the Enlightenment, the separation of state, church, and scholarship was still far off. Positions, power, money, and influence were at stake—not only within the city itself.

A course of study usually lasted seven years before a graduate was permitted, as a sign of his status as a doctor, to wear a ring. During the first two years, every student was required to devote himself to philosophy before choosing a specialized field. In addition to instruction in the humanities, students participated in church services, theatrical performances, music-making, and practical skills such as fencing and riding, all of which were considered indispensable in the life of an educated young man. 

However, the university was more than merely an educational institution. In 1665, Innsbruck had lost its status as a residence city and thus much of its prestige and splendor. The operation of the university partially compensated for this degradation, as the aristocracy continued to be present in the city in the form of students. Students and professors altered the city’s social fabric. In the first decade following the foundation, nearly fifty different intellectuals from all parts of Europe taught philosophy in Innsbruck to more than 300 students. At social events such as processions, delegations like the Congregation of the Holy Virgin—whose members were drawn from the Jesuit-influenced university—were particularly prominent. Professors appeared in velvet robes of different colors depending on their discipline, while students carried the swords they were permitted to bear. Academics also spoke German differently from the local population, while official matters were usually conducted in Latin in any case. Work hard, play hard applied even then. The strictly supervised student routine in lecture halls and auditoriums was enlivened by a colorful mix of boisterous evening entertainment, excursions into the surroundings of Innsbruck, music-making, church processions, and theatrical performances. Unlike the soberly and modestly dressed inhabitants of Innsbruck, young men from well-to-do families appeared flamboyant and cheeky, in the manner of medieval dandies. They spoke among themselves in a way that must have seemed utterly ridiculous to outsiders.

Despite their social standing, students were often not diligent model pupils but rather young men accustomed to a certain lifestyle and status. Managing these young elites required a separate legal system. To a certain degree, students were subject to university jurisdiction, which was independent of municipal law. Only in cases involving capital punishment did the regional government have to be consulted. This created a diffuse and often contradictory system in which one segment of society was permitted, at least in certain situations, to do what was forbidden to another. Encounters between privileged youths and citizens, servants, and craftsmen did not always proceed smoothly. Upper-class teenagers were accustomed to carrying weapons and using them. Insults to honor could, much like in the military, lead to duels even in student circles. Especially in combination with alcohol, disturbances were not uncommon. Thus, in January 1674, “not only at night did disturbances, rumors, and improper actions occur,” and “students of the university were encountered carrying all sorts of prohibited weapons such as firearms, pistols, blunderbusses, stilettos, sabers, knives …”. Students were also officially forbidden to drink excessively. If this nevertheless occurred in one of Innsbruck’s taverns, the young offender would be reprimanded. If he was unable or unwilling to pay the bill, the aggrieved innkeeper could not bring a complaint before the court, as the excessive serving of alcoholic beverages to students was itself forbidden. To enforce university law, the rectorate maintained its own force. The Scharwache was armed with halberds and tasked with preventing student disturbances as effectively as possible. Six men served armed duty day and night to maintain order. The costs were shared by the city of Innsbruck and the university. There was also a dedicated carcer in which offenders could be detained on bread and water. Deprivation of liberty, fines, and even expulsion from the territory could be imposed by the university.

Throughout its history, the university was also a political institution and always a mirror of the prevailing spirit of the age. From the mid‑18th century onward, it served to educate loyal, Catholic civil servants for the state. The name Leopold‑Franzens University refers to the emperors Leopold and Francis, under whom the university was founded and later re-established. Twice, the university was downgraded to a lyceum or abolished altogether. Emperor Joseph II closed it, as did the Bavarian administration during the Napoleonic Wars. The Jesuit-influenced students and professors were viewed with suspicion and were excluded from the education system. Emperor Francis I, who during the Restoration again adhered more closely to the traditionally Catholic line of the Habsburgs, re-founded the university in 1826. Nevertheless, the university remained under observation even within Metternich’s police state. During the pre‑March period (Vormärz), nationalist and liberal forces were regarded with suspicion. The secret state police were present not only in lecture halls but also within student circles, in order to suppress potentially subversive ideas among young agitators at an early stage. Industrialization and the accompanying new economic, political, and social rules also transformed university life. In keeping with the spirit of the age, the inaugural lecture by the dean of the Faculty of Philosophy, Prof. Dr. Joachim Suppan (1794–1864), addressed a practical problem in physics so that “a more precise knowledge of the highly important and useful invention of the steam engine might also be achieved for domestic industry, where it has hitherto found no application.” The fact that Suppan, in addition to his degrees in philosophy and mathematics, was also an ordained priest illustrates the influence the Church still exerted on education in the 19th century. How closely the university remained connected to state authority as well as to the Church is shown by Suppan’s concluding admonition to the students to “one day render beneficial service to the fatherland through knowledge and virtue.” The national conflicts of the late Habsburg monarchy were likewise reflected in the university’s history. The 19th century was the age of associations—in the case of the university, student fraternities. In Innsbruck, conflicts between German-speaking and Italian-speaking students repeatedly caused tensions, reaching their climax in the Fatti di Innsbruck. Students with German nationalist leanings continued to play a major role at the university thereafter. Many of these young men had grown up in the Habsburg Empire and had served in the First World War. The ponderous parliamentary Republic of Austria appealed less to many young academics than the new political movements that likewise emerged during this period. Male elites were suddenly no longer among themselves alone. Women and sons of craftsmen had long been barred from studying at the university; now it at least became theoretically possible to advance socially through education. Five years after the founding of the Republic, the university celebrated its first female Doctor of Law. The press reported:

“This coming Saturday, Miss Mitzi Fischer will be awarded the degree of Doctor of Law at the University of Innsbruck. Miss Fischer is a native of Vienna. She also completed her secondary education in Vienna. After her matriculation examination, she pursued the study of law at the University of Innsbruck. The future doctor passed all examinations with distinction and would therefore, according to former custom, have to be promoted sub auspiciis imperatoris. In any case, Miss Fischer is the first woman to earn the doctoral degree in law at the University of Innsbruck.”

The enthusiasm of the young men—some of whom had returned from the fronts of the First World War—was partly directed toward fascist Italy, perceived as modern and dynamic, and later toward National Socialist Germany, both of which upheld traditional role models. With the Anschluss to the German Reich in 1938, the university was renamed once again. After the war, the German Alpine University became once more the Leopold‑Franzens University. The relative calm with which Innsbruck’s students behaved in 1968 was striking, much as it had been in 1848. While students in other European cities were the driving force of change, Innsbruck remained unruffled. In Paris, paving stones were thrown; in Innsbruck, boycotts and sit-ins sufficed. Although there were individual groups in the late 1960s and 1970s—such as the Communist Group Innsbruck, the Committee for Solidarity with Vietnam, the socialist VSStÖ, or the liberal‑Catholic Action within the Austrian National Union of Students—no mass movement emerged. The vast majority of students came from the upper classes and had completed their secondary education at Catholic-oriented grammar schools. Beethoven’s old observation that “as long as the Austrian still has his brown beer and sausages, he will not revolt” proved true. Only a few students could be inspired by solidarity with Vietnam, Mao Zedong, or Fidel Castro. Who would risk their own career in a country dominated by the trinity of the Tiroler Tageszeitung, Bishop Paulus Rusch, and a provincial parliament with an absolute ÖVP majority? Those who nevertheless dared to distribute rebellious leaflets or leftist literature had to reckon with media defamation, reprimands by the rectorate, or even visits from state authorities. Professors were seldom criticized, many of them still exuding in the 20th century the aloofness and unapproachable aura of Early Modern times, or making little effort to conceal their political convictions. More frequently criticized was the inadequate equipment of the modest lecture halls, given the constantly growing number of students. The great transformation of Austrian universities was not fought for but voted for. Under Federal Chancellor Bruno Kreisky, tuition fees were abolished. Education became attainable and conceivable for a larger number of young people. As a result, the number of students at Austrian universities rose from around 50,000 in 1968 to more than 73,000 by 1974.

Despite all adversities and curiosities over the centuries, the University of Innsbruck has, since its earliest days, generally enjoyed an excellent reputation. In the 20th and 21st centuries, faculty and students repeatedly achieved internationally acclaimed research results. Victor Franz Hess was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on cosmic radiation. Quantum physicist Anton Zeilinger was also associated with the University of Innsbruck, though not at the time of his award in 2022. Professors Fritz Pregl, Adolf Windaus, and Hans Fischer likewise received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, though none of them were active in Innsbruck at the time. The university hospital has likewise delivered outstanding achievements in both research and education, as well as in the daily medical care of the city, and is considered one of Innsbruck’s flagship institutions. The university is of great importance to the city not only intellectually and economically. Around 30,000 students populate and shape life between the Nordkette mountain range and the Patscherkofel. 

The year 1848 occupies a mythical place in European history. Innsbruck was not one of the hotspots like Paris, Vienna, Budapest, Milan or Berlin, but even in the “Holy Land” of Tyrol the revolutionary year left its mark. In contrast to the rural surroundings, an enlightened educated bourgeoisie had developed in Innsbruck. Enlightened people no longer wanted to be subjects of a monarch or territorial prince, but citizens with rights and duties in relation to a modern state. Students and members of the liberal professions demanded political participation, freedom of the press and civil rights. Workers demanded better wages and working conditions. Particularly radical liberals and nationalists even questioned the absolute authority of the Church. In March 1848 this socially and politically highly explosive mixture erupted in uprisings and street fighting in many cities. In Innsbruck, some students and professors celebrated the newly granted freedom of the press with a torchlight procession. On the whole, however, the revolution proceeded quietly in the rather leisurely Tyrol. To speak of a spontaneous outburst of emotion or even a revolution would already be an exaggeration: the date of the procession was postponed from 20 to 21 March because of bad weather. There were hardly any anti-Habsburg riots or violent incidents; a stray stone thrown into a Jesuit window was one of the highlights of the Alpine version of the Revolution of 1848. The students even supported the city magistrate in maintaining public order, thereby demonstrating their gratitude to the monarch for the newly granted freedoms and their loyalty.

The initial enthusiasm for change among the bourgeois elites was soon replaced in Innsbruck by a surge of German-national patriotism. On April 6, 1848, the governor of Tyrol led a ceremonial procession in which the German flag was displayed. A German tricolour was also hoisted on the city tower. While students, workers, liberal-national citizens, republicans, supporters of a constitutional monarchy, and Catholic conservatives could not agree on social issues such as press freedom, they shared a common hostility toward the Italian independence movement, which had spread across northern Italy from Piedmont and Milan. Innsbruck students and riflemen, with the support of the imperial army leadership, marched into the Trentino to suppress unrest and uprisings at an early stage. Notable members of this corps included the already elderly Father Haspinger, who had fought alongside Andreas Hofer in 1809, and Adolf Pichler. Johann Nepomuk Mahl-Schedl, a wealthy owner of Büchsenhausen Castle, even equipped his own company and marched over the Brenner Pass to secure the border. However, the war did not remain confined to the southern borders. Innsbruck itself, as the political and economic center of the multinational crown land of Tyrol and home to many Italian speakers, became an arena of the conflict between nationalities. Combined with ample alcohol consumption, anti-Italian sentiment posed a greater threat to public order than the demand for civil liberties. A dispute between a German-speaking craftsman and an Italian-speaking Ladin escalated to such an extent that it nearly triggered a pogrom against the numerous businesses and inns of Italian-speaking Tyroleans.

The relative calm of Innsbruck suited the imperial court in Vienna, which was under pressure. As unrest in the capital continued after March, Emperor Ferdinand fled to Tyrol in May. According to contemporary press reports, he was enthusiastically welcomed by the population.

"“What is the name of the land to which such an honour falls, what is the people that enjoys such trust in these fateful times? Does the peace and security here rest solely on legend from ancient times, or is there also in the present a foundation on which one can build, which the wind cannot blow away and the storm cannot shake? This Alpine land is called Tyrol, do you like it? Yes, the Tyrolean people alone prove, in the midst of a shaken Europe, reverence and loyalty, courage and strength for their hereditary ruling house, while all around rebellion, contradiction, defiance and demands, often even revolt and upheaval rage; Tyrol alone stands firmly without wavering in custom and obedience, in religion, truth and law, while elsewhere insolence and falsehood, madness and passions prevail …”"

In June, a young Franz Joseph—still not yet emperor—also stopped at the Hofburg on his return from the battlefields of northern Italy instead of traveling directly to Vienna. Innsbruck once again became a royal residence, albeit only for one summer. While blood was shed in Vienna, Milan, and Budapest, the imperial family enjoyed rural Tyrolean life. Ferdinand, Franz Karl, his wife Sophie, and Franz Joseph received guests from foreign courts and were driven by carriage to excursion destinations such as Weiherburg, Stefansbrücke, Kranebitten, and even up to Heiligwasser, and went on hikes. This calm did not last long. Ferdinand, considered no longer fit to rule, handed over power under gentle pressure to Franz Joseph I. In July 1848, the first parliamentary session was held in Vienna, and a constitution came into force. However, the monarchy’s willingness to reform soon waned. The new parliament—the Reichsrat—could not pass binding laws, the emperor never attended it, and he did not understand why a monarchy ordained by God needed such a council.

Nevertheless, liberalization continued, especially in cities. Innsbruck was granted the status of a city with its own statute. Municipal law introduced a form of citizenship tied to property or tax payments, granting certain rights. Local voting rights were extended to adult male citizens. Innsbruck politics came to be dominated by a greater German liberal faction of merchants, traders, industrialists, and innkeepers. On June 2, 1848, the first issue of the liberal, pro-German Innsbrucker Zeitung was published. Conservative readers preferred the Volksblatt für Tirol und Vorarlberg, while moderates read the Bothen für Tirol und Vorarlberg. Press freedom, however, was soon restricted again. Censorship was partially reintroduced, and newspapers were not allowed to write against the provincial government, monarchy, or Church.

"Anyone who, by means of printed matter, incites, instigates or attempts to incite others to take action which would bring about the violent separation of a part from the unified state... of the Austrian Empire... or the general Austrian Imperial Diet or the provincial assemblies of the individual crown lands.... Imperial Diet or the Diet of the individual Crown Lands... violently disrupts... shall be punished with severe imprisonment of two to ten years."

After Innsbruck had officially replaced Meran as the provincial capital in 1849 and had thus finally become the political centre of Tyrol, parties began to form. With the establishment of the Catholic-conservative faction and the liberals, a pair of opposing ideas emerged that would shape politics not only until the First World War. Associations of all kinds as political organisations in advance of parties, and newspapers, formed the lines along which society split in all questions of life from the cradle to the grave. From 1868 onwards, the liberal, greater German-oriented party provided the mayor of the city of Innsbruck. The influence of the Church declined in Innsbruck in contrast to the surrounding municipalities. Individualism, capitalism, nationalism and consumption stepped into the breach. New worlds of work, department stores, theatres, cafés and dance halls did not displace religion entirely even in the city, but the weighting shifted as a result of the civil freedoms won in 1848.

The probably most important legal change of 1848 was the land relief patent. In Innsbruck the clergy, especially Wilten Abbey, owned a large part of the agricultural land. The Church and the nobility were exempt from taxes. In 1848/49 feudal lordship and the relationship of subjection were abolished in Austria. Ground rents, tithes and compulsory labour were thus removed. The landowners received one third of the value of their land from the state within the framework of the reform, one third was regarded as tax relief, and one third of the compensation had to be borne by the peasants themselves. They could pay this amount in instalments over twenty years. The after-effects can still be felt today. The descendants of the peasants who were successful at the time enjoy, through inherited land ownership resulting from the 1848 reforms, the fruits of prosperity and also political influence through land sales for housing, leases and compensation payments by public authorities for infrastructure projects. The landowning nobility of the past had to come to terms with the humiliation of taking up bourgeois occupations. The transition from privilege by birth to privileged status within society through financial means, networks and education often succeeded. Many Innsbruck dynasties of academics have their origins in the decades after 1848.

Life also changed for the broader population. The previously unknown phenomenon of leisure time emerged and, together with disposable income available to a greater number of people, fostered hobbies. Civil organisations and associations—from reading circles to choral societies, fire brigades and sports clubs—were founded. The revolutionary year also manifested itself in the cityscape. Parks such as the English Garden at Ambras Castle or the Hofgarten were no longer reserved exclusively for the aristocracy but served citizens as local recreational areas. In St. Nikolaus the Waltherpark was created as a small oasis of calm. One floor above, the first swimming and bathing facility in Tyrol opened at Büchsenhausen Castle; soon afterwards another bath followed in Dreiheiligen. Excursion inns around Innsbruck flourished. Alongside high-end restaurants and hotels, a scene of taverns emerged in which workers and employees could also afford pleasant evenings with theatre, music and dancing.

The period between the French Revolution and the Battle of Königgrätz in 1866 was a highly warlike era. Many of the later political attitudes, animosities toward other groups, and the European nationalism of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries—which would also shape the history of Innsbruck—had their roots in the conflicts of this time. The monarchies of Europe, led by the Catholic Habsburgs, declared war on the French Republic. Although revolutionary Paris was far away and no comprehensive press system existed for the dissemination of news, the alleged godlessness of the murderers of Marie Antoinette was effectively spread through pamphlets and sermons from church pulpits. Fear arose that the revolutionary slogan “Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité,” along with its principles, might spread throughout Europe. During the Coalition Wars, a young general named Napoleon Bonaparte advanced across the Alps in 1796 with his Italian army and encountered Austrian troops. This was not merely a war over territory and power—it was a clash of systems. The Grande Armée of revolutionary France confronted the forces of the conservative and Catholic Habsburgs. Tyrolean riflemen (Schützen) actively participated in the fighting, defending the province’s borders against the advancing French. The men were accustomed to handling weapons and were considered skilled marksmen. The historian Ludwig Denk described this in a publication from 1860:

"...The Tyrolean's main passion is shooting. Early on, the father takes his son hunting. It is not uncommon to see boys running around with loaded rifles, climbing high mountains and shooting birds or squirrels..."

The strength of units such as the Hötting Rifle Company, established in 1796, lay not in open field battles but in guerrilla warfare. Moreover, they believed they had a secret weapon against the most advanced army of the time: the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Since 1719, Jesuit missionaries had spread devotion to the Sacred Heart even in the most remote valleys, successfully establishing it as a unifying force in the struggle against pagan customs and Protestantism. Faced with the godless revolutionary French, it seemed only natural that the Sacred Heart would once again—after 1703—watch protectively over the Tyrolean warriors of God. In desperate circumstances, the Tyrolean troops renewed their covenant. Against all odds, the riflemen succeeded in their defensive efforts. The abbot of Stams Abbey petitioned the provincial estates that, henceforth, “the Feast of the Divine Heart of Jesus should be celebrated annually with a solemn church service, if Tyrol were freed from the threat of enemy danger.”

Victory in this battle did not change the outcome of the war against Napoleon’s overwhelming forces, nor did it alter the territorial expansion of Tyrol—while Innsbruck’s population declined. During the turmoil of war, the Habsburg territory had expanded without notable military success—and likely without the help of the Sacred Heart. The archiepiscopal territory of Trentino became part of the crown lands through a territorial settlement known as the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss in the final phase of the Holy Roman Empire before its dissolution in 1803. Innsbruck, however, shrank. Fallen soldiers and war-related economic hardship led to a decline in the population from over 9,500 around 1750 to approximately 8,800 in the early decades of the nineteenth century. While this may seem modest in absolute numbers, the consequences were severe: stagnation in urban life. Young men were missing—as labourers, husbands, and fathers. This wartime recession remains largely underrepresented in the city’s historiography. Perhaps the near absence of Biedermeier architecture in Innsbruck can be seen as a subtle reminder of these difficult years. 

After the Napoleonic Wars and the reorganisation of Europe at the Congress of Vienna, Tyrol’s borders remained largely peaceful for around thirty years. This changed with the Italian Risorgimento, the national movement led by Sardinia‑Piedmont and France. In 1848, 1859, and 1866, the so‑called Italian Wars of Unification took place. Over the course of the nineteenth century—at the latest since 1848—a fervent nationalist enthusiasm spread among young men of the upper classes across Europe. Volunteer armies sprang up everywhere. Students and academics formed associations; gymnasts and riflemen alike sought to prove their newfound national identity on the battlefield, supporting official armies against their respective enemies. During this time, Innsbruck served as an important logistical hub as a garrison town. Following the Congress of Vienna, the Tyrolean Jäger Corps became the Imperial and Royal Tyrolean Kaiserjäger Regiment, an elite unit deployed in these conflicts. Volunteer formations such as the Innsbruck Academics and the Stubai Riflemen also fought in Italy. Thousands fell in battle against a coalition consisting of the traditional enemy France, the particularly “godless” Redshirts under Giuseppe Garibaldi, and the emerging Kingdom of Italy, formed at Austria’s expense under the leadership of the Francophile House of Savoy from Piedmont. The media further inflamed sentiment behind the front lines. The Innsbrucker Zeitung preached loyalty to the emperor and a Greater German‑Tyrolean nationalism, railed against Italians and the French, and celebrated the bravery of Tyrolean soldiers. One report stated:

“The strong occupation of the heights at the exit of the Valsugana near Primolano and Le Tezze has often given the Innsbruck Academics I and the Stubai riflemen cause to undertake voluntary excursions against Le Tezze, Fonzago, and Fastro, as well as to the right bank of the Brenta and the heights opposite the small camps of the Sette Comuni… On the 19th, the Stubai riflemen had already struck down several enemies when they ventured down for the first time, creeping up on them…”

Probably the most famous battle of the Wars of unification fand in Solferino 1859 in der Nähe des Gardasees statt. Entsetzt vom blutigen Geschehen entschloss sich Henry Durant das Rote Kreuz zu gründen. Der Schriftsteller Joseph Roth beschrieb das Geschehen auf den ersten Seiten seines Romans Radetzkymarsch.

"In the battle of Solferino, he (note: Lieutenant Trotta) commanded a platoon as an infantry lieutenant. The battle had been going on for half an hour. Three paces in front of him he saw the white backs of his soldiers. The first row of his platoon was kneeling, the second was standing. Everyone was cheerful and certain of victory. They had eaten copiously and drunk brandy at the expense and in honour of the emperor, who had been in the field since yesterday. Here and there one fell out of line."

The year 1866 proved particularly catastrophic for the Austrian Empire. In Italy, Venetia and Lombardy were lost. In the north, the Habsburg army suffered a devastating defeat at the Battle of Königgrätz. After this short “brother’s war,” Prussia took over leadership of the German Confederation from the Habsburgs. Austria’s reorientation toward the east meant that Innsbruck definitively became a city on the western periphery of the empire. This shift was accompanied by a resurgence of nationalist ideas, particularly among Innsbruck’s liberal upper bourgeoisie. Support for the “Greater German solution”—a united state with the German Empire rather than the Austro‑Hungarian Monarchy—was especially strong. The extent to which this German Question divided the city became apparent more than thirty years later, when the Innsbruck city council proposed naming a street after Otto von Bismarck. While conservative loyalists reacted with outrage, the liberal Greater German faction around Mayor Wilhelm Greil welcomed the idea. After the Second World War, the defeat at Königgrätz supported Austria’s narrative of being the first victim of National Socialism, as it had already been excluded from a unified German state in 1866.

To this day, the conflicts at Tyrol’s southern borders continue to shape tradition and the cityscape. The Sacred Heart celebrations were long marked by great pomp and, especially in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, developed into a volatile mixture of superstition, Catholicism, and ethnic nationalism directed against French and Italian influences. Countless soldiers continued to entrust their fate to the Sacred Heart even amidst the shellfire of the First World War. Alongside Cranach’s Madonna of Mercy, the flaming Sacred Heart remains one of the most popular Christian motifs in Tyrol and adorns the façades of countless buildings. With sites such as the Tummelplatz, the Pradl Military Cemetery, and the Kaiserjäger Museum on Bergisel, Innsbruck preserves several places of remembrance for these bloody conflicts, in which many of its residents marched off to war and never returned.

An Innsbruck student nearly changed the course of world history instead of Gavrilo Princip. In 1913, the young man boasted to a waitress about his plans to shoot the heir to the throne, but he was arrested before he could carry them out. Only when the world-changing shots were actually fired in Sarajevo a year later did an article appear in the Innsbrucker Nachrichten on June 30 about the events. The consequences that the First World War, which subsequently broke out, would have for the world and for people's everyday lives could not yet be foreseen after the assassination of Franz Ferdinand on June 28. Two days after the murder of the Habsburg heir in Sarajevo, readers in Innsbruck were already reading prophetic words in their newspaper: “We have arrived at a turning point – perhaps the turning point – in the destiny of this empire.” In Innsbruck, too, enthusiasm for war was widespread in 1914. Driven by the slogan of the time, “God, Emperor, and Fatherland,” the vast majority of people unanimously welcomed the attack on Serbia. Politicians, the clergy, and the press fuelled the general jubilation. Particularly “deserving” in promoting the war were the two theologians Joseph Seeber (1856–1919) and Anton Müllner, known as Brother Willram (1870–1919), who, through their sermons and writings such as The Bloody Year, elevated the war into a crusade against France and Italy. In addition to the imperial proclamation To My Peoples, which appeared throughout the media of the Empire, the Innsbrucker Nachrichten published an article on July 29, the day after Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, about Prince Eugene's capture of Belgrade in 1717. The tone in the media was celebratory, although not entirely without dark forebodings of what was to come.

"The Emperor's appeal to his people will be deeply felt. The internal strife has been silenced and the speculations of our enemies about unrest and similar things have been miserably put to shame. Above all, the Germans stand by the Emperor and the Empire in their old and well-tried loyalty: this time, too, they are ready to stand up for dynasty and fatherland with their blood. We are facing difficult days; no one can even guess what fate will bring us, what it will bring to Europe, what it will bring to the world. We can only trust with our old Emperor in our strength and in God and cherish the confidence that, if we find unity and stick together, we must be granted victory, for we did not want war and our cause is that of justice!"

Many Innsbruck residents volunteered for the campaign against Serbia, which was believed to be a matter of only a few weeks or months. So many volunteers poured into Innsbruck from outside the city to report to the recruitment commissions that the city was almost bursting at the seams. No one could imagine how differently things would turn out. After the first battles in distant Galicia, it became clear that this would not be over within a few months. The Imperial Riflemen (Kaiserjäger) and other Tyrolean troops were effectively sacrificed. Poor equipment, inadequate supplies, and the catastrophic leadership of the High Command under Conrad von Hötzendorf led thousands either to their deaths or into captivity, where hunger, abuse, and forced labour awaited them. In 1915, Italy entered the war on the side of France and Britain. Under the infamous secret Treaty of London, the young kingdom had been promised generous territorial gains in return for supporting the Entente against Germany and Austria. On May 23, the former ally declared war on the Habsburg Empire. Until regular troops could be transferred from the Eastern Front, regional defence depended on the Standschützen, a force consisting of men under 21, over 42, or those deemed unfit for regular military service. Correspondingly, casualties were high. Fighting in the mountain war stretched from the Ortler in the west across the northern shore of Lake Garda to the Sexten Dolomites. Innsbruck itself was not directly affected by military operations. At the very least, however, the sounds of war could be heard in the provincial capital, as reported in the newspaper of July 7, 1915:

“Soon after the Italians commenced hostilities, cannon fire could clearly be heard in the region of the Serles peak, coming from one of the battlefields in southern Tyrol, probably the Vielgereut plateau. In recent days, the sound of artillery fire has also undoubtedly been detected in Innsbruck itself and in the northeastern parts of the city — individual powerful blasts, dull rather than rolling and resonant, echoing across the Brenner Pass. There can be no mistake. In Innsbruck itself, the thunder of the guns is more difficult to detect because of the noise of the city, but on one occasion, around 9 p.m., when there was some degree of quiet, this unmistakable thunder, originating from our mortars, was clearly heard.”

Although the front was far away, the war increasingly penetrated civilian life. This total involvement of society in warfare was a new phenomenon. The mass mobilization of a large proportion of the working male population brought many businesses to a complete standstill. Shop shelves remained empty, public transport services ceased, and craftsmen and labourers were called up for military service. Companies still able to operate were subordinated to the wartime economy. By the “Hunger Winter” of 1917, Innsbruck’s economy had almost completely collapsed. Food, coal, and firewood were in short supply, and hunger and cold became bitter enemies of women, children, the wounded, and those unfit for military service. During the final years of the war, provisions were distributed through ration cards. The basic weekly allowance per person amounted to 500 grams of meat, 60 grams of butter, and 2 kilograms of potatoes. Archive photographs show long queues of desperate and hungry people outside food shops. Protests and strikes repeatedly broke out. Politicians, trade unionists, workers, and returning soldiers saw an opportunity for change. Under the slogan “Peace, Bread, and Suffrage,” parties of many different political backgrounds united in opposition to the war. The cityscape also changed. Barracks were erected in Höttinger Au to house prisoners of war. Wounded soldiers arrived in such large numbers that civilian buildings, including the university library then under construction and Ambras Castle, were converted into military hospitals. A predecessor of today’s Tram Line 3 was established to transport the wounded from the railway station to the new garrison hospital, today’s Conrad Barracks in Pradl. To cope with the large number of fallen soldiers, the Pradl Military Cemetery was created.

As the war neared its end, the front also drew closer. In February 1918, the Italian air force succeeded in dropping three bombs on Innsbruck. The Neue Freie Presse reported for the first time on the secret Treaty of London, heightening Tyrolean anxiety over the threatened loss of territory south of the Brenner Pass. By then, most people already knew the war was lost and sensed the fate that awaited Tyrol, as this article of October 6, 1918, demonstrates:

“External and internal enemies are gambling today with the land of Andreas Hofer. The latest throw of the dice is even more cruel; never before has a free land been bartered away so disgracefully. The blood of our fathers, sons, and brothers has been shed in vain if this shameful plan becomes reality. The final throw has not yet been made. Therefore, Tyroleans, attend the Tyrolean People’s Assembly in Brixen on October 13, 1918 (next Sunday). German soil must remain German; Tyrolean soil must remain Tyrolean. Tyroleans, decide your own future!”

On November 4, Austria-Hungary and the Kingdom of Italy finally agreed to an armistice. Part of the agreement granted Italy the right to occupy territory of the monarchy. Alarm bells immediately rang among Austria-Hungary’s allies in the German Empire. On the very next day, Bavarian troops entered Innsbruck. Germany was still at war with Italy and feared that the front might shift into North Tyrol, bringing it closer to German territory. Fortunately for Innsbruck and the surrounding region, Germany also capitulated one week later on November 11. As a result, major military engagements between regular armies were avoided.

Nevertheless, Innsbruck remained in danger. Massive convoys of military vehicles, trains packed with soldiers, and thousands of exhausted troops making their way home on foot passed through the city. Anyone who could jumped onto overcrowded trains or military vehicles to leave the front behind and return home. In November 1918 alone, more than 270 soldiers lost their lives during these reckless attempts or had to be admitted to one of the city’s hospitals. The city not only had to maintain order among its own citizens and ensure food supplies but also protect itself against looting. To preserve public order, the Tyrolean National Council established a citizens’ militia on November 5 composed of pupils, students, workers, and ordinary citizens. On November 23, 1918, Italian troops occupied the city and its surroundings. More than 80,000 Italian soldiers were stationed in Tyrol, around 5,000 of whom required accommodation in the starving and destitute city. Schools were turned into barracks. Mayor Greil’s conciliatory appeal to surrender the city peacefully succeeded. There were isolated disturbances, food riots, and incidents of looting, but there were no armed clashes with the occupation troops and no Bolshevik revolution such as the one that occurred in Munich.

The consequences of the First World War for Innsbruck’s population were devastating. More than 1,200 people lost their lives on battlefields or in military hospitals, while approximately 600 were wounded. Memorials to the First World War and its victims can be found throughout Innsbruck, particularly at churches and cemeteries. The Kaiserjäger Museum on Bergisel displays uniforms, weapons, and photographs from the war. The theologians Anton Müllner and Josef Seeber have streets named after them in Innsbruck. A street was also named after Archduke Eugene, commander-in-chief of the Austro-Hungarian Army on the Southern Front. A monument to the unsuccessful military leader stands in front of the Hofgarten. The eastern section of the Amras Military Cemetery commemorates the Italian occupation.

Political violence, alongside hunger and a severe housing shortage, shaped Austria throughout the 1920s and 1930s. The two major mass parties of the young republic, the Social Democrats and the Christian Socials, regarded each other with hostility. Both parties established paramilitary organizations to enforce their political agendas on the streets if necessary. The Republikanischer Schutzbund on the Social Democratic side and various Christian Social or even monarchist-oriented Heimwehr groups, which for simplicity may be grouped under this collective term, watched one another like opposing sides in a civil war. Many politicians and functionaries on both sides had fought on the front during the war and had become deeply militarized as a result. The Tyrolean Heimwehr enjoyed superior infrastructure and political connections due to the support of the Catholic Church. On November 12, 1928, the tenth anniversary of the founding of the Republic, 18,000 Heimwehr members marched through the city in the first nationwide Heimwehr rally, demonstrating their strength on what was the most important holiday for Austrian Social Democrats. From 1930 onward, the Nazi Party (NSDAP) also became increasingly visible in public life. It found supporters particularly among students and disillusioned young workers. By 1932, the party already had 2,500 members in Innsbruck. Violent clashes between the hostile political factions occurred repeatedly. The most notorious of these became known as the Hötting Hall Battle (Höttinger Saalschlacht) of May 27, 1932. At that time, Hötting was still independent and not yet part of Innsbruck. The community was inhabited mainly by workers. In this “red” stronghold of Tyrol, National Socialists planned a rally at the Goldener Bär Inn, a traditional meeting place of Social Democrats. This provocation escalated into a fight that left more than thirty people injured and one National Socialist dead. The violence spread across the entire city; even in the hospital, the injured continued fighting each other. Only the intervention of the gendarmerie and the army succeeded in separating the opposing sides.

Nach diesen bürgerkriegsähnlichen Jahren setzten sich 1933 die Christlichsozialen unter Kanzler Engelbert Dollfuß (1892 – 1934) durch. Sein Ziel war die Errichtung des sogenannten Österreichischen Ständestaats, heute besser bekannt unter dem Begriff Austrofaschismus. Der gesamte Staatsapparat wurde analog zum Faschismus Mussolinis in Italien unter der Vaterländischen Front geeint werden: Antisozialistisch, autoritär, konservativ im Gesellschaftsbild, antidemokratisch, antisemitisch und militarisiert. Nicht wenige Menschen waren froh, dass das Parlament und der Mehrparteienstaat durch einen starken Mann ersetzt wurde, der Ruhe und Ordnung versprach. In Innsbruck kam es während dieses in vielen Städten Österreichs teils blutigen Umsturzes zu keinen nennenswerten Kampfhandlungen. Am 15. März wurde das Parteihaus der Sozialdemokratischen Arbeiterpartei Tirol im Hotel Sonne geräumt. Der Anführer des Republikanischen Schutzbundes Gustav Kuprian wurde wegen Hochverrat festgenommen und die einzelnen Gruppen des Schutzbundes entwaffnet. Die Tiroler Wochenzeitung wurde als Parteiorgan gegründet. Der Innsbrucker Gemeinderat wurde von 40 auf 28 Mitglieder verkleinert. Anstatt durch freie Wahlen wurden sie vom Landeshauptmann ernannt. Die bis dato stark vertretenen Sozialdemokraten wurden aus der Stadtregierung entfernt. Dollfuß war in Tirol überaus populär, wie Aufnahmen des vollen Platzes vor der Hofburg während einer seiner Ansprachen aus dem Jahr 1933 zeigen. Seine Politik war das, was der Habsburgermonarchie am nächsten kam. Bereits 1931 hatten sich einige Tiroler Bürgermeister zusammengeschlossen, um das Einreiseverbot für die Habsburger aufheben zu lassen. Diese Politik wurde von der katholischen Kirche unterstützt und schaffte es bis in die Verfassung von 1934: „Im Namen Gottes, des Allmächtigen, von dem alles Recht ausgeht, erhält das österreichische Volk für seinen christlichen, deutschen Bundesstaat auf ständischer Grundlage diese Verfassung.“ Die Bindung an die Kirche verschaffte der Regierung Zugriff auf Infrastruktur, Presseorgane und Vorfeldorganisationen. Gegen die verhassten Sozialisten ging die Vaterländische Front mit ihren paramilitärischen Einheiten hart vor. Man schreckte nicht vor Unterdrückung und Gewalttaten gegen Leib und Leben sowie Einrichtungen der politischen Gegnerschaft zurück. Mutmaßliche und echte Sozialisten, Sozialdemokraten, Gewerkschafter und Kommunisten wurden immer wieder verhaftet. Die Presse war politisch gesteuert und zensuriert, die Artikel glorifizierten das ländliche Leben in seiner Idylle. Kinderreiche Familien wurden finanziell unterstützt. Schulen wurden nach Geschlechtern getrennt und auch die Lehrpläne unterschieden sich, Hausarbeit für die Mädchen, vormilitärische Erziehung für die Buben. Die Kulturpolitik grenzte sich bewusst vom nationalsozialistischen, antiklerikalen Nachbarn im Norden ab. Theater und Musik sollten Österreich als den „besseren und zivilisierteren“ deutschen Staat zeigen.

The Austrofascism sorgte aber, wenn überhaupt, nur kurz für Ruhe und Ordnung. Am 25. Juli 1934 kam es in Wien zu einem Putschversuch der verbotenen Nationalsozialisten, bei dem Kanzler Dollfuß ums Leben kam. Hitler, der die Anschläge nicht angeordnet hatte, distanzierte sich zunächst offiziell vom Geschehenen, was den geplanten Umsturz im Keim erstickte. Auch in Innsbruck kam es zu einem Umsturzversuch. Beim Versuch einer Gruppe von Nationalsozialisten die Kontrolle über die Stadt zu gelangen, wurde in der Herrengasse ein Polizist erschossen. In Innsbruck wurde im Gedenken an den zum Märtyrer stilisierten ermordeten Bundeskanzler auf „Verfügung des Regierungskommissärs der Landeshauptstadt Tirols“ der Platz vor dem Theater, wo er sich noch zwei Wochen zuvor mit Richard Steidl getroffen hatte, zum Dollfußplatz umgetauft. Sein Nachfolger an der Staatsspitze war mit Kurt Schuschnigg (1897 – 1977) ein gebürtiger Tiroler. Der Kriegsveteran aus altösterreichischem Kleinadel war Mitglied der Innsbrucker Studentenverbindung Austria. 1930 hatte der als Rechtsanwalt tätige Parlamentarier Schuschnigg die Ostmärkische Sturmschar gegründet, eine katholisch und antisemitisch geprägte paramilitärische Einheit, die das Gegengewicht zu den radikaleren Heimwehrgruppen bildeten. Als Unterrichtsminister und Justizminister war er maßgeblich für den gesellschaftlichen Rechtsruck im Ständestaat mitverantwortlich, unter anderem führte er die Todesstrafe wieder ein. Für die Innsbrucker Bevölkerung änderte sich unter dem neuen Kanzler wenig an der Alltagsmisere. Wirtschaftlich konnte der Ständestaat das Ruder in den 1930er Jahren nicht herumreißen. Die staatlichen Investitionen in große Infrastrukturprojekte kamen nach der Wirtschaftskrise 1931 zum Erliegen. Die Arbeitslosenquote lag 1933 bei 25%. Die Einschränkung der sozialen Fürsorge, die zu Beginn der First Republick was introduced had dramatic effects. The long-term unemployed were excluded from receiving social benefits as "Discontinued“ ausgeschlossen. Die Armut ließ die Kriminalitätsrate ansteigen, Überfälle, Raube und Diebstähle waren an der Tagesordnung. Ein besonderes Problem war wie schon in den Jahrzehnten zuvor die Wohnsituation. Trotz der Bemühungen seitens der Stadt modernen Wohnraum zu schaffen, hausten noch immer viele Innsbrucker in Bruchbuden. Badezimmer oder ein Schlafraum pro Person war die Ausnahme. Seit dem großen Wachstum Innsbrucks ab den 1880er Jahren war die Wohnsituation für viele Menschen prekär. Eisenbahn, Industrialisierung, Flüchtlinge aus den deutschsprachigen Gebieten Italiens und Wirtschaftskrise hatten Innsbruck an den Rand des Möglichen getrieben. Nach Wien hatte Innsbruck die zweithöchste Anzahl an Bewohnern pro Haus vorzuweisen. Die Mietpreise für Wohnraum waren derart hoch, dass Arbeiter häufig in Etappen schliefen, um sich die Kosten zu teilen. Zwar waren vor allem in Pradl neue Wohnblöcke und Obdachlosenunterkünfte wie das Wohnheim für Arbeiter in der Amthorstraße im Jahr 1907 oder die Herberge in der Hunoldstraße errichtet worden, das genügte aber nicht um der Situation Herr zu werden.

In diesem Klima aus gesellschaftlicher Diktatur und wirtschaftlicher Not entstanden an den Randgebieten der Stadt mehrere Barackensiedlungen, gegründet von den Ausgeschlossenen, Verzweifelten und Abgehängten, die im System keinen Platz fanden. Das ehemalige Kriegsgefangenenlager in der Höttinger Au westlich der Stadt diente Obdachlosen als Notunterkunft. Die bis heute bekannteste und berüchtigtste innerstädtische Enklave war die Bocksiedlung am Gebiet der heutigen Reichenau. Zwischen dem damals dort beheimateten Flughafen und dem späteren Konzentrationslager Reichenau siedelten sich ab 1930 mehrere Familien an. Die Entstehungslegende spricht von Otto und Josefa Rauth als Gründerinnen, deren Wohnwagen hier strandete. Das falsche Parteibuch zu haben genügte, um im Innsbruck des Ständestaates keinen leistbaren Wohnraum ergattern zu können, Rauth hatte als bekennender Kommunist das allerfalscheste. Sein Floß, die Noah's Ark, mit dem er über Inn und Donau in die Sowjetunion gelangen wollte, ankerte am Flussufer vor dem Gasthof Sandwirt, ohne je abzulegen. Nach und nach entstand örtlich am Rand der Stadt und sozial am Rand der Gesellschaft eine Siedlung, die von ihrem inoffiziellen Bürgermeister Johann Bock (1900 – 1975) wie eine unabhängige Kommune geleitet wurde. Er regelte den Alltag in seinem Wirkungsbereich in rau-herzlicher Manier. Die Luftangriffe des Zweiten Weltkrieges verschärften die Wohnsituation in Innsbruck und ließen die Bocksiedlung wachsen. Um die 50 Unterkünfte sollen es am Höhepunkt gewesen sein. Auch die Baracken des Konzentrationslagers Reichenau wurden als Schlafplätze genutzt, nachdem die letzten dort verwahrten Nationalsozialisten verlegt oder freigelassen worden waren. Die Bockala hatten einen fürchterlichen Ruf unter den braven Bürgern der restlichen Stadt, bei aller Geschichtsglättung und Nostalgie wohl nicht zu Unrecht. Viele, nicht aber alle Bewohner waren arbeitslos oder kriminell. Oft waren es Bürger, die durch das System fielen, die sich in der Bocksiedlung niederließen. So hilfsbereit und solidarisch die oft exzentrischen Bewohner der Siedlung untereinander sein konnten, waren körperliche Gewalt und Kleinkriminalität an der Tagesordnung. Übermäßiger Alkoholkonsum war gängige Praxis. Asphaltierte Straßen, Kanalisation und Sanitäranlagen gab es ebenso wenig wie eine reguläre Stromversorgung. Sogar die Versorgung mit Trinkwasser war lange prekär, was die ständige Gefahr von Seuchen mit sich brachte. Ausstattung und Bauart der Behausungen waren ebenso heterogen wie ihre Bewohner. Es gab Wohn- und Zirkuswägen, Holzbaracken, Wellblechhütten, Ziegel- und Betonhäuser. Innerhalb der Bocksiedlung kam es zu Vermietung und Verkauf der errichteten Häuser und Wägen. Unter Duldung der Stadt Innsbruck entstanden unter Johann Bock sogar ersessene Werte. Die Bewohner bewirtschafteten Selbstversorgergärten und hielten Vieh, auch Hund und Katze standen in kargen Zeiten am Speiseplan. Fixe Grenzen gab es keine, Bockala zu sein war in Innsbruck ein sozialer Status.  

Der Anfang vom Ende der Bocksiedlung waren die Olympischen Spielen 1964 und ein Brand in der Siedlung im Jahr zuvor. Eine Urban Legend behauptet, das Feuer sei vom Magistrat gelegt worden, um die Räumung des Viertels zu beschleunigen und den Bau des Olympischen Dorfes zu ermöglichen. 1967 verhandelten Bürgermeister Alois Lugger und Johann Bock, Erzählungen nach in alkoholgeschwängerter Atmosphäre, über das weitere Vorgehen und Entschädigungen seitens der Gemeinde für die Räumung. Bis zum faktischen Ende sollte es aber dauern. Erst 1976 wurden die letzten Quartiere wegen hygienischer Mängel unter Zwang verlassen. Viele Bockala wurden in städtische Wohnungen in Pradl, der Reichenau und dem neu errichteten O-Village umgesiedelt. Die Sitten der Bocksiedlung lebten dort unter neuer Adresse noch einige Jahre fort, was zu einem guten Teil bis heute den schlechten Ruf dieser Stadtviertel ausmacht. Weniger gut verankert im Gedächtnis vieler Innsbrucker als die Legenden der Bocksiedlung ist die Zwischenkriegszeit, dabei ist diese Periode oft noch mehr Teil der Alltagskultur als wir wahrnehmen. In Kirchen wie in St. Jakob im Defereggen in Osttirol oder in der Pfarrkirche Fritzens sind Bilder mit Dollfuß als Beschützer der katholischen Kirche mehr oder minder unkommentiert zu sehen. Bis heute gibt es rote und schwarze Autofahrerclubs, Sportverbände, Rettungsgesellschaften und Alpinverbände, deren Wurzeln in diese Zeit zurückreichen. Die Geschichte der Bocksiedlung wurde in vielen Interviews und mühsamer Kleinarbeit vom Stadtarchiv für das Buch „Bocksiedlung. A piece of Innsbruck" of the city archive.

The abundance of churches, chapels, crucifixes, statues, and paintings in public spaces strikes many visitors to Innsbruck from other countries as unusual. Not only places of worship, but also many private houses are decorated with depictions of Jesus, Mary, saints, and biblical scenes. For centuries, the Christian faith and its institutions shaped everyday life throughout Europe, and Innsbruck—as a residence city of the strictly Catholic Habsburgs and the capital of the self-proclaimed Holy Land of Tyrol—was particularly richly endowed with ecclesiastical buildings. In terms of number and scale relative to the conditions of earlier times, churches appear as gigantic features in the cityscape. In the 16th century, Innsbruck, with its approximately 5,000 inhabitants, possessed several churches whose splendor and size surpassed every other building, including the palaces of the aristocracy. Wilten Abbey was a vast complex in the midst of a small farming village that had developed around it.

The spatial dimensions of these places of worship reflect their importance within the political and social structure. For many inhabitants of Innsbruck, the Church was not only a moral authority but also a secular landowner. The Bishop of Brixen was formally equal in rank to the territorial prince. Peasants worked on the bishop’s estates just as they did on those of a secular ruler. The clergy exercised both taxation and judicial authority over their subjects, and ecclesiastical landowners were often regarded as particularly demanding. At the same time, it was also the clergy in Innsbruck who were largely responsible for social welfare, healthcare, care for the poor and orphans, food distribution, and education. The Church’s influence extended into the material world in a way comparable to how the modern state operates today through tax offices, police, schools, and employment services. What democracy, parliament, and the market economy represent for us today, bishops, the Bible, Christian devotional literature, and parish priests represented for people of earlier centuries: a reality that maintained order.

It would be incorrect to believe that all clergymen were cynical power-hungry figures who exploited their uneducated subjects. The majority of both clergy and nobility were devout and God-fearing, albeit in a manner that is difficult to comprehend from today’s perspective. It was not the case that every superstition was blindly accepted or that people were arbitrarily executed based on anonymous accusations. In the early modern period, violations of religion and morals were tried before secular courts and punished severely. Charges were brought under the term heresy, which encompassed a wide range of offenses. Sodomy—meaning any sexual act not serving reproduction—sorcery, witchcraft, and blasphemy, in short any deviation from the correct faith, could be punished by burning. The act of burning was intended both to purify the condemned and to destroy them and their sinful behavior completely, thereby removing evil from the community. For a long time, the Church regulated everyday social life down to the smallest details. Church bells structured people’s daily schedules. Their sound called people to work or worship, or informed the community of a death through tolling. People were able to distinguish individual bell signals and their meanings. Sundays and holidays structured time. Fasting days regulated diet. Family life, sexuality, and individual behavior were expected to conform to Church-prescribed morality. For many people, salvation in the afterlife was more important than happiness on earth, which was seen as predetermined by the course of time and divine will. Purgatory, the Last Judgment, and the torments of hell were real and served to frighten and discipline even adults.

While parts of the Innsbruck bourgeoisie were at least gently awakened by Enlightenment ideas after the Napoleonic Wars, the majority of the population remained committed to a mixture of conservative Catholicism and superstitious popular piety. Religiosity was not necessarily a matter of origin or social class, as repeatedly demonstrated by social, media, and political conflicts along the fault line between liberals and conservatives. Although freedom of religion was legally enshrined in the December Constitution of 1867, the state and religion remained closely linked. The Wahrmund Affair, which originated at the University of Innsbruck in the early 20th century and spread throughout the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was just one of many examples of the influence the Church exercised well into the 1970s. Shortly before the First World War, this political crisis, which would affect the entire monarchy, began in Innsbruck. Ludwig Wahrmund (1861–1932) was Professor of Canon Law at the Faculty of Law of the University of Innsbruck. Originally selected by the Tyrolean governor to strengthen Catholicism at what was considered an overly liberal university, Wahrmund was a proponent of enlightened theology. Unlike conservative representatives in the clergy and politics, reform Catholics viewed the Pope as a spiritual leader but not as a secular authority. In Wahrmund’s view, students should reduce the gap and tensions between Church and modernity rather than cement them. Since 1848, divisions between liberal-national, socialist, conservative, and reform-oriented Catholic interest groups and parties had deepened. Greater German nationalist-minded Innsbruck citizens oriented themselves toward the modern Prussian state under Chancellor Bismarck, who sought to curtail the influence of the Church or subordinate it to the state. One of the fiercest fault lines ran through the education and higher education system, centered on the question of how the supernatural practices and views of the Church—still influential in universities—could be reconciled with modern science. Liberal and Catholic students despised one another and repeatedly clashed. Until 1906, Wahrmund was a member of the Leo Society, which aimed to promote science on a Catholic basis, before becoming chairman of the Innsbruck local branch of the Association for Free Schools, which advocated complete de-clericalization of the education system. He evolved from a reform Catholic into an advocate of a complete separation of Church and state. His lectures repeatedly attracted the attention of the authorities. Fueled by the media, the culture war between liberal German nationalists, conservatives, Christian Socials, and Social Democrats found an ideal projection surface in the person of Ludwig Wahrmund. What followed were riots, strikes, brawls between student fraternities of different political orientations, and mutual defamation among politicians. The “Away from Rome” movement of the German radical Georg Ritter von Schönerer (1842–1921) collided on the stage of the University of Innsbruck with the political Catholicism of the Christian Socials. German nationalist academics were supported by the likewise anti-clerical Social Democrats and by Mayor Greil, while the Tyrolean provincial government sided with the conservatives. The Wahrmund Affair reached the Imperial Council as a culture-war debate. For the Christian Socials, it was a “struggle of liberal-minded Jewry against Christianity,” in which “Zionists, German culture warriors, Czech and Ruthenian radicals” presented themselves as an “international coalition,” a “liberal ring of Jewish radicalism and radical Slavic movements.” Wahrmund, on the other hand, in the generally heated atmosphere, referred to Catholic students as “traitors and parasites.” When Wahrmund had one of his speeches printed in 1908, in which he questioned God, Christian morality, and Catholic veneration of saints, he was charged with blasphemy. After further, sometimes violent assemblies on both conservative and anti-clerical sides, student riots, and strikes, university operations even had to be suspended temporarily. Wahrmund was first placed on leave and later transferred to the German University in Prague. The cultural conflict between liberal and Catholic students in Innsbruck reached its tragic climax in 1912. During a brawl in front of the Breinössl inn on Maria-Theresien-Strasse, the medical student Max Ghezze (1889–1912) suffered a fatal blow to the back of the head. The members of the dueling German-nationalist student fraternity Gothia, who were suspected of the crime, were released due to lack of evidence. Also in the First Republic, the connection between Church and state remained strong. Ignaz Seipel, a Christian Social politician known as the “Iron Prelate,” rose in the 1920s to the highest office of the state. Federal Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss viewed his corporative state as a construct based on Catholicism and as a bulwark against socialism. After the Second World War, Church and politics in Tyrol were still closely linked in the persons of Bishop Rusch and Chancellor Wallnöfer. Only then did a serious separation begin. Faith and the Church still have a fixed place in the everyday life of Innsbruck’s residents, even if often unnoticed. Church withdrawals in recent decades have dented official membership numbers, and leisure events are better attended than Sunday Mass. Nevertheless, the Roman Catholic Church still owns extensive land in and around Innsbruck, including outside the walls of monasteries and educational institutions. Numerous schools in and around Innsbruck are also influenced by conservative forces and the Church. And anyone who enjoys a public holiday, taps Easter eggs together, or lights a candle on a Christmas tree does not need to be Christian to act—disguised as tradition—in the name of Jesus.

Auch in der Ersten Republik war die Verbindung zwischen Kirche und Staat stark. Der christlich-soziale, als Eiserner Prälat in die Geschichte eingegangen Ignaz Seipel schaffte es in den 1920er Jahren bis ins höchste Amt des Staates. Bundeskanzler Engelbert Dollfuß sah seinen Ständestaat als Konstrukt auf katholischer Basis als Bollwerk gegen den Sozialismus. Auch nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg waren in Tirol Kirche und Politik in Person von Bischof Rusch und Kanzler Wallnöfer ein Gespann. Erst dann begann eine ernsthafte Trennung. Die Kirchenaustritte der letzten Jahrzehnte haben der offiziellen Mitgliederzahl zwar eine Delle versetzt und Freizeitevents werden besser besucht als Sonntagsmessen. Glaube und Kirche haben noch immer ihren fixen Platz im Alltag der Innsbrucker, wenn auch oft unbemerkt. Die römisch-katholische Kirche besitzt aber noch immer viel Grund in und rund um Innsbruck, auch außerhalb der Mauern der jeweiligen Klöster und Ausbildungsstätten. Etliche Schulen in und rund um Innsbruck stehen ebenfalls unter dem Einfluss konservativer Kräfte und der Kirche. Und wer immer einen freien Feiertag genießt, ein Osterei ans andere peckt oder eine Kerze am Christbaum anzündet, muss nicht Christ sein, um als Tradition getarnt im Namen Jesu zu handeln.