Antoniberg (Zusmarshausen)

The striking Antoniberg rises about 1500 meters northeast of the parish church of the Zusmarshausen market ( Augsburg district , Swabia ) above the Zusamtal . The ridge, the height of which is 508.9  m above sea level. NN , carries the remains of one of the most unusual fortifications in southern Bavaria.

description

The ramparts lie on a narrow ridge running from west to east, which is set off from the adjoining ridge by a depression. On the other sides, the slopes drop moderately steeply into the valley.

To the east is a small slope terrace (approx. 20 × 30 meters) in front of it. The western face was additionally secured by an arched rampart, which, like the moat that runs around the entire complex, is almost completely leveled to form a berm .

The former ring trench is about four to five meters below the fortification plateau, which slopes down a few meters to the east in a stepped terrain. In the northwest, the trench has slipped about five to ten meters due to slope erosion.

The castle plateau secured by the moat is only 12 to 20 meters wide. The total length is approx. 160 meters. The hillside terrace in front and the stepped terrain in the east creates a kind of outer bailey . However, the old castle driveway flows into the moat in the northeast. A potential attacker may have been forced to negotiate the entire length of the facility.

From the northeast, an artificially divided slope edge runs up from the valley to the fortification and thus additionally secured the castle path.

The ramparts were certainly only reinforced by palisades , wickerwork or plank fences. No wall remnants can be seen on the slope edges. A possible interior development seems to have consisted only of wood or clay framework . Remnants of walls or bricks cannot be found in the entire castle area.

The surrounding ditch has been used as a logging route to the present day, so that the remains of the ditch in the northwest, documented by Otto Schneider (Working Group for Pre- and Early History Augsburg) in 1976/77, have largely been leveled today. The topographical survey of the area made by Schneider was published in 1977.

The Bavarian State Office for the Preservation of Monuments lists the ground monument as a ring wall of prehistoric times under the monument number D 7-7529-0015.

Time and purpose

The time and the original purpose of the ramparts are unclear. The slope trenches and the staggered rampart system on the west side are reminiscent of early medieval castle complexes, which were often expanded in this area during the Hungarian invasions .

The interior, which is only 20 meters wide, speaks against a fortified prehistoric hilltop settlement on the ridge. The relatively elaborate rampart system around the narrow core structure corresponds more to a temporary protective or early aristocratic castle.

Otto Schneider (1977) even considered a connection between the ground monument and the battle of Zusmarshausen - the last major combat action of the Thirty Years' War - to be conceivable. A bivouac site from this era has been found on the northwestern foothills of the Antoni Mountains .

However , all these attempts at classification must remain speculative until a professional archaeological investigation of the castle area has been carried out.

literature

• Hermann Endrös (ed.): Guide to archaeological monuments in Swabia, Volume 1: Archaeological walks around Augsburg . Konrad Theiss Verlag, Stuttgart and Aalen 1977, ISBN 3-8062-0185-4 , pp. 79-80.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation: Entry ( Memento from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive )

Coordinates: 48 ° 24 '43.2 "  N , 10 ° 36' 5.5"  E