Serfaus - History

History

The oldest findings of civilisation in the region of Serfaus are from the Bronze Age. The remains of a 3200 year old fireplace on the Komperdell, a nearby high alpine meadow, indicates that the area was used as a pasture or hunting ground. More archaeological research was undertaken at the "Zienerbichl", discovering remnants of the Late Antiquity and Middle Ages.

Pre-Roman field names and some Celtic traces still hint at the early settlers in this region. Ancient historians described the area as Raetia and its inhabitants as Raeti. However, with the conquest of the area by the Romans about 15 BC the Roman and Raetic cultures began to mix, creating the Romansh people. The Romansh language, which is still spoken in some parts of the Swiss Canton Graubünden, has survived in many of the regional field names. In the 6th century the German speaking Bavarii started to inhabit the plateau, gradually extruding the Romansh from day to day language.

The village itself was first officially mentioned in the 11th century. The towns of See and Kappl in the Paznaun valley were partly settled through Serfaus. Till 1891 See was also part of the rectory of Serfaus, which led to the fact that there is still a graveyard for citizens of See in the village of Serfaus. Other important cultural landmarks include the pilgrimage church of St. Georgen. Built in the Middle Ages it is one of the oldest churches in the region.

During the 19th century tourism started to flourish in Tyrol and after the Second World War, tourism became the main source of income for the village.

1942 fourteen houses were destroyed by a fire, which left 16 families (a total of 89 people) without home and caused a damage of about 650.000 Reichsmark. The village was rebuilt after the Second World War, also allowing the new buildings more space in contrast to the old structure of a clustered romansh village.

To cope with the increase of traffic due to a growing tourism in the region, Serfaus banned private traffic in winter in the 1970s. For the transportation of guests (and especially Skiers) a bus service was established. In order to enable an even quieter and more environmentally friendly way of transportation, the subway system, the Dorfbahn Serfaus went into operation in 1985. The use of the underground is free of charge and over its course of 1280 m it has 4 stopps (Parkplatz, Kirche, Raika, Seilbahn) and can transport up to 1500 people per hour.