ÖSTERREICH | AUSTRIA |
Bundesland: Burgenland | |
Bezirk: Mattersburg |
The spa Bad Sauerbrunn is situated at an elevation of 280 m in the Mattersburg district of Burgenland. The mineral waters had alrady been used by the Romans. In modern times, the waters were used for therapeutic treatments again since 1847. When the German-speaking parts of western Hungary had become part of Austria in 1920, Sauerbrunn became the provisional seat of the government of the new federal state of Burgenland in 1921. The government and administration were moved to the definitive capital, Eisenstadt, in 1925.
The old Kurhaus or Kuranstalt [left, no. 2643: background] was first built in 1853 by the
physician Dr. Josef Fink from Wiener Neustadt who had leased the mineral springs from the princes Esterházy.
The Kurhaus was enlarged in 1857 by the addition of a further floor. In 1903 the Kurhaus was converted to a
sanatorium by the physician Dr. Grimm, then leaseholder of the Kurhaus (his name is also mentioned on the gate to the sanatorium, depicted on glass no. 2643
[left: barely visible on the right hand edge of the picture]). During World War I the sanatorium was converted
first to a reconvalescent home and then to a military hospital. The spa reopened in the early 1930s. After World War .
which had caused the cosure of the spa in 1929, the spa reopened again in 1947.
[http://www.bad-sauerbrunn.at/Ortsgeschichte.332.0.html, http://www.aeiou.at/aeiou.encyclop.b/b051906.htm]
The Paulquelle ('Paul's spring') [left, no. 2643: far left],
the oldest mineral spring of Bad Sauerbrunn seems to have been used already in Bronze Ages, as seems likely from
archeological finds excavated in 1925 and 1928. The earliest description of the medicinal uses of the waters is found in a book
printed in 1777. In 1800 a new tapping of the spring was built. Another spring, the 'Gemeindequelle' ('Municipal spring')
was found in 1967. The waters of the latter spring have the highest content in magnesium of all mineral springs in Austria.
[http://www.bad-sauerbrunn.at/Ortsgeschichte.332.0.html, http://www.sagen.at/doku/quellen/quellen_burgenland / Sauerbrunn_Gemeindequelle.html]