St. Veit - the ancient capital of Carinthia, this charming town, is called sunny not because there is a lot of sun, but there is really a lot of it here - the sun's rays just penetrate everything through, spray along with streams of fountains.
“Sunny” in the name of the city is not at all an artistic epithet, not a figure of speech, but a completely legal technical term. The fact is that in this tiny (only 12 thousand population), old town launched an ultramodern project called "The sunny city of St. Veit." It consists in the fact that by 2020 the city will achieve full energy self-sufficiency through the use of renewable energy sources, primarily solar. To do this, the construction of the largest photovoltaic power plant in Austria was launched.
Solar energy has long been no longer fiction. Many countries are actively working in this direction, including Austria. And we are already used to seeing entire fields of solar panels driving along the autobahns, and in cities on buildings. But in the courtyard and on the roof of our hotel! - it was unexpected.
Ernst Fuchs Palace
Ernst Fuchs, creating this palace in the style of fantastic realism, could not imagine that his most creative creation for that time was being modernized with solar panels. But it will still remain a postmodern symbol of the city.
Ernst Fuchs Palace Hotel
But I would call the real super-modern symbol of St. Veit the electric car on Hauptplatz - the main square of the city.
Gray-haired antiquity and avant-garde - they look here not at all futuristically. The city actively lives in the 21st century and seems to feel good about it.
What did this square not see over the centuries of its existence! And sorrow and joy - everything took place here: fairs and riots, festive processions of the dukes and kings, knightly tournaments and performances of the most famous minnesingers.
Walther von der Vogelweide fountain
And the execution of the rebels took place here too. Interestingly, the rulers were not very scattered with the right to death. St. Veit received city law, and with it the right to have its own judge and 12 jurors back in 1224, but only in 1447 the city was entrusted with the right to sentence to death.
The fountain bowl was installed in the eastern part of the square in 1566, but the Roman bowl, which is 2 thousand years old, was used! In the center of the bowl is a bronze figure of a miner, who from time immemorial has been an important profession in the district. Since 1399, when the city received the rights to extract iron in Huttenberg, which immediately brought it to economic prosperity, the miner did become a breadwinner and breadwinner, so the author portrayed him so movingly and the townspeople lovingly called "Schüsselbrunnbartele".
Of course, these were not the copper mines in Sweden that made her a superpower for a while. No, but quite sufficient for the economic basis of the well-being of St. Veit.
Numismatists know St. Veit by its wonderful and rare coins, which were minted here, already, from 1205 for five thousand years! Coin minting is the subtle art that the local craftsmen were famous for.
Let's go further west to the marble plague column erected here in 1715, in gratitude to God for getting rid of this terrible disease. At its peak - the all-seeing eye vigilantly watches that the townspeople do good.
In fact, the life of a small town has changed little since the Middle Ages. Near the square, around the corner, it flows continuously, for many centuries in a row, a fire stream. According to the medieval rules, every city, town, village, village, in general, any settlement should have had such a fire stream, like every family - a leather fire bucket.
The main role in the architectural ensemble of the city, of course, is played by the magnificent Town Hall.
Town Hall
The basis of the building is Gothic, but only the pediment and a metal plate with a quote from the Saxon Mirror, the oldest legal directory in Germany, compiled in the 13th century, are preserved from it.
The rest of the facade decor is baroque. Light and light, in the form of busts, garlands and military trophies, was created already in the XVIII century
Town Hall Sculpture of Justice, attributed to Johann Pacher
But the most interesting awaits us inside. We pass through the open portal door and find ourselves in a lovely arcade courtyard.
As soon as Brunelleschi created the first such Renaissance courtyard in Florence, fashion spread to them with incredible speed throughout Europe. In the XVI century. each self-respecting city for the town hall or seigneur for his palace, without fail ordered a similar architectural creation. Already in this millennium it was covered with a glass dome - a great place for concerts was formed. And the storage of the sculpture for which we are here.
Ernst Fuchs. Hermes Trismegistus
Hermes Trismegistus - sculpture by Ernst Fuchs. The sculpture is unusual, like all the creations of this author.