Sankt Lambrecht is a

market town A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village or city. In Britain, small rura ...

in the district of

Murau Murau () is a town in the western part of the Austrian federal state of Styria. It is the administrative seat of Murau District. Geography The historic town is located in mountainous Upper Styria in the valley of the Mur river between the Lower ...

Styria Styria ( ; ; ; ) is an Austrian Federal states of Austria, state in the southeast of the country. With an area of approximately , Styria is Austria's second largest state, after Lower Austria. It is bordered to the south by Slovenia, and cloc ...

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

. It is known for St. Lambrecht's Abbey, one of the most important

Benedictine The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, th ...

monasteries in Austria. The monastery complex and its gardens are part of the Zirbitzkogel-Grebenzen

nature park A nature park, or sometimes natural park, is a designation for a protected area by means of long-term land planning, sustainable resource management and limitation of agricultural and real estate developments. These valuable landscapes are pres ...

. In the course of a Styrian administrative reform, the former municipality of Sankt Blasen merged into Sankt Lambrecht with effect from 1 January 2015.

Geography

The

Upper Styria Upper Styria (), in the Austrian usage of the term, refers exclusively to the northwestern, generally mountainous and well-wooded half of the federal state of Styria. The southeastern half of the state around the capital of Graz is known as Cent ...

n municipality is located in the Thaja valley (''Thajagraben'') within the northern

Gurktal Alps The Gurktal Alps (, ) is a mountain range in the Central Eastern Alps in Austria which is named after the valley of the Gurk river. The range stretches west to Lake Millstatt and east to Neumarkter Sattel (north-northwest of Neumarkt in Steie ...

, east of the district capital

and near the Styrian- Carinthian border. At a height of above sea level, Sankt Lambrecht is the highest situated market town in Styria. Trades practiced here are woodworking (windows, furniture, chairs), a

dynamite Dynamite is an explosive made of nitroglycerin, sorbents (such as powdered shells or clay), and Stabilizer (chemistry), stabilizers. It was invented by the Swedish people, Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Nobel in Geesthacht, Northern German ...

factory (explosives, military products), and tourism. The municipal area comprises the cadastral communities of Sankt Lambrecht and Sankt Blasen.

History

The Benedictine abbey was established in 1076 by the

Margraves of Styria Margrave was originally the medieval title for the military commander assigned to maintain the defence of one of the border provinces of the Holy Roman Empire or a kingdom. That position became hereditary in certain feudal families in the Empir ...

. A first Romanesque basilica was consecrated in 1160, after a blaze it was rebuilt in the preserved Gothic

hall church A hall church is a Church (building), church with a nave and aisles of approximately equal height. In England, Flanders and the Netherlands, it is covered by parallel roofs, typically, one for each vessel, whereas in Germany there is often one s ...

style until 1421. After the Austrian ''

Anschluss The (, or , ), also known as the (, ), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into Nazi Germany on 12 March 1938. The idea of an (a united Austria and Germany that would form a "German Question, Greater Germany") arose after t ...

'' to

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

in 1938, St. Lambrecht Abbey was seized by the Nazi authorities. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

the premises housed two sub-camps of the infamous

Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp Mauthausen was a German Nazi concentration camp on a hill above the market town of Mauthausen, Upper Austria, Mauthausen (roughly east of Linz), Upper Austria. It was the main camp of a group with List of subcamps of Mauthausen, nearly 100 f ...

, one for male inmates and one for females.

Politics

Seats in the municipal assembly (''Gemeinderat'') as of 2015 local elections: *

Austrian People's Party The Austrian People's Party ( , ÖVP ) is a Christian-democratic and liberal-conservative political party in Austria. Since January 2025, the party has been led by Christian Stocker (as an acting leader). It is currently the second-largest p ...

(ÖVP): 8 *

Social Democratic Party of Austria The Social Democratic Party of Austria ( , SPÖ) is a social democratic political party in Austria. Founded in 1889 as the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Austria (, SDAPÖ) and later known as the Socialist Party of Austria () from 1945 unt ...

(SPÖ): 5 *

Freedom Party of Austria The Freedom Party of Austria (, FPÖ) is a political party in Austria, variously described as far-right, right-wing populist, national-conservative, and Eurosceptic. It has been led by Herbert Kickl since 2021. It is the largest of five part ...

(FPÖ): 2

Sister city / Twin city

The city is twinned with: *

Lukovica The Municipality of Lukovica (; ) is a municipality in the eastern part of the Upper Carniola region in Slovenia. The seat of the municipality is Lukovica pri Domžalah. It lies on the main road from Ljubljana to Celje and has been an independen ...

References

Cities and towns in Murau District {{Styria-geo-stub