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By
Billie Ann Lopez
Photographs
by Peter Hirsch
Mention
Vienna's 16th century Mannerist-Renaissance Neugebaeude Palace (New
Building Palace) to almost anyone in Vienna, and you are likely to
draw a blank stare even though it was once one of the largest and
most splendid Renaissance palaces north of the Alps.
Mostly
the reason why people don't know about this barely surviving, but
still magnificent relic from the past, is its location behind the
Zentralfriedhof's Krematorium in Vienna's Simmering heath, now part
of the 11th District. The enormous Neugebaeude Schloss was conceived
and built by Maximilian II. Construction began in 1569, most likely
following the design of Jacopo da Strada.
In
its time, it was known as a Lust-Schloss (Pleasure Palace) and meant
to house Maximilian's diverse collections. Maximilian II was a man of
many interests beyond affairs of state. He was a serious collector of
books, plants and animals, and art. Vienna owes the foundation of its
famous Spanish Riding School and its Hofbibliothek, now the Austrian
National Library, to his wide-ranging interests and ability to make
things happen because "we now wish it".
The
Neugebaeude Palace wasn't Maximilian's main residence, nor was it
the only palace he built. He also built the Stallburg, the
Kaiserebersdorf Palace which is now a juvenile detention facility,
also in the 11th District, and the Katterburg, a hunting lodge which
in later centuries became the site for Schoenbrunn Palace. But the
Neugebaeude Schloss was his grandest. Its 50 meter long
corridors were designed to facilitate Maximilian's wish to take long
walks with visiting philosophers and thinkers. The palace walls were
to be covered with paintings and frescos to please his aesthetic
sense and an eerie grotto-styled artificial cave and chapel were
built for his spiritual needs. Though greatly diminished from its
former splendor, even today the palace is still quite remarkable.
The
palace park is surrounded by a Renaissance-styled crenellated wall,
punctuated with small towers. The terraced palace gardens, designed
to make use of the natural slope of the surrounding heath, were once
in viewing distance of the untamed Danube and held an abundance of
flowerbeds, marble fountains and statuary, an elegant labyrinth, and
menageries for both rapacious animals such as lions, tigers, and
leopards, as well as for more peaceful animals such as stags, hares,
and exotic birds. Swan glided on its small lake.
Maximilian
died in 1576 before his Lust-Schloss was finished. Although Rudolf
II, his son and successor, visited the Neugebaeude Schloss
occasionally, the palace was mostly abandoned and its deterioration
swift. (A wonderful painting by Lucas van Valckenborch (1530/35-1597)
of Rudolf II and his court enjoying a walk in the forest in front of
the Neugebaeude Schloss was recently acquired by the Kunsthistorische
Museum and can now be seen in a side gallery there.)
Legend
says the design for the Neugebaeude Palace was strongly influenced
by the memory of the Turkish siege of 1529 when Sultan Suleiman the
Magnificent's tented legions were encamped here. This bit of history
also supports the theory as to why the Turks didn't destroy the
Neugebaeude Palace when they returned in 1683. Quite the contrary.
Kara Mustafa, the Grand Vezir, admired the palace and respected the
site's historical role in 1529 by assigning guards to protect it and
used it as an armory for the 1683 siege of Vienna. In 1704, the
Neugebaeude was ransacked by the Hungarians during the War of
Independence (1703-11) and the animals in the menagerie slaughtered.
A curious outcome of this slaughter was the striking inclusion of
leopard pelts into the official Hungarian Guards' uniforms.
Following
the death of Prince Eugen in 1736, Emperor Charles VI bought his
famed Belvedere menagerie and transferred the rapacious animals to
the Neugebaeude menagerie. Later, when Emperor Francis Stephan of
Lorraine, husband of Maria Theresa, established the menagerie at
Schoenbrunn Palace, he also kept meat-eating animals at Neugebaeude,
in part due to their smell. During construction of Schoenbrunn
Palace, columns and some of the statuary from the Neugebauede Palace
were used in the Gloriette. Its main entrance was removed and is now
part of the Roman ruin. Following WWI, the military transferred
ownership to the City of Vienna and in the 1920s, part of its grounds
were used for Vienna's crematorium and urn graves. During WWII,
the cellars of the Neugebaeude Palace were used to manufacture tank
engines for the German Army. Later still, parts of the palace were
used to store theater props. But mostly, the Neugebaeude Palace has
stood empty and purposeless for over 400 years.
Today,
both cost and its location have made it difficult to find a useful
function for this deteriorating palace. Fortunately, money has been
found to maintain and even restore those parts most in need of
repair. Last summer and this, a summer outdoor cinema on the palace
grounds has proved quite popular and periodic guided tours through
the interior have been available, all fully booked. Hopefully,
sometime in the near future, a purpose will be found that will
justify the funds necessary to fully restore this astonishing
treasure from the past.
The
author thinks the Neugebaeude Palace would be a splendid facility to
house another equally unknown Austrian treasure-the Heroon of Trysa.
The Heroon of Trysa is the mausoleum of an unknown 4th century B.C.E.
Lycian prince excavated by Austrian archeologists in the late 19th
century in what is now southwest Turkey and brought to Vienna. It has
remained in storage for over 125 years with only a few of its panels
on exhibit in the Kunsthistorische Museum's Collection of Greek and
Roman Antiquities. Incorporating Greek, Lycian, and Oriental
elements, nearly 600 figures were chiseled in limestone into friezes
measuring 211 meters in length, but originally arranged in two bands,
one above the other, relating the life of the entombed hero as well
as other historical and mythical figures, deeds, and events.
Given
the 50 meter-long corridors of the Neugebaeude Palace and its grand
hall, it seems to the author that it would make a splendid home for
the Heroon of Trysa and allow the world to finally see it in its
entirety. The author will be writing more about the Heroon of Trysa
in the fall.
For
further information, or to register your interest in future guided
tours of the Neugebaeude Palace, contact: 0664/415 7250 between 10:00-13:00.
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