Wirtheim Castle

Castle Wirtheim is a renaissance - castle of the 15th and 16th centuries in Wirtheim , in the municipality of Biebergemünd in Main-Kinzig-Kreis in Hesse .

Street side 2019

Coat of arms above the entrance, on the left (heraldic right) forester von Gelnhausen, on the right Schleifras

Courtyard side from the east, 2012

history

The castle is first mentioned in 1426 as an Electoral Mainz fief, which was given to Martin Forstmeister von Gelnhausen . Around 1500 it came into the possession of the von Lauter family , who were related to Forstmeister and who used it as a Mainz office. Significant parts of the current structure of the palace are likely to come from this time.

In 1582 the von Forstmeister family bought the castle back, but initially left it to the Electorate of Mainz . In 1717 Johann Friedrich Freiherr von Forstmeister lived in Schloss Wirtheim. In 1797, the pledges and fiefdoms were converted by Mainz selling the castle to Hugo von Forstmeister for 14,000 florins . In 1808 the castle changed hands again and went to 18 citizens of Wirtheim for 17,800 florins.

Renovations took place in 1982 and 1997. Today there are private apartments in it.

investment

Wirtheim Castle is a two-story solid building. On the courtyard side it has a round stair tower with a round spindle. The development through such a tower is very typical for small rural aristocratic residences in the region. Above the entrance there is a double coat of arms of the forest masters von Gelnhausen with the lords von Schleifras . On the street side there is a barrel-vaulted room in the basement, which is now broken through as a pedestrian passage.

literature

Waltraud Friedrich: Cultural monuments in the Main-Kinzig district II.1. Bad Orb, Biebergemünd, Birstein, Brachttal, Freigericht. Ed .: State Office for Monument Preservation Hessen , Theiss, Stuttgart 2011, ISBN 978-3-8062-2469-6 ( Monument topography Federal Republic of Germany ), pp. 223–225 and 236.
Rudolf Knappe: Medieval castles in Hessen. 800 castles, castle ruins and fortifications. 3. Edition. Wartberg-Verlag, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2000, ISBN 3-86134-228-6 , p. 387.
Rolf Müller (Ed.): Palaces, castles, old walls. Published by the Hessendienst der Staatskanzlei, Wiesbaden 1990, ISBN 3-89214-017-0 , p. 50.

Web links

Commons : Schloss Wirtheim - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Renaissance castles in Hesse (project at the Germanic National Museum by Georg Ulrich Großmann )
Wirtheim Castle, Main-Kinzig district. Historical local lexicon for Hesse (as of February 17, 2014). In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS). Hessian State Office for Historical Cultural Studies (HLGL), accessed on October 30, 2014 .

50.222445 9.261947Coordinates: 50 ° 13 ′ 20.8 " N , 9 ° 15 ′ 43" E