Vienna and Death: an eternal love, a special relationship embracing sentimental, melancholic coquettishness and an almost passionate intimacy.
As a well-known wine tavern song goes, there’ll always be wine, but we won’t always be here to enjoy it. In Vienna, opulent funerals with a large cortege of mourners can still be the source of gushing enthusiasm. And on All Saints' and All Souls' Day at the beginning of November, when the dead are remembered, Viennese stream to Vienna’s Simmering district by the thousands to visit the Central Cemetery (Zentralfriedhof), one of the largest burial grounds in Europe. But surely this is logical: the Viennese simply love life. Therefore, they also love death, the other side of life.
It may be a bit of a cliché that the Viennese have an especially close bond with death compared to other city dwellers, but this one happens to hit the mark. A yearning for death seems to have native roots in Vienna. At wine taverns, the proverbial Viennese easy charm often quickly topples into profound death melancholia; and the Central Cemetery doubles up as one of the largest recreational areas within the city limits. The mortal remains of members of the imperial family are laid to rest in crypts that contain an elegant air of eternity. And entire museums containing curios and absurdities surrounding Death (who, according to a well-known wine-tavern song, is Viennese himself), evoke delicious feelings of horror.
It cannot be a coincidence that Sigmund Freud discovered “death mania” in Vienna of all places, and that Erwin Ringel, known in the world of psychology as “Mr. Suicide,” founded Europe’s first crisis intervention center in Vienna in 1948. And in Vienna, Johann Strauss the Elder and Younger, both tormented by fears of traveling, old age, sickness and death, produced music that will remain immortal: the Viennese waltz, underneath whose seemingly blissful facade one can always find melancholy and grief.
Central Cemetery & First Class Funerals
Once called an “aphrodisiac for necrophiles” by artist André Heller, Vienna’s Central Cemetery is the second largest burial site in Europe (after Ohlsdorf Cemetery in Hamburg), with an area of 2.4 square kilometers and over 330,000 graves, in which three million people are laid to rest. At the same time, it is a profoundly Viennese institution. City dwellers often visit it for a family outing or simply as a place to walk, stopping to enjoy roasted chestnuts or sausages just outside the cemetery gates, or for refreshment in the form of coffee and cake at Konditorei Oberlaa by the main entrance. And, if they are lucky, they might even witness great culture – free of charge. Members of the Vienna Philharmonic and choir singers from the Vienna State Opera sometimes supplement their incomes at open graves with schmaltzy Ave Marias or somber funeral marches. Visitors to the huge site can save their legs and tour the plots in style from the comfort of a horse drawn carriage available at the stand by the main entrance (Tor 2)NULL. (Mid-March to All Saints Day [November 1] daily, advance booking recommended, www.fiaker-wulf.at). Anyone who prefers to explore on two wheels can borrow an e-bike using the SIMBIKE app (stand is located at the main entrance, Tor 2).
Those who like to hear gruesome tales besides interesting facts about the Central Cemetery can take part in the exclusive night-time tours conducted after dark every Saturday night from October to March – goosebumps guaranteed! Registration at www.gabitours.at/destinations/der-zentralfriedhof-bei-nacht (in German).
Other uniquely Viennese additions include the introduction of a park of inner strength and tranquility. Built according to geomantic principles, the park is intended to support the grieving process. There is also a baby cemetery, and residents of the city who have left their mortal remains to medical science are interred in the anatomical cemetery. Natural burials can be arranged at the Central Cemetery’s two Waldfriedhöfe, or forest cemeteries, as well as at the Feuerhalle Simmering. Here, urns are interred among the roots of selected trees and flowering perennials, and the name of the deceased is added to a communal memorial plaque – saving the cost of a headstone and gardener.
However, for many Viennese, it seems that nothing is too expensive for eternity: with a Schöne Leich (“beautiful funeral”) – an interment on a grand scale with a splendid traditional six-horse cortège, professional speakers at the open graves and an opulent funeral meal – they can pay a final, reverential homage to their loved ones. About half of all bereaved choose the pricey “First Class Funeral.” Exclusive treatment is also available for the deceased who have been cremated, including urns in “black gold”, a ceramic material otherwise known as Terra Nigra that was used by the ancient Etruscans and Romans – each individual urn is hand-made in Austria and unique, and can be adorned with designs in 24-carat gold or platinum. Augarten Porcelain Manufactory also produces hand-made, one-off pieces, which are delivered together with a smaller memorial urn in which family members can store part of their loved one’s ashes to keep at home.
The Viennese concept of a beautiful funeral is not the exclusive preserve of the city’s human residents. Pets, of which there are many in the Austrian capital, qualify for similar pomp and circumstance. The city’s human population of around 1.9 million is joined by more than 55,000 dogs, an estimated 15 percent of households have cats, and that is before other small animals enter into the equation. For several years Vienna has also had a pet cemetery opposite the main entrance, offering everything a normal cemetery would: it has a chapel of rest, crematorium, burial plots for caskets and urns, an urn wall, wooden memorials with inscriptions and, for anyone with a higher budget, gravestones including plot maintenance. And if that still does not satisfy the animal lover inside, it is also possible to buried alongside pets in the first Viennese animal and human graveyard which is located behind the crematorium.
Economy Coffins & Grave Digger Accessories
The expenditures of the Viennese on funerals have brought about some peculiar ideas. In 1784 Emperor Joseph II came up with the “Economy Coffin,” a coffin with a flap on its underside, through which the corpse could be dropped into the grave – permitting re-use of the coffin. As original and money-saving as this invention may have been, the Viennese simply would not have it. They demonstrated their indignation in riots and protest marches and forced the regent to take back his edict.
One of these economy coffins can be seen at the new location of the Vienna Funeral Museum (Bestattungsmuseum Wien). Situated in an old funeral hall by the main entrance of the Central Cemetery (Gate 2), the museum’s fascinating permanent exhibition provides insights into all aspects of Vienna’s unique funeral and cemetery culture. Among the 250 artifacts on display are a horse-drawn hearse from 1900, mourning liveries, a diverse selection of coffins and the “life-saving alarm”, which people who were not really dead could use to draw attention to their predicament from inside their coffins. The museum offers 300 square meters of exhibition space and features a treasure trove of historical pictures, as well as multimedia exhibits including an audio hit parade of the most commonly selected funeral songs, a film of Emperor Franz-Joseph’s funeral and touchscreens providing information on all the cemeteries in Vienna as well as the graves of famous people at the Central Cemetery. An audio guide offers a tour of the museum and through the cemetery itself. Quirky souvenirs are available from the museum shop and at the main entrance.
Imperial Cemetery Reforms
For many centuries, the Viennese wanted to bury their dead as close to their homes as possible. The largest cemeteries were therefore situated in the center of the city, near St. Stephen’s Cathedral, St. Rupert’s Church and the Abbey of the Scots (Schottenstift). This practice came to an end during the reign of reformist Emperor Joseph II. He forbade funerals in churches and crypts in the center of the city, which particularly overflowed during epidemics. He had cemeteries built in Währing, Matzleinsdorf and the Schmelz area, all of which were still suburbs at the time. He did not anticipate that the city would grow as rapidly as it did: before another hundred years had passed, these graveyards were again surrounded by dwelling houses. The Central Cemetery (Zentralfriedhof), Vienna’s vast “city for the dead” in Simmering, was founded in 1874. Today it has Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Islamic and various Orthodox sections, as well as a Buddhist and a Mormon section. Between 1908 and 1910, Max Hegele built the massive Dr. Karl Lueger Memorial Church, a counterpart to Otto Wagner’s art nouveau church at Steinhof. Also of architectural interest is the cemetery’s Main Gate, which was also built by Hegele, and the crematorium opposite designed by Clemens Holzmeister, which was built in the years 1922-23 on the grounds of the dilapidated Renaissance Neugebäude palace.
Tombs of Honor for Strauss et al
The Tombs of Honor (Ehrengräber) at the Central Cemetery are the equivalent of an Austrian Pantheon. Maps are available for EUR 1 from the shop next to the main entrance (Tor 2). Visitors can use the Hearonymus app to download an audioguide for the cemetary and the museum for EUR 6.99 each (reduced to EUR 5 each using the discount code available from the shop).A map of the grounds can be purchased from the porter (Main Gate, Gate Two) or from the Info Point (café, on the right after Gate Two) for EUR 1. A Tombs of Honor guidebook is available from the cemetery’s administrative office to help visitors find the final resting places of such notable figures as Johannes Brahms, Johann Strauss the Elder and Younger, Ludwig van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (memorial only), Franz Schubert, Arthur Schnitzler (Jewish Section), Curd Jürgens, and Helmut Qualtinger, who once said so fittingly: “In Vienna, you have to die first before they celebrate your life. But after that, you live long…” This does not necessarily apply to Austria’s famous pop star Falco. However, he does also have a tomb of honor at the Central Cemetery. The singer Udo Jürgen’s gravestone is also worth a look: this six ton marble slab is shaped like a grand piano beneath a shroud.
In 2013, a dedication ceremony was held at the national memorial for victims of the Nazi judicial system in the Central Cemetery. A plaque unveiled at this space, in the Cemetery’s Group 40, commemorates approximately 2,000 people murdered by the regime. Ashes from memorials at a number of concentration camps are also interred here, in memory of victims of the regime who died there.
Once the Central Cemetery had opened, the suburban cemeteries of Josephinian times became redundant. They were gradually closed by city authorities during the “Red Vienna” era between the two World Wars. The remains of prominent citizens were transported to Simmering and the former cemeteries converted into parks. Today, only little remains at the Märzpark, Schubertpark and Waldmüllerpark to remind you of their former role as sites of silence and reverence.
Mozart at the Romantic St. Marx Cemetery and other Viennese burial grounds
St. Marx Cemetery has, however, retained its original character. This unique burial ground, the only Biedermeier cemetery in Vienna, still boasts an enchanting and highly romantic atmosphere. The ivy-clad gravestones, inscriptions commemorating industrialists, wealthy gentry and even the spouse of a sewage worker, long avenues and, importantly, the former mass grave in which Mozart was originally placed, have become a special place of pilgrimage for melancholics and romantics.
Also popular are the noble cemeteries of Hietzing, Grinzing, Döbling and Heiligenstadt, with their many graves of timeless elegance. And the Jewish Cemetery in Seegasse is truly something special. Over 400 years old, it was devastated by the Nazis and only reopened in 1984. Today, this burial ground is located in the inner courtyard of a retirement home. The sensational find of a number of old gravestones in 2013, buried underground during the Nazi era in order to protect them, has inspired hope that more may be found. This would mean that the oldest surviving Jewish cemetery in Vienna could be restored to its original condition, which would make it the only Jewish burial place in the world to be returned to its pre-Second World War state.
The Cemetery of the Nameless (Friedhof der Namenlosen) is located far from the center of the city, on the banks of the Danube at Albern Harbor. It was here that all those who met with their maker in the waters of the Danube up until the mid-20th century – suicides, accident victims and persons whose identity could not be established – were buried. A special service is held on the first Sunday of the month in the cemetery chapel at 3.30pm. On the first Sunday after All Saints‘ Day there is a memorial service for all those whose remains were never recovered, as part of which a raft carrying symbolic headstone, flowers and burning candles floated down the Danube. Since appearing in Before Sunrise (1995) and popular Austrian crime series SOKO Donau the graveyard has become something of a tourist destination in its own right.
The part of the Central Cemetery reserved for Muslims was joined by the city’s first Muslim-only cemetery in 2008, a 4,000 grave burial ground in Vienna’s Liesing district. In cooperation with the Islamic Religious Community in Austria, the City funeral service conducts burials here in accordance with Muslim tradition. One exception does apply, however. According to Austrian law, bodies must be buried in a coffin, unlike in Islamic tradition which stipulates that believers should be laid to rest wrapped in a linen cloth.
Imperial Burial Vault & Habsburg Heart Vault
The Habsburgs’ final resting place is yet another shining example of the morbid tendencies of the Austrians. Emperor Ferdinand III decreed that the Vault of the Church of the Capuchin Friars should serve as an official burial site of the Habsburgs. Today, around 150 of them are entombed in – almost invariably spectacular – metal caskets. All of them (with one exception, a governess of Empress Maria Theresa) were members of the Habsburg dynasty. The crypt centers around a large double sarcophagus decorated with life-size figures, containing the bodies of baroque empress Maria Theresa and her consort Franz Stephan of Lorraine. Joseph II rests much more modestly in a simple copper coffin. Emperor Franz Joseph was laid to rest next to Empress Elisabeth and Crown Prince Rudolf. His brother Emperor Maximilian I, who was assassinated in Mexico, was given a place in a new vault that was added in the 1960s. And in 1989, Austria’s last empress, Zita, joined her relatives in the Imperial Burial Vault. In 2011 Dr. Otto Habsburg-Lothringen, the first-born son of the last imperial couple Karl I and Zita and the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne from 1916-1918, was laid to rest here alongside his wife Regina. One of Otto’s brothers, Carl Ludwig, was likewise buried here in 2008.
Gruesome, but true: according to an unchanging ritual, the bodies of the Habsburgs were buried at three locations. Their hearts were put into the Herzgruft or Heart Vault in the Church of the Augustinian Friars (Augustinerkirche), where today, they still fill 54 silver urns. The intestines were placed in copper urns in the Herzogsgruft (Ducal Vault) of the Catacombs in St. Stephen’s Cathedral. And the “remaining remains” were embalmed and laid to rest in the Imperial Burial Vault.
Catacombs & Plague Pits
Guided tours through the Catacombs of St. Stephen’s Cathedral can make for a morbid form of entertainment. Today they contain the bones of thousands of Viennese which were exhumed from the cemetery that used to surround the church on the orders of Emperor Joseph II. These mortal remains, the “plague pits” filled to the brim with bones, and the urns containing the internal organs of many of the Habsburgs who were laid to rest in the nearby Capuchin’s Crypt never fail to raise a chilling shudder. In the Crypt of St. Michael’s Church you can still see thousands of bones, several hundred coffins and – due to the special atmospheric conditions – some excellently preserved mummies in equally well-preserved clothes.
Narrenturm & Wachsfiguren
The Viennese may have always had close bonds with death, but using bodies as objects of medical study was taboo for centuries. The enlightened spirit of Emperor Joseph II, however, found a remedy. In 1784, he founded a military medical and surgical academy which provided the opportunity for doctors to engage in their studies. In the same year he oversaw the transformation of the sanatorium and poorhouse in what is now Alser Strasse into the city’s General Hospital. After the inauguration of the new General Hospital (Neues AKH), a gigantic pair of 22-storey towers visible from all over the city, the old site (Altes AKH) was gradually converted into the new University of Vienna campus, The huge complex with its many inner courtyards, which still stands today, now houses numerous departments of the University of Vienna, a thriving bar and restaurant scene and the famous Narrenturm (“Fool’s Tower”). This cylindrical building with five floors and 139 cells was where mentally ill individuals were held. The location still has its gruesome aspects. Today, the tower houses the Pathological Anatomical Collections containing a huge number of exhibits of deformed body parts.
The opportunity of studying medicine and surgery was also provided at the Josephinum, which was inaugurated in 1785. Joseph II charged the famous architect Isidor Canevale with the job of designing the school. In the Baroque winged building, the emperor also had an extensive library installed. The centerpiece of the institute, however, was the wax figures used by doctors-to-be for their anatomical studies. The life-sized exhibits, complete with real hair, can be admired in elegant rosewood chests at the Josephinum.
Death in Viennese Song
Death in Vienna is omnipresent, even in the most unlikely of places. For instance, you find it at wine taverns when the waves of sentimentality and wine-induced bliss are at their peak. Not cruel, not fear-inspiring, but as a part of reality; in fact, as a friend. This has always been so and will probably remain so forever. Lyrics alluding to death flow off the lips. Modern wine tavern musicians such as Neuwirth’s Extremschrammeln uphold this tradition, being not so much humorous – as in the phrase “Sell my clothes, I am going to heaven….” – but more sombre (And when it is time to go and be buried, then harness my black horses and drive me there.”). The Viennese thus demonstrate that, even in death, they have style.
Addresses:
Central Cemetery (Zentralfriedhof)
Simmeringer Hauptstrasse 234, 1110 Vienna, www.friedhoefewien.at
Mon-Fri 9am-Nov 3-end of Feb 8am–5pm, Mar & Oct 1-Nov 2, 7am–6pm, Apr-Sep 7am-7pm, May-August until 8pm on Thu
Cemetery of the Nameless (Friedhof der Namenlosen)
Alberner Hafenzufahrtsstrasse, east of the dockside, 1110 Vienna, Tel. +43-660 600 30 23, www.friedhof-der-namenlosen.at
Cemetery open around the clock, chapel and tomb by prior arrangement
Friedhof St. Marx
Leberstraße 6-8, 1030 Wien, Tel. +43-1-4000-8042,
www.wien.gv.at/umwelt/parks/anlagen/friedhof-st-marx.html
Apr 1-Sep 30, 6.30am–8pm, Oct 1-Mar 31 6.30am–6.30pm
Herzgruft (Heart Crypt of the Habsburgs in the Loreto Chapel, Church of the Augustinian Friars)
In der 1st district, Josefsplatz entrance, phone +43-1-533 70 99, www.augustinerkirche.at
Guided tours every Sunday and public holidays after mass (approx 12.15pm) and by prior arrangement
Islamic Cemetery
Großmarktstraße 2a, 1230 Wien, Tel. +43-676 470 69 20, www.derislam.at
Mon-Fri 8.30am-4.30pm, Sat, Sun 7.30am-5pm, public holidays 8.30am-16:30pm
Josephinum – Collections of the Medical University of Vienna
Währinger Straße 25, 1090 Wien, Tel. +43-1-401 60-260 01, www.josephinum.ac.at
Wed-Sat & public holidays 10am-6pm, Thu 10am-8pm
Jewish Cemetery
Seegasse 9-11, 1090 Wien (Eingang durch das Pensionistenheim), Tel. +43-1-531 04-0,
www.ikg-wien.at
Access via the Haus Rossau retirement home Mon Fri 7am-3pm
Imperial Burial Vault (Kaisergruft/Kapuzinergruft)
Neuer Markt/Tegetthoffstraße 2, 1010 Wien, Tel. +43-1-512 68 53-88, www.kapuzinergruft.com
Open daily 10am-6pm, Nov 1 & 2 10am-2pm, Dec 24 10am-4pm, Dec 31 10am-3pm, Jan 1 12pm-6pm
St. Michael’s Church
Michaelerplatz 5, 1010 Wien, www.michaelerkirche.at
7am-8pm daily, Sun and public holidays 8am-8pm; crypt tours Fri&Sat 10am & 12pm (except church holidays) or by prior arrangment, tel. +43-650 533 80 03
Pathological Anatomical Collections in the Narrenturm
Spitalgasse 2, 6. Hof, Universitätscampus, 1090 Wien, Tel. +43-1-521 77-606,
www.nhm-wien.ac.at/narrenturm
Wed 10am–6pm, Thu&Fri 10am-3pm, Sat 12pm-6pm, closed on public holidays
St. Stephen’s Cathedral
Stephansplatz, 1010 Wien, Tel. +43-1-515 52-3054, www.stephanskirche.at
Catacomb tours: Mon-Sat 10am, 11am, 11:30am, 1:30pm, 2pm, 2:30pm, 3:30pm, 4pm and 4:30pm,
Catacomb tours: Mon-Sat 10am, 11am, 11:30am, 1:30pm, 2pm, 2:30pm, 3:30pm, 4pm and 4:30pm, Sun and public holidays 1:30pm, 2pm, 2:30pm, 3:30pm, 4pm and 4:30pm2 pm, 3 pm, 4 pm
Tierfriedhof Wien (Vienna pet cemetery)
Anton-Mayer-Gasse 5 (gegenüber Haupteingang Zentralfriedhof), 1110 Wien,
Tel. +43-1-760 70-28190 (9-15 Uhr), www.tfwien.at
Nov 3-end of Feb 8am–5pm, Mar & Oct 1-Nov 2 7am–6pm, Apr to Sep 7am–7pm, May to Aug 7am–8pm
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Autorin: Hanne Egghardt
Last updated: July 2022
