Gneixendorf is a village near Krems in

Lower Austria Lower Austria ( , , abbreviated LA or NÖ) is one of the nine states of Austria, located in the northeastern corner of the country. Major cities are Amstetten, Lower Austria, Amstetten, Krems an der Donau, Wiener Neustadt and Sankt Pölten, which ...

. It was the location of Stalag XVII-B, the setting of the

Billy Wilder Billy Wilder (; ; born Samuel Wilder; June 22, 1906 – March 27, 2002) was an American filmmaker and screenwriter. His career in Hollywood (film industry), Hollywood spanned five decades, and he is regarded as one of the most brilliant and ver ...

film ''

Stalag 17 ''Stalag 17'' is a 1953 American war film directed by Billy Wilder. It tells the story of a group of American airmen confined with 40,000 prisoners in a World War II German prisoner-of-war camp "somewhere on the Danube". Their compound holds ...

''. The stone-age pre-history, the history of Christian orders settlement and rule and their stately renaissance buildings, followed by a manorial history, particularly of the van Beethoven and von Schweitzer families between 1820 and 1935 and the World War II break with the STALAG XVII B Prisoner-of-War camp 1940-1945 are all comprehensively documented by "Chronik von Gneixendorf", published in 2009 by Verschoenerungsverein Gneixendorf. See also Krems-Gneixendorf. Gneixendorf has been incorporated with the town of Krems since 1968. The composer

Ludwig van Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. He is one of the most revered figures in the history of Western music; his works rank among the most performed of the classical music repertoire ...

spent the period September–December 1826 in Gneixendorf as the guest of his younger brother

Johann Johann, typically a male given name, is the German form of ''Iohannes'', which is the Latin form of the Greek name ''Iōánnēs'' (), itself derived from Hebrew name '' Yochanan'' () in turn from its extended form (), meaning "Yahweh is Graciou ...

, who had acquired Schloss Wasserhof (see A. Thayer, "Life of Beethoven", Princeton University Press (1964)).

Sources

Gneixendorf
Populated places in Lower Austria {{LowerAustria-geo-stub