Four limes were planted around 1810 to stand guard over a roadside image of the Virgin Mary, and more than two centuries later they are still at their post. The register of Land Salzburg records both the date and the reason: the trees were set along the Freisaalweg around an old Marian wayside shrine as a symbolic protection for it. Most old trees leave their purpose to guesswork. These four had theirs written down. They went in the year Salzburg passed from Austrian to Bavarian rule, and they were already standing when it returned to Austria six years later. The province protected them as a natural monument in 1972. The path runs from Akademiestraße across an open meadow to Schloss Freisaal, and it is public and free, with no gate to pass. Stand by the shrine and the whole arrangement is in front of you: four big trunks, the small shrine between them, and the Hohensalzburg fortress on its hill behind. The Hornbeam of Freisaalweg is about 380 metres away on the same ground, so the two make an easy pair. What the register does not say is which lime these are. It names them only as Linden, and nobody has published a girth or a height. If you can tell small-leaved from large-leaved by the leaves, or have a tape measure with you, tell us what you find.
flowers
late June into July, when the limes flower and the meadow path smells of them
Freisaalweg, between Akademiestraße and Schloss Freisaal, Nonntal, SalzburgYou can recognise them as the four limes standing around a small wayside shrine on the meadow path. They are on the Freisaalweg between Akademiestraße and Schloss Freisaal, with the fortress on the hill behind.
Free. Stands beside a public footpath across an open meadow; no gate.
Nonntal, about 1.5 km south of the old town; walk from Salzburg Hauptbahnhof or Akademiestraße bus stops not checked
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from.