Eisenberg Castle (Bavaria)

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Eisenberg Castle
General view of Eisenberg Castle from the neighboring Hohenfreyberg Castle

General view of Eisenberg Castle from the neighboring Hohenfreyberg Castle

Creation time : around 1315
Castle type : Höhenburg, summit location
Conservation status: ruin
Standing position : Count
Place: Eisenberg
Geographical location 47 ° 36 '46 "  N , 10 ° 35' 25"  E Coordinates: 47 ° 36 '46 "  N , 10 ° 35' 25"  E
Height: 1055  m above sea level NN
Eisenberg Castle (Bavaria)
Eisenberg Castle
Main south gate before the conservation measures, 1983
The main castle from the south

The Eisenberg Castle is the ruins of a medieval hilltop castle on the Isenberch , a 1,055  m high foothills of the Tannheimer Mountains , four kilometers north of Pfronten in the community Eisenberg in Ostallgäu in southwestern Bavaria . Together with Hohenfreyberg Castle, the castle ruins form a group of castles that dominate the landscape and can be seen from afar.

history

Around 1315 the new castle was laid out by the noble free von Hohenegg . The Hohenegger were against the expansionist ambitions of the Tyrolean Count Meinhard II. - which of its two castles hole and Vilsegg north into - had seized Allgäu dodged.

The first documentary mention of the new castle is dated 1340 with "uf den Isenberch". Already in 1382 the Hohenegger had to give the fortress to the Austrian Duke Leopold III. von Habsburg , who soon afterwards gave the castle and the rule as a fief to Friedrich von Freyberg , the son-in-law of the last noble lord of the castle, Berthold von Hohenegg .

The castle was damaged during the Peasants' War in 1525, for which the family was compensated ten years later.

Towards the end of the Thirty Years' War , Eisenberg shared the fate of its two neighboring castles, Hohenfreyberg and Falkenstein . In September 1646 the Tyrolean provincial government decided - in view of the threat from the advancing Protestant army - to give up its three Allgäu outposts. The castles were evacuated and set on fire so that they should not fall into the hands of the attackers intact. Since the Protestants changed their direction shortly afterwards, sacrificing the fortifications was pointless. All three castles have been uninhabited ruins since then .

The ruins remained in the possession of the von Freyberg-Eisenberg zu Eisenberg family until 1952 . That year the last woman who bore this old name died. In 1980, the Eisenberg community bought the remains of the ruins, in order to start the renovation together with the Association for the Preservation of Eisenberg Castle a year later .

description

The "high coat"
East side of the main castle and kennel
View through the southern main gate of the watchtower in the outer bailey

The core of the complex is the oval main castle , which was built from around 1315. It is a mantle wall castle , so the ring wall is led around the entire main castle in the manner of a shield wall . A keep was superfluous here, the high cloak took on its military and representative functions. At the end of the 15th century, the fortification and modernization of the castle began. The mantle was raised and closed with a crenellated wreath , a strong kennel was placed around the main castle and the fortifications of the large outer castle expanded. The outer bailey wall is reinforced by four semicircular, wall-high shell towers, a similar tower strengthens the kennel wall next to the main gate.

The original castle entrance was on the east side of the main castle, the current entrance situation was not created until the 16th century and a large, earth-filled bastion was placed in front of the old gate . Today's entrance to the main castle is opposite to the west, making the main gate much easier to reach from the outer castle.

Inside the main castle, the walls of the residential and commercial buildings have been partially preserved. The castle had two palaces and a chapel , a cistern , a baking and bathing room and storage rooms. Some remains of the cellar vault can also be seen. The interior development is attached directly to the mantle wall.

In the west, a low, square tower rises in the outer bailey, which may have previously served as a refuge or a gun platform. Today it is used with its built-in wooden viewing platform as a lookout point on Pfronten and the surrounding Allgäu and Tyrolean mountains.

The entire complex has now been secured by the community and the castle association and is freely accessible. While the neighboring Hohenfreyberg castle was renovated according to the most modern scientific criteria, Eisenberg offers the example of a “conventional” castle renovation carried out with a lot of idealism and cleanly. Additions and "smoothing" were only made where it was structurally and statically necessary.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Archives of the Stams monastery, document G XXXIb n 3.

literature

  • Joachim Zeune , Bertold Pölcher: Eisenberg. Burgenverlag Zeune and Koop, Eisenberg 1999, ISBN 3-934132-02-2 .
  • Klaus Leidorf , Peter Ettel , Walter Irlinger, Joachim Zeune : Castles in Bavaria - 7,000 years of history in an aerial photo. Konrad Theiss Verlag , Stuttgart 1999, ISBN 3-8062-1364-X , pp. 144-145.
  • Toni Nessler: Castles in the Allgäu, Volume 2: Castle ruins in the West Allgäu and in the neighboring Vorarlberg, in the Württemberg Allgäu, in the northern Allgäu around Memmingen, in the northeast Allgäu around Kaufbeuren and Obergünzburg as well as in the eastern Allgäu and in the adjacent Tyrol. 1st edition. Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten 1985, ISBN 3-88006-115-7 , pp. 217-231.
  • Klaus Wankmiller: Eisenberg Castle. One of the largest castles in the Allgäu, in: Das Schöne Allgäu 83 (2020), issue 2, pp. 130-133.

Web links

Commons : Burg Eisenberg  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Reconstruction of Eisenberg Castle