Preißen-Wolfsmaterl

The "Preißen-Wolfsmarterl" in front of the Preißengut in Herrnberg is a reminder of the time after the Thirty Years' War. The picture shows a girl being attacked by a wolf. This depiction is flanked by St Leonhard and St Florian and the Holy Trinity is enthroned in the clouds above. The inscription below the picture reads: "Remember in prayer our white person who was attacked and mauled by a wolf in the nearby forest on her way home from the Spinnroas in 1666. Lord grant her eternal rest and peace. "It is undisputed that there were wolves in our area around this time. Even the arrest book of the Schärding district court from around 1600 contains provisions according to which everyone was obliged to help catch wolves. During the Thirty Years' War they became a plague, so that in 1643 a Bavarian electoral order demanded that the necessary people, horses, nets and other necessities be provided for trapping wolves. However, it is doubtful that a wolf actually attacked a human. Perhaps the girl had some misfortune on her way home at night and was then "mauled" by wolves.At the so-called "Spinnroas", also known as "Rockaroas", women and girls from the neighbourhood once met in a farmhouse parlour to spin "Hoar" (flax) with the spinning wheels they had brought with them. They not only spun, but also sang, joked and danced when boys joined them in the spinning parlour at an advanced hour. This amusement was once a thorn in the side of the authorities. In the arrest book of the district court of Schärding around 1600, it said (in today's German): "Likewise, all skirt rides and night dances, in which nothing but fornication is practised and many a man's child is dishonoured and deceived, as one sees daily, shall be seriously forbidden under penalty in the future."