Stadtturm Enns

The Ennser Stadtturm stands in the heart of Enns, a town in Upper Austria’s Linz-Land district. Built between 1564 and 1568 under Emperor Maximilian II at the townspeople’s request, it served as a bell, watch and clock tower. Rising 60 metres high, the four-storey structure has a nearly 17-metre copper roof topped with a sphere and a Genius figure. It occupies the centre of Enns’s main square and blends Gothic and Renaissance styles, its façade marked by bold painted decoration. Twice—in 1798 and 1860—the citizens successfully fought plans to demolish the tower.

The tower’s history reflects Enns’s changing needs and ambitions. Its origins lie in the mid-16th-century Reformation, when townsfolk wanted a central symbol of civic identity. Earlier research had suggested the Italian architect Christoph Canevale as designer, but archival work uncovered the name Hans von Matz, a local master who oversaw the project. The tower’s unusual clock, with its minutes and hours hands swapped, adds a quirky detail to its story. Funded partly by Georg Gienger von Rotteneck, the copper roof alone cost ten gulden, five kreuzer and two pfennig for three months’ work in 1567.

Visitors climb more than 157 steps to reach the public gallery above the clock, used as an observation platform. The tower is part of Enns’s largely preserved old town, where surrounding Bürgerhäuser display Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque and Classicist features. Nearby, the former baroque town hall now houses the Museum Lauriacum, and the Sparkassengebäude shows 19th-century façades with medieval arcades. From the tower’s west side, streets lead north to Mauthausen and south to Vienna, while the Linzer Straße offers a route west from the square.