Where to Stay in Eppan, Trentino-Alto Adige

What is Eppan known for?

Eppan is the centre of South Tyrol's largest wine-growing area. Over a dozen of its varieties count among the region's top wines. The Überetsch around it has the highest density of castles in Europe, over 200 historic buildings, about 20 of them castles and palaces, and Hocheppan, seat of the Counts of Eppan, is famous for the medieval frescoes in its chapel.

What are the main landmarks in Eppan?

Hocheppan, centre of the Counts of Eppan, keeps the famous frescoes of its chapel. Hocheppan is reached on foot. Boymont and the Altenburg were built by the same counts, and Schloss Korb and Schloss Englar began as towers of their retainers.

Castle Gandegg and Castle Freudenstein, both listed heritage monuments, add two more. The parish church of St. Pauls, 86 metres high and built from 1460 to 1647, is called the Dom auf dem Lande, and its Gothic tower carries a Baroque onion dome.

What is the history of Eppan?

Stone cist graves, hillforts such as the one at Perdonig, and a Late Bronze Age settlement show how early Eppan was settled. In 2005 building work at St. Pauls uncovered a Roman villa with 4th-century floor mosaics and baths. The name is Roman.

Appianum meant the estate of the Appius family, and Paulus Diaconus wrote at the end of the 8th century that the Franks had destroyed a castrum Appianum in 590, when the area belonged to the Lombard duchy of Trento. In the High Middle Ages the Counts of Eppan fought the Counts of Tyrol for control of what is South Tyrol, ruling from Hocheppan. St. Pauls was the old centre, with the Altenburg nearby as the seat of the court, and its great parish church went up between 1460 and 1647.

The Überetsch railway linked Eppan with Bolzano from 1898 to 1974, and since 1971 the municipality has carried an der Weinstraße, on the Wine Road, in its official name.

Where is Eppan?

Eppan lies in the south of South Tyrol, a few kilometres southwest of Bolzano, and covers about 59.7 square kilometres. Most of it is the northern half of the Überetsch, an upland of low hills above the floor of the Adige valley, with the Mitterberg dividing it from the valley on the east. The Mendel ridge rises to the west.

Its neighbours include Bolzano, Kaltern, Andrian, Terlan, and Nals.

How do you get to Eppan?

The SS 42, part of the South Tyrolean Wine Road, is Eppan's main road, linked in the north of the municipality to the MeBo expressway. The old railway line closed in 1974. Much of its route carries a cycle path.