Vienna Legends: Mozart, Elisabeth Bathory & Restless Ghosts

Vienna has a long history, dating back to the 1st century CE Roman military camp of Vindobona. It was the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and is now the capital of Austria.

And it’s been home to some pretty big names over the centuries. Mozart, Beethoven, Sigmund Freud, Gustav Klimt, Hedy Lamarr, Marie Antoinette and Erwin Schrödinger, among many others, have all lived in the city.

Yet it’s also got a darker side. Its vast Central Cemetery is a testament to the Viennese fascination with death. Empress Elisabeth of Austria, nicknamed Sissi, apparently had a fascination with the supernatural, and some say she still roams the hallways of the Hofburg palace (Oberauer 2021).

In this sixth instalment of European City Legends, we’re going to explore a handful of these odd tales. Let’s start with an ominously named street…

Blutgasse

Blutgasse, or Blood Alley, is part of Vienna’s first district, Blutgassenviertel. Its history dates to the Middle Ages.

It wasn’t always called Blutgasse. Between 1368 and 1392 people called it Kothgässel, which means Faeces Alley. It gives you an idea of the kind of street it might have been. It also makes me think of London’s Sherborne Lane, which in the 1270s was called Shittborwelane, which later became Shiteburn Lane.

Yet Blutgasse became the street’s official name in 1862. According to legend, a group of Knights Templar were murdered in the street in 1312 during the violent dissolution of the order. They’d tried to hide in the cellars at No. 3, but they were dragged into the street where they met their end. The street got its name from all the blood that flowed along it (Oberauer 2021).

Researchers have since debunked this story as nothing more than an urban myth (Wien Geschichte Wiki 2024). There is a second possible explanation that a nearby slaughterhouse discharged waste into the street, giving it the name ‘Blood Alley’.

As you’d imagine about a street with such a name, it also has an associated ghost story. According to some, Blutgasse led to one of Vienna’s execution sites. Condemned prisoners made their way along the alley, and some think their ghosts continue to make this journey over and over (Amy 2019).

I’m less inclined to believe this story, because Blutgasse opens out onto an ordinary street. It also lies some 350m to the southeast of Hoher Markt, which was the city’s execution site in the 14th and 19th century (Oberauer 2021).

Mozart and the Masked Messenger

We’re going to turn off Blutgasse into Domgasse, where you’ll find the Mozarthaus at No.8. Mozart lived here between 1784 and 1787, and he composed The Marriage of Figaro here, among others.

I don’t know how true this legend is, but I absolutely adore Mozart’s music and it was fascinating to visit the Mozarthaus in the Old Town.

In the story, a masked messenger came to the apartment with a commission for Mozart (Anda 2022). It sounded like an interesting project but there was one condition: he couldn’t talk about the piece with anyone. Mozart thought little of it and got to work.

But the longer he worked on it, the more he began to question the masked messenger. Who was he? Who did he work for? And worse…did he even exist? Mozart apparently began to fear the messenger actually came from the Otherworld. The requiem wasn’t a commission for someone else. No, it was the music to be played at his own funeral.

Despite this belief, Mozart worked night and day to finish it. As it was, he never completed it. He died of kidney failure aged 35 on 5 December 1791.

The requiem was one of the pieces played at his funeral. You’d recognise the Lacrymosa section because it gets added to plenty of film and TV moments.

Is it true? Well, Count Franz von Walsegg commissioned the requiem for a service in 1792 to mark the first anniversary of his wife’s death. Composer Franz Xaver Süssmayr completed the requiem and delivered it in 1792, and there are suggestions Walsegg wanted to claim the authorship of the requiem. Apparently, he’d done so with other works.

Problem was, Mozart’s widow Constance wasn’t going to let that happen. She started the stories of the masked messenger, and Mozart’s belief the requiem was for his own funeral, at a performance to raise money for her. Stories like that ‘stick’, and thus Mozart’s authorship lives on.

Elisabeth Bathory’s Viennese Murder Palace?

Augustinerstraße 12 looks fairly unremarkable from the outside now, but in the early 17th century, Elisabeth Bathory apparently spent winters there.

According to legend, one of Bathory’s servants sourced a stream of young maids who were never seen again by their families. While some ended up at Cachtice Castle, others were employed at the Hungarian House in Vienna. There are reports of weird noises at night, that were once so bad the Augustianian monks across the street threw earthenware at the house (inaleaguewithsatan 2016).

While the house isn’t open to the public, some claim you can hear howls of pain coming from the building (Oberauer 2021). There used to be tours of the building, although the torture was supposed to have happened in the attic and cellar.

I’m still not convinced that Bathory was the bloodthirsty villain history paints her to be – and you can read my article about her to find out why. True, people would be unlikely to question a wealthy and powerful woman about screams coming from her house, but how much were the stories attached to the house added after her trial, and how many of them date to the time of her actual residence there? It’s hard to know.

Friedhof der Namenlosen

It wouldn’t be a Fabulous Folklore article without a graveyard, and the Friedhof der Namenlosen, or Cemetery of the Nameless, is more special than most. It’s the final resting place of people who drowned in the Danube.

Naturally, these people found different ways into the Danube. Some were murdered, others suffered accidents. A whirlpool in the river caught driftwood and dead bodies, many of whom were buried here immediately. The victims don’t have headstones, but rather simple wrought iron crosses mark the graves. Occasionally, they may have ‘male’ or ‘female’, or the date when the body washed up on them, but most of the graves have nothing to say who is buried there. Their plaques read ‘Unbekannt’, or ‘Namenlos’.

The cemetery now exists in two halves. The earlier half, which predates 1900, is almost entirely overgrown and inaccessible. The newer part is on the other side of the dam, and 104 people were buried in this part between 1900 and 1940. Only 43 were identified. Many of these identifications are due to the work of Josef Fuchs, a volunteer gravedigger. He researched the bodies retrieved from the river, and he identified all but one of the bodies he buried himself. He looked after the graves until he died aged 90 in 1996.

Thankfully, bodies no longer wash up here due to the construction of a port and grain silos.

So why is this in a post about folklore? I wanted to include it partly to draw attention to Fuchs, tirelessly working to ensure people didn’t remain nameless. But also because there is still an annual remembrance for those in the cemetery. Members of the Albern Fishing Association gather on the first Sunday afternoon following All Saints’ Day. They build a raft and decorate it with flowers, wreaths, and burning candles, which they launch on the Danube. They follow it along the river, pushing the raft along if it gets stuck until the river claims it (Stadt Wien n.d.).

The Bad Luck Cat of the Katzensteighaus

I wanted to end with a more ‘typical’ story, although this one seems to have about three different things going on in it at once. According to local legend, a white cat is linked with the Katzensteighaus. Bad luck follows anyone who sees her. So far, so typical of folklore.

Yet the story continues. A woman decided to kill her lover’s wife so she could have him for herself. She decided to use poison but inadvertently poisoned herself instead. Following her death, she now roams across the rooftops as a cat. No, I don’t know why that would be the logical outcome, either. The story isn’t clear as to why she’s associated with this specific house, unless either she or her loved lived there.

People believe the house is generally unlucky. A fire broke out in 1522, destroying the house. No one knows what started the fire, though its cause seems to have been a mystery. The rebuilt building collapsed in 1590 during an earthquake. Even now, tenants apparently never last long, with the building often unoccupied. The implication is that the building somehow drives off those who try to live or work there, though it’s unclear why. Many such properties end up being linked with terrible crimes on the site, but this one isn’t, as far as I can tell.

Much of the ominous atmosphere seems to come from the basement. There’s a wooden chair in the basement that sets off EMF meters even though it’s nowhere near any electrical wiring (Vienna Ghosthunters n.d.). Paranormal investigators find it does so no matter where they put it in the basement. So is the chair the source of the disturbances, which is unlikely if the building faced bad luck in the 16th century? Or is the basement the problem? Let me know your thoughts!

What other Vienna legends do you know?

Other legends abound in Vienna, although often all that survives is a fragment or a juicy snippet. They’re enough to create a frisson of creepiness, but not enough to sustain a blog post.

But as with the other European cities I’ve covered, it’s obvious why stories congregate in cities. Humans rub up against each other in large volumes, and for long periods of time. That’s a lot of human activity – and a lot of stories. People tell each other those stories, and they morph with every retelling.

Though if you do head to Vienna, keep your wits about you. Who knows which of their famous celebrities you might meet, even after death?

References

Anda (2022), ‘A Spooky Vienna Tour – Alternative Vienna Experiences’, Travel for a While, https://travelforawhile.com/a-spooky-vienna-tour/.

Amy (2019), ‘The Terrors of Blood Street: Blutgasse, Vienna, Austria’, Amy’s Crypt, https://amyscrypt.com/blood-street-blutgasse-vienna-austria/.

inaleaguewithsatan (2016), ‘Ungarisches Haus (Hungarian House)’, Atlas Obscura, https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/ungarisches-haus-hungarian-house.

Oberauer, Alisa (2021), ‘The 10 haunted places housing ghosts in Vienna that you need to check out before this spooky season ends’, Vienna Würstelstand, https://viennawurstelstand.com/guide/most-haunted-places-in-vienna/.

Stadt Wien (no date), ‘The Cemetery of the Nameless’, Stadt Wien, https://www.wien.gv.at/kultur/religion/friedhof-der-namenlosen.html.

Vienna Ghosthunters (no date), ‘The Investigation’, Vienna Ghosthunters, https://viennaghosthunters.net/seiten/katzensteiginvestigation1.html.

Wien Geschichte Wiki (2024), ‘Blood Alley’, Wien Geschichte Wiki, https://www.geschichtewiki.wien.gv.at/Blutgasse.