History of Via Ferrata
From battlefields to sport climbing routes – the fascinating destiny of a discipline born under shellfire.
The term «via ferrata» – Italian for «iron road» – describes today a mountain route equipped with steel cables, iron rungs and metal ladders anchored into the rock. Behind this sporting definition lies an extraordinary history, intimately tied to the great tragedies of the 20th century, the genius of military engineers, and the passion of mountaineers.
Key Dates
First documented iron fixtures in the Austrian Alps – iron rungs set to secure access to the Dachstein massif.
Fixed pitons installed on Monte Cristallo (Dolomites) by mountain guides, paving the way for systematic rock equipping.
Italy declares war on Austria-Hungary. The front runs through the Dolomites : military engineers equip the rock faces on a massive scale.
Hundreds of kilometres of steel cables, ladders and tunnels are hewn into the rock by Italian Alpini and Austro-Hungarian Kaiserjäger.
Italian and Austrian alpine clubs rehabilitate the military routes and open them to the public. Unofficial birth of recreational via ferrata.
First dedicated via ferrata guidebooks published in Italy. The discipline acquires its own name and identity.
Expansion into France, Switzerland and Austria. National alpine clubs begin systematically equipping new routes.
The UIAA publishes unified grading recommendations. In Switzerland, the SAC uses the K1–K6 scale ; internationally, the Austrian A–F notation is the standard.
Over 10,000 equipped routes in Europe. Via ferrata is one of the fastest-growing mountain sports disciplines worldwide.
Origins : 19th-Century Alpinism
Before the war took hold of the concept, the idea of fitting rock faces with iron supports had already germinated in the 19th-century alpine world. Pioneer mountaineers began driving bolts, rings and short ladders into the most demanding passages to make ascents accessible to wealthy clients.
The earliest documented iron fixtures are dated to around 1843 in the Austrian Dachstein massif. In 1869, guides on the Monte Cristallo in the Dolomites went further and installed the first permanent fixtures on a route open to tourist clientele. These initiatives remained isolated and artisanal, however – it would take the brutality of industrial warfare to transform this niche practice into a large-scale network.
1915–1918 : The Dolomite War, the Birth Certificate
On 23 May 1915, Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary. The front line stretched for nearly 600 kilometres, a significant portion running straight through the Dolomites – those limestone cathedrals rising above 3,000 metres. For both commands, the problem was immediate : how to move soldiers, equipment and ammunition across vertical rock faces in extreme winter conditions?
The answer was military engineering. The Italian Alpini on one side, the Austro-Hungarian Kaiserjäger and Standsschützen on the other, launched into a titanic construction project. Steel cables, forged rungs, metal ladders, zip-lines, suspension bridges and tunnels blasted into the rock : within a few campaign seasons, these men equipped hundreds of kilometres of cliff faces with staggering precision and resolve.
Among the most remarkable achievements was the Strada delle 52 Gallerie on Monte Pasubio : a network of 52 galleries and six kilometres of path carved into the rock by the Alpini between 1917 and 1918. On the Marmolada, Austrian soldiers built an underground city in the glacier – the Città di Ghiaccio – to house up to 12,000 men. By the Armistice of November 1918, thousands of metres of cables and iron fixtures remained anchored in the rock.
« The alpine soldiers carved into living rock the foundations of a discipline that the entire world practises today. »
– Museo della Guerra Bianca, Adamello (Italy)
The Slow Democratisation (1945–1980)
Italy emerged from the war with a singular heritage : thousands of kilometres of equipped routes, abandoned in massifs that had become, in peacetime, extraordinary playgrounds. The Club Alpino Italiano (CAI) and the Österreichischer Alpenverein (ÖAV) undertook to rehabilitate, secure and waymark the most accessible of the military routes.
The Via Ferrata delle Bocchette Centrali in the Brenta massif (Trentino Dolomites) became the symbol of this renewal. It was not until the late 1960s that the discipline acquired a specific name and its own identity.
Europe Gets Equipped (1980–2000)
During the 1980s, via ferrata crossed Italian borders. In France, the first systematic routes appeared in the Southern Alps and the limestone gorges of the Vercors. Austria – which uses the term «Klettersteig» – developed a dense network in the Eastern Alps. Germany followed in the Bavarian Alps.
The 1990s brought a true explosion : Spain, Slovenia and many other countries joined the movement. Specialist manufacturers introduced the first Y-shaped energy-absorbing lanyards – a revolution in safety that opened the discipline to a far wider audience.
Switzerland : At the Crossroads of Three Alpine Traditions
Switzerland holds a unique geographical and cultural position in the history of via ferrata. A mountain country par excellence, it is simultaneously heir to the Alemannic Klettersteig tradition, the Francophone via ferrata tradition, and the Italian-speaking tradition of Ticino, directly connected to the Dolomitic origins.
The Swiss Alpine Club (SAC/CAS), founded in 1863 – one of the oldest alpine clubs in the world – played a pioneering role. From the 1980s onwards, the Bernese Prealps, the Valais Alps, Graubünden, Fribourg and Ticino progressively equipped their iconic rock faces.
The SAC uses its own grading scale – the Hüsler grading –, from K1 (easy) to K6 (extremely difficult), where K stands for Klettersteig. Exactly equivalent to the Austrian A–F notation (K1 = A through K6 = F), it is the scale displayed on trailhead signs and official route sheets in Switzerland. The UIAA, headquartered in Bern since 1932, published in 2002 international grading recommendations progressively adopted by all European federations.
The Modern Era : Safety, Grading and Democratisation
Since the 2000s, via ferrata has enjoyed remarkable worldwide growth. The combination of technical accessibility – no free-climbing expertise required –, vertiginous exposure and exceptional scenery attracts new practitioners every year, from families to seasoned alpinists. The Y-lanyard with energy absorber, now mandatory, dissipates up to 80 % of the energy of a fall.
In 2009, the Dolomites were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. The discipline continues to evolve : aquatic via ferrata, night routes, historically themed itineraries – each year, new routes enrich the world’s alpine heritage, including the hundred-plus via ferrata that Switzerland counts today.