South Tyrolean Unterland

After the fall of the Roman Empire and the Migration Period, the Adige valley south of Bolzano was gradually settled by Bavarian peasants from the 6th century onwards.

In the 12th and 13th century, the Counts of Tyrol continued to expand their dominant possession in the region and finally achieved independency from the Bavarian dukes as well as from the prince-bishops of Trent and Brixen.

When after World War I the Tyrolean lands up to Brenner Pass fell to the Kingdom of Italy according to the 1915 Treaty of London, the Italian authorities shifted the border northwards and from 1921 the entire Unterland area up to Bronzolo belonged to the Trentino province.

The Fascist regime in Italy decided to force the so-called mixed-language regions to be Italianised while German South Tyroleans insisted on the Salorno border (see Bozner Bergsteigerlied).

On 30 May 1946 a large protest rally on the Castelfeder hill near Neumarkt was organised by the newly established South Tyrolean People's Party (SVP).