• The Treasure of Maultasch
• A Tyrolian Forester's Legend
• The Adasbub

The Treasure of Maultasch

Above the route which leads from Meran to Botzen, not far from Terlan, are the ruins of the old castle of Maultasch, which was once the favourite dwelling of a princess of the same name. Some think the castle its name from her. while others say the princess derived her name from the castle.

There have been two different parts of this building, the main one was below in the valley to guard the route. On that spot there is still a hole in the rock, and the hole leads into an underground passage. Through it, Margaretha Maultasch, the last owner there, used to og up the upper part of it on the heights above, and that part was called Neuhaus.

In this passage is said to lie a hidden treasure, guarded by a fearful keeper who is said to be the devil himself. Many people have tried to get at this treasure, but no one has ever succeeded.

Those who live in the surrounding country recount that some years ago, two young peasants of Meran had resolved to go and take the treasure. On their way there, they said to one another, "Today the devil will not escape us." So they entered the passage and began to repeat the incantations they had learnt by heart for the purpose, while throwing around them consecrated powders. But all at once a huge black dog rushed on them. They fled away, terrified to death, believing that the devil himself was at their heels. Since that time no one has ever again tried to discover the treasure of Maultasch.

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A Tyrolian Forester's Legend

One day a poor woman of Lengenfeld, in the Oetz valley in the Tyrol, went up the mountains to meet her husband, who was guarding a flock of goats there. On her way she passed by a chapel and entered it. While she was praying, a large eagle swooped down and carried off in his claws her little son, who was amusing himself outside on the moss. But the eagle settled with his prey on a peak which was quite close to the goat-herd, who frightened off the bird with stones and saved the child. He did not know the child was his own, for he had not seen it since spring.

Without anyone else knowing it, three good fairies who lived in the neighbourhood of the Oetz Valley beneath an enormous mountain peak called the Morin, had been invisibly active in the saving of the goat-herd's boy.

The boy grew up and always bore in his mind an attraction to the highest peaks of the mountains. He became a hardy Alpine climber and clever mountain shot, and a secret impulse ever pushed him to the heights above Morin, for the legend said that there was a paradise for animals; there were herds of gazelles and stone-bucks, but no huntsman had ever succeeded in getting near them.

The foolhardy boy wished to try his luck anyway, and started his wanderings. One day he got lost and was in danger of his life. He didn't know where he was, and from the ice-covered peak that reaches into the clouds over three thousand metres high, he slipped down on a green Alp which he had been unable to see from above, and in the fall he fainted.

As he came again to himself he was lying on a beautiful bed in the crystal cave of the three fairies. They had saved him a second time. They stood round him, all shining, and their look awakened in him the sweetest sensations.

He remained now as a guest of the fairies, and was well cared for. He was allowed to look at their beautiful dwelling, their gardens, and their pets. He was told that his amiable hostesses were the protecting genii of all Alpine animals, and they made him promise never to kill or to hurt one of those innocent creatures, – no gazelle, no Alpine hare, no snow-hen, not even a weasel.

He was allowed to remain with them for three days. But then he had to promise three things if ever he wanted to return to them, or if ever he wished to live happily down in the valley. First, he was not to tell anyone that he had ever seen the three fairies or been with them. Second, he was never to do any harm to any Alpine animal. Third, never to let human eye see the way they were going to show him, and through which he might be the more easily able to return to where they lived.

Then, after a tender parting, the son of the Alps was taken into a steep mountain gully which led down to the valley of the rushing Achen, which tears along under bowers of Alpine rose-bushes.

The fairies now added that on every full-moon night he was allowed to pay them a visit for three days, and that he had only to enter through that gully, and give a certain sign that they acquainted him with.

The boy returned home completely altered; it seemed as though he was dreaming, and from now on he never took an Alpine stock in his hand, never went hunting, but every full-moon night he stole quietly to the chasm in the rock deep beneath the Morin, entered into the interior of the mountain, and was for three days happy with the fairies, listening to their wondrous songs as someone entranced.

At home his form shrank, he became pale and emaciated, and his parents and friends pressed him in vain to tell what was the matter with him.

"Nothing at all," he answered to these questions; "I am as happy as I can be."

As his father and mother had become aware of his secret strolls on the full-moon nights, they followed him once quietly. Close at the entrance of the chasm he heard his mother's voice. She called his name. At the same moment the rocks shut together before his eyes, and the mountains crashed down with the noise of thunder, so that rocks fell down on rocks.

The poor boy's happiness was gone for good. He returned to his native village, but he cared neither for his mother's tears nor his father's reproaches and remained apathetic and indifferent to everything. In this way he faded away till autumn came, till the herds were driven down into the winter stables of the village, and the beautiful summer life of the mountain world died and was covered with snow.

Then one day two friends of the goat-herd arrived and talked of a hunting excursion which they intended to make on the top of the Morin;. Then for the first time again the eyes of the pale young Alpine hunter became bright, the irresistible love of hunting awakened again in him, – perhaps there was some greater attraction too.

The youth prepared his hunting things, borrowed an Alpine stock, for his own had been left behind broken in his fall from the peak of the Morin, and then he joined the hunting excursion which started in early morning. First he walked with them, then he hurried before the others, higher and higher. His heart grew light as he ascended, for too long the heavy air of the narrow valley had oppressed him. He climbed as quickly as a goat, and at last he caught sight of a sentry gazelle, which whistled and disappeared behind the peak it had been standing on.

The young hunter climbed to the top of the peak. From there he saw down below him a little green spot where a large herd of gazelles were browsing. Only one of them came within range, and this one he pursued till the poor animal in her anxiety and terror was unable to get further, and stopped on the edge of a precipice that the huntsman in his excitement had not noticed. He levelled his rifle. The plaintive cry of a female voice resounded in his ears, but he paid no heed to it; he took deadly aim and fired.

Lo! at that moment he was surrounded by a halo of brightness, and in the middle of that light stood the gazelle unhurt, and before her floated the three fairies in dazzling splendour, but they looked severe and angry. They approached him, but on seeing their faces without one smile or look of love on them, the boy was seized with a deep horror. He staggered, – one step more - and fell backwards down the precipice three hundred meters from the edge where he had stood. Pieces of stone rolled down, and a tremendous wall of rock tore down after him with a fearful roar, and buried him.

The rock is still called "The Hunter's Grave.''

[Abridged and retold]

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The Adasbub

About two hundred years ago there lived at Lengenfeld, in the valley of the Oetz, a man of enormous size. He was called "the Adasbub", and was a monster among people. He had fought as a soldier in many wars, and had returned from them more savage and wild than ever. He had also brought home large sums of money from foreign countries, money that he had stolen and extorted from people, and now he bought his own farm, which he began to manage in a way.

He was most of the time in the village inn. There he boasted as the first in Lengenfeld about his velvet jacket decorated with buttons made out of old pieces of silver money. The young fellows of the village soon wished to imitate these vain ideas of the big man.

He who offended the Adasbub had to fear what this dreaded man might do to. The Adasbub could turn a mountain torrent on his farm, or roll down huge snowballs, with most likely rocks hidden in them, on his roof, for he loved to injure his neighbours.

He also surrounded himself with a gang of fellows who suited his tastes, and was their leader in carrying out the most fearful outrages. They also pulled down the crosses in the cemetery, which they stuck upside down in the ground over the graves.

Once the gang wanted to take by force a farmer's daughter on the Burgstein above Lengenfeld. But the farmer came to hear of it and sharpened his axe. When Adasbub entered the house, the farmer hit him in the skull with tremendous fury. The monster fell dead at his feet with a split skull, and the monster's companions fled.

People from all parts swarmed up the Burgstein and thanked the farmer for having delivered the country from such a wretch. They cut off the head of the Adasbub and dragged the body to the edge of a precipice. The skull was thrown into the charnel-house of the cemetery of Lengenfeld as a terror and warning to wicked men.

[Retold]