Schiffleut Museum Stadl-Paura - The Stadl-Paura Ship Museum

A Unesco World Heritage Site

As early as the 14th century, there was a kind of guild or colliery the Stadl boatmen founded and belonged to. As Lambach Abbey was the landowner and lord of the manor for Stadl, Queen Elisabeth commissioned the Abbot of Lambach with the entire organisation of salt transport on the Traun from Stadl at the beginning of the 14th century. This transport and trade brought considerable sums of money into the monastery.

This was not the only way in which the abbey became very wealthy; it also owned over 60 villages and farms, which had to pay the tithe, the tenth part of their income. In addition, the serf farmers as well as the sailors performed unpaid manual labour. Manual labour consisted of planting, tending and harvesting the agricultural crops of the landlord, the monastery. Tension labour was work that was carried out with draught animals. This repeatedly led to conflicts with Lambach Abbey.

The shipmen's guild from the 14th century can be seen as the forerunner of today's shipmen's association, which was founded at the end of the 19th century as a shipmen's support association.

Its task was to alleviate the social situation of the boatmen, most of whom had become unemployed due to the transfer of salt transport to the horse-drawn railway, but above all to provide financial support for those unable to work. These included old or injured skippers and their widows. During the Second World War, the National Socialists dissolved the activities of the shipping association. However, it was revitalised after their disempowerment.

Topics that have developed since then are the preservation of the boatmen's tradition, the operation of the Schiffleut Museum, the Salzstadln, the organisation of festivals such as the Schifferfest and the annual return train. More than 600 members support the association today.

Since 2022, the upstream boat trip downstream and the upstream towing of the ships by horses, also known as the Gegenzug, has been included in UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage Austria list.

The boatmen's association still organises counter trains today. Visitors have the opportunity to experience this up close on a weekend in August.