Garmisch

Garmisch lies in an Alpine valley beneath the mountains of southern Bavaria. To its east stands Partenkirchen, an old settlement on the road between Venice and Augsburg. From the late thirteenth century the valley belonged to the County of Werdenfels, ruled by the prince-bishops of Freising. Their representative governed from Werdenfels Castle on a crag north of Garmisch.

A decline in overland commerce, difficult farming on the marshy valley floor and recurrent epidemics brought hardship to the inhabitants. Between 1589 and 1596, witch trials claimed sixty-three lives. The accused were held and tried at Werdenfels Castle, which acquired a fearful reputation and was abandoned in the seventeenth century. Much of its stone was later used to build Garmisch's Baroque New Church, completed in 1752. Freising's rule over the county ended in 1803.