Girsberg Castle

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Girsberg Castle
Girsberg castle ruins

Girsberg castle ruins

Alternative name (s): Burg Giersberg, Burg Guirsberg, der Stein, Burg Stein, Burg Klein-Rappoltstein, Burg Geyersberg
Creation time : 13th Century
Castle type : Höhenburg, spur location
Conservation status: ruin
Standing position : Gentry
Construction: Humpback cuboid, boss cuboid, quarry stone
Place: Ribeauvillé
Geographical location 48 ° 12 '12.5 "  N , 7 ° 18' 26"  E Coordinates: 48 ° 12 '12.5 "  N , 7 ° 18' 26"  E
Height: 528  m

The castle Girsberg (also Giersberg , French: Château du Girsberg ) is the ruin of a Spur castle in the field of French community Ribeauvillé (German: Rappoltsweiler) in Alsace . First mentioned in documents in 1288, the small castle received its current name from its owners in the 14th and 15th centuries: the Lords of Girsberg.

Besieged and captured by the Lords of Rappoltstein in a feud in the first quarter of the 15th century , it was abandoned at the beginning of the 16th century and left to decay.

The ruin, like the two neighboring castles Hohrappoltstein and Ulrichsburg, has been under monument protection as a classified Monument historique since October 1, 1841 .

Name variants

Since it was first mentioned in a document in 1288 as "castrum quod dictur der Stein", the castle complex has been given very different names over the centuries. In 1316 it reappears as "the stone". In the second half of the 14th century, however, the renaming after the feudal recipients at that time , the Lords of Girsberg, took place, because in 1379 it was first mentioned as "Gyrsberg", which also spelled "Giersberg", "Girsperg" and "Guirsberg" appears. In 1458 the castle complex is also called "Klein-Rappoltstein". Other names that have been used for Girsberg Castle over the years are "Burg Stein" and "Burg Geyersberg".

description

Floor plan of the castle ruins

The castle is enthroned at 528 meters above sea ​​level on a 60 meter long plateau of a granite rock that towers up to 20 meters and descends like a staircase on its south side. It stands between the Hohrappoltstein and Ulrichsburg plants within sight and is the smallest of the three Rappoltsweiler castles.

The ruin consists of the remains of the former main castle and the south-east of it something deeper bailey . The main building materials used were red and gray sandstone . From the outer bailey, parts of the one meter thick ring wall made of humpback ashlars and the late Gothic castle gate are still preserved.

The main castle area is dominated by the striking remains of the pentagonal keep . As building material for its walls, granite bosses were used, which were extracted directly from the castle rock. The ground floor of the 5.30 meter wide tower has no space. Above this is a windowless chamber with a high entrance five meters high, which is closed off by a late medieval defense plate .

To the south of the keep are the remains of the former residential building made of rubble stones . The southern gable wall is particularly well preserved, while its eastern wall was reinforced by a semicircular tower. In the lower part of the western wall, the arched gate of a lavatory and an arched niche above it is still preserved.

history

The time of origin of the first castle complex cannot be precisely dated. The architectural features still preserved from this construction phase indicate that it was built in the first half of the 13th century. Accordingly, a branch of the Lords of Rappoltstein built the castle as a residence. As a result of a lightning strike on July 10, 1288, a large part of the castle burned down, but was then rebuilt. After it came to Anselm II von Rappoltstein by dividing the estate in 1298, he exchanged it in 1304 for the ancestral seat of the Lords of Girsberg near Soultzbach-les-Bains in the Münstertal . As feudal lords, however, the Rappoltsteiners retained both the right of first refusal and the right to open the stone .

The Girsbergers renewed the castle, which was named after them from then on. Their rule ended on June 11, 1422, when Hans Wilhelm von Girsberg was in feud with Maximin I. Smassmann von Rappoltstein. The Rappoltsteiner besieged it together with Count Hans von Lupfen, was able to take it and set the facility on fire. Hans Wilhelm von Girsberg was shot dead. Since he was childless, Girsberg Castle fell back to the Lords of Rappoltstein as a settled fiefdom, who from 1458 had them administered by a castle vogt .

An engraving from Matthäus Merian's Topographia Alsatiae published in 1644 shows the three castles of Rappoltsweiler with Girsberg Castle in the middle.

During the 15th century, a comprehensive new building took place in which the core castle was enlarged. In addition to increasing the keep, the Rappoltsteiners probably also had the Romanesque residential building increased during this period . Its top floor dates back to the second half of the 15th century.

At the beginning of the 16th century the castle was still inhabited, but was then abandoned, so that it began to deteriorate gradually. However, a copper engraving by Matthäus Merian published in 1644 shows the complex with the roof still intact.

In the 1990s, restoration measures were carried out to secure the existing building fabric.

legend

Two brothers from Rappoltstein, the gentlemen of Girsberg Castle and Ulrichsburg, had an appointment to hunt early in the morning. The night before, they had agreed that whoever woke up first would wake the other with a bolt gun on his shutter. On the morning of the hunt, the owner of the Ulrichsburg thought he was the first to wake up and got ready at the window to fire a shot with his crossbow at Girsberg. But just at the moment when he opened his own shutter to have a free firing path, the bolt of his brother, who had risen even earlier, whizzed up and pierced his heart.

literature

  • Karl Albrecht (Ed.): Rappoltsteinisches Urkundenbuch. Volumes 1, 2 and 3. Colmar 1891 and 1894.
  • Thomas Biller, Bernhard Metz: The late Romanesque castle building in Alsace (1200-1250). 1st edition. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-422-06635-9 , pp. 225–228.
  • Fritz Bouchholtz: Castles and palaces in Alsace. According to old templates. Weidlich, Frankfurt am Main 1965, pp. 115–117.
  • Nicolas Mengus, Jean-Michel Rudrauf: Châteaux forts et fortifications médiévales d′Alsace. Dictionnaire d'histoire et d'architecture. La Nuée Bleue, Strasbourg 2013, ISBN 978-2-7165-0828-5 , pp. 264-268.
  • Friedrich J. Ortwein (ed.): Rappoltstein. 1905-2005. Locher, Cologne 2005, ISBN 3-930054-50-7 , pp. 640, 646-649 ( PDF ; 138.3 MB).
  • Felix Wolff: Alsatian Castle Lexicon. Directory of castles and chateaus in Alsace. Weidlich, Frankfurt am Main 1979, ISBN 3-8035-1008-2 , pp. 281-283.

Web links

Commons : Burg Girsberg  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Footnotes

  1. ^ Friedrich J. Ortwein: Rappoltstein. 1905-2005. 2005, p. 640.
  2. ^ The Rappoltsweiler castles in the Base Mérimée of the French Ministry of Culture (French), accessed on December 21, 2009.
  3. ^ Karl Albrecht: Rappoltsteinisches Urkundenbuch. Volume 1, item 172.
  4. ↑ Information according to Karl Albrecht: Rappoltsteinisches Urkundenbuch. Volume 2, item 173. Biller / Metz give 1401 as the first mention. Cf. Thomas Biller, Bernhard Metz: The late Romanesque castle building in Alsace (1200-1250). 2007, p. 225.
  5. ↑ a b c Site des Châteaux Forts d'Alsace , accessed January 22, 2020.
  6. ↑ Éliane and Alain Morley-Schaeffer: 300 Châteaux en Alsace. Premier guide Vosges et Plaine. Éditions des Dernières Nouvelles-Istra, 1979, ISBN 2-7165-0032-0 , p. 53.
  7. ↑ Ferdinand Mehle: Castle ruins of the Vosges. Morstadt, Kehl [and a.] 1986, ISBN 3-88571-146-X , p. 156.
  8. ↑ a b Bodo Ebhardt : The defense construction of Europe in the Middle Ages. Volume 1. Reprint of the 1939 edition. Flechsig, Würzburg 1998, ISBN 3-88189-243-5 , p. 328.
  9. ^ A b Friedrich-Wilhelm Krahe: Castles of the German Middle Ages. Floor plan lexicon. Flechsig, Würzburg 2000, ISBN 3-88189-360-1 , p. 214.
  10. ^ Thomas Biller, Bernhard Metz: The late Romanesque castle building in Alsace (1200-1250). 2007, p. 225.
  11. ↑ a b Thomas Biller, Bernhard Metz: The late Romanesque castle building in Alsace (1200-1250). 2007, p. 226.
  12. ↑ Kastel Elsass , accessed on December 21, 2009.
  13. ^ According to Thomas Biller, Bernhard Metz: The late Romanesque castle building in Alsace (1200–1250). 2007, p. 225. Other sources cite 1316, but the deal is only confirmed once more that year.
  14. ^ Thomas Biller, Bernhard Metz: The late Romanesque castle building in Alsace (1200-1250). 2007, p. 227.