Pöham
Photo: Bruni Griesner
The Black Madonna of Pöham
45 minutes South of Salzburg. According to a book on local churches, this statue is yet another copy of the Black Madonna of Loreto venerated as a “Gnadenbild” an image of grace in the Filialkirche Mariä Himmelfahrt in the village Pöham with her own pilgrimages. Yet if she is really a “Loretomadonna”, which no other website mentions, this one is a unique and a free interpretation. According to Bruni Griesner’s article on Black Madonnas, she is known in the village as the “ugly” Madonna. Legend says that her original home was a tree. It burned, the Madonna remained, but with a charred face.
The original chapel was erected around 1743-6 in thanksgiving for a treasure found in that place. It is not clear whether that treasure included the Black Madonna.
