Schloss Moosham

Snapshot

Schloss Moosham in the high Lungau was the seat of the Salzburg archbishops’ judicial power in the mountains and the site of one of the most severe witch-trial episodes in the region. The Wilczek family has owned and opened it for over a century.

The Story

The Lungau is the most remote of Salzburg’s regions: a high-altitude basin ringed by mountains, historically cut off from the lower valleys for months each year. The archbishops of Salzburg needed instruments of governance here as elsewhere in their territory, and Moosham, founded in the 13th century, served that function. It was a castle of administration and justice, not of comfort.

In the late 17th century the castle’s role in justice took a darker form. The Zauberer-Jackl trials, running roughly from the 1670s through the 1690s, saw scores of people prosecuted for witchcraft and sorcery, many of them young vagrants and itinerant beggars who passed through the Lungau’s isolated passes. Historians regard the Moosham trials as among the most intense of the late Holy Roman Empire’s persecution campaigns. The numbers executed are disputed in the historical record, but the scale was significant.

After secularisation the castle became a private possession. The Wilczek family, an aristocratic house known for preserving Austrian heritage including Kreuzenstein Castle in Lower Austria, took ownership and opened Moosham to the public. What visitors find today is a collection of period rooms, weapons, furniture, and hunting trophies in a building that has not been heavily museified: it retains the quality of a private house that happens to be medieval.

Visiting

Moosham 13, Unternberg, in the Lungau. Typically open Tue-Sun during the season, roughly 10:00-17:00; confirm hours before visiting as the castle is privately owned. Paid admission. Allow 1-2 hours. Combine with Burg Mauterndorf, approximately 10 km north in the same valley. The Lungau is approximately 90 minutes’ drive from Salzburg city.