Christmas 1814. Vienna is full of diplomats, monarchs and spies, as the Congress of Vienna redraws the map of Europe. In the salon of Fanny von Arnstein, one of the city’s great hostesses, something unusual happens on Christmas Eve: a fir tree with candles stands in the middle of the room. The secret police, who had informers here too, recorded it in a report dated 26 December: “At Arnstein’s, the day before yesterday, there was a very well-attended Christmas tree party in the Berlin manner.” Among the guests were the Prussian State Chancellor Hardenberg and Prince Radziwill, and everyone received “presents or souvenirs from the Christmas tree”.
Fanny von Arnstein came from a Jewish family in Berlin and knew the custom from her home city, where the decorated tree was already common at the time.
The emperor takes a liking
Two years later Archduchess Henriette of Nassau-Weilburg, a Protestant and the wife of Archduke Charles, had a tree of lights put up in her palace in Seilerstätte. Emperor Franz I attended the celebration and apparently liked what he saw; soon there was a Christmas tree in the Hofburg too. What the emperor did, first the nobility and then the middle classes adopted, and from the 1820s the Christmas tree spread throughout Vienna. Many visitors know the archduchess’s palace from the inside, by the way: today it houses the Haus der Musik.
From the salon to Rathausplatz
Even before that, St. Nicholas had brought a small tree with candles for the children in some households, but the custom was not widespread. Over the 19th century, Christmas with the family around the tree and the crib became the norm. Today Vienna’s most famous Christmas tree stands in front of City Hall: since 1959 a different Austrian province has given the city a mighty tree every year, and since 1981 South Tyrol has taken part as well. The Christmas market on Rathausplatz, at first intended only as a temporary site, has been held there since 1975.
Discover Advent in Vienna
Salons, spies and a tree full of candles: we like to tell such stories where they happened, from mid-November to 23 December also on our Advent tour of the Christmas markets. On our Vienna Highlights tour we pass many places connected with the Congress of Vienna, and you will find our Advent tips in our post Advent in Vienna 2026.
