The Bienstand, in several histories and novels called the Bistand, is a low mountain ridge, 865 m high, in the Bavarian Forest between the villages of Sankt Oswald-Riedlhütte and Grafenau, immediately south of the clearly higher mountains of the Rachel and Lusen, which lie within the Bavarian Forest National Park. Its name probably comes from the Middle High German (bien=near and stand=forest pasture, see also Kirchlinger Stand) and means near the forest pasture.