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Our Austria

Heritage-rich Austria: About sickle smiths and ancient crops

Everyone knows World Heritage and UNESCO; In Austria, Wachau and Schönbrunn Palace are among the World Heritage Sites. Considered worthy of protection by UNESCO since 2009, the “intangible cultural heritage”, oral traditions, rituals and festivals, and traditional craft techniques are much less known. The show follows people who maintain regional customs with great passion.

Hubert Weingärtner was one of the last of his guild; He worked as a sickle smith in Micheldorf, Upper Austria. The history of this craft is preserved in a museum there, just as the association “Nova's Ark” in Lower Austria preserves the knowledge of ancient crops. The seeds of more than 5,000 crops are archived and propagated here, and long-forgotten vegetables and fruits are cultivated and saved from extinction. In Salzburg's Pinschau, a group has dedicated itself to healing knowledge. Selected herbs are handpicked to produce medicinal products from their extracts. There are now 106 such remedies and their indications and effects have been documented in writing.

The traditional field and farm names of the Carinthian Slovenes are an important part of the socio-historical and linguistic development of Carinthia. In order to prevent these names from disappearing, citizens' initiatives have put them on the maps. It captures the linguistic and cultural roots of the region, which give the people living there their identity.