Tradition: Austrian Mythology
Alternative Names: Fairy of the Sonnwendjoch
Category: Fairy
The Myth
The Fairy of the Sonnwendjoch was a proud and beautiful supernatural mistress of the mountain, living deep inside the Sonnwendjoch near Rattenberg. She protected the wild creatures that lived among its slopes and rocky clefts and regarded all the animals of the mountain as her own. Within the mountain lay a magnificent hidden kingdom of glittering palaces, great halls with crystal ceilings and reddish marble walls, gardens whose trees never withered, green meadows filled with peaceful herds, and clear streams winding through the mountain’s depths.
One day, a young knight from Mehrnstein Castle was hunting a chamois near the foot of the mountain when the fairy appeared before him and demanded to know why he was hunting on her land. She warned him that every animal belonged under her protection and commanded him never again to pursue the mountain’s creatures if he wished to have her favor. The knight agreed, and the fairy led him into her hidden kingdom. She fell in love with him and gave him a magical ring as a token of their bond. From then on, the knight continued to ride out as though going hunting, but instead secretly visited the fairy inside the mountain. Although he had once been a famous hunter, he never returned with game, and his friends wondered why he no longer showed interest in hunting or in the noblewomen of the surrounding castles.
Eventually, the lord of Rattenberg invited the knight to a wedding feast. There he met a beautiful noblewoman from Innsbruck who admired the fairy’s ring and persuaded him to give it to her. The knight immediately regretted his betrayal and hurried back to the Sonnwendjoch the following morning to beg the fairy’s forgiveness. On the way, however, a white deer crossed his path and awakened his old hunting instinct, causing him to pursue it toward the mountain. He reached the rock where he had always entered the fairy’s kingdom by tapping with the ring, but the ring was gone and the entrance would not open. The fairy appeared before him holding the ring and told him that he had broken his promise three times: he had been unfaithful, had allowed the ring to leave his hand, and had once again chased one of her protected animals. She declared that he would suffer for his betrayal and disappeared forever. As the knight departed, a great mudslide thundered down the mountain and buried a wide area. He was never truly happy again, eventually leaving the Inn Valley and undertaking a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, from which he never returned.
Sources
“Die Fee vom Sonnwendjoch.” In Die schönsten Sagen aus Österreich. n.p., n.d., p. 260. Reproduced by SAGEN.at. https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/oesterreich/tirol/unterinntal/sonnwendjoch.html