Neuchâtel Castle (Durach)

Neuchâtel Castle
The keep from the north
Creation time :	after 1300
Castle type :	Höhenburg, spur hill location
Conservation status:	Wall remains
Standing position :	Nobility, clergy
Place:	Durach Castle
Geographical location	47 ° 41 '30.7 "  N , 10 ° 21' 42.3"  E Coordinates: 47 ° 41 '30.7 "  N , 10 ° 21' 42.3"  E
Height:	780  m above sea level NN

The ruins of Neuchâtel Castle are located on a wooded hill spur southeast of Durach in the Oberallgäu district in Bavarian Swabia . In addition to the restored remains of the keep , some remains of the wall have been preserved.

history

The main castle from the outer bailey plateau

The hilltop castle was built after 1300 as the seat of a branch of the Lords of Sulzberg. The sex had split into two lines around 1300. The main line continued to reside at the nearby Sulzberg Castle .

The fortress replaced an older Dienstmannenburg ("old castle") belonging to the Kempten monastery and was called "new castle" or "Neusulzberg". Older sources even located a Roman burgus on the terrain spur.

In 1380, Konrad Schenk von Sulzberg zu Neuenburg, the last male offspring of the Neuchâtel line, died. The castle then came to the Lords of Schellenberg, who were related to the Sulzbergers.

In 1408 the Kempten prince monastery placed a bailiff in the castle who was directly under the prince abbot.

In 1421 the Schellenbergs sold their fiefdom to the monastery. The sale was confirmed by Emperor Sigismund in 1436 .

In 1455 a penal and reformatory was installed on the fortress. During the German Peasant War in 1525, some ringleaders of the rebels are said to have been captured and tortured on the Neuchâtel.

In 1546 troops of the Schmalkaldic League occupied the castle. Two years later, the women and children from the area fled to Neuchâtel from the hostilities. In 1552 a troop of horsemen of the north German princes conquered the complex after the castle bailiff refused to hand it over. After the enemy soldiers withdrew, the fortress was repaired again.

The last Vogt left the mountain castle over the Durach in 1642. The castle was abandoned and exploited as a quarry .

Around 1893 a farmer blew up the large keep to get more building material. In 1992, during archaeological excavations in advance of the planned renovation measures, the former blast tunnel was discovered at a depth of about two meters.

In 1993 and 1999 the municipality of Durach secured the ruins of the keep. The rest of the wall remains, however, still severely endangered.

description

The interior of the keep with the walled-in high entrance

The southwest side of the keep

The strongly substance-endangered kennel wall in the southwest of the main castle

The castle was built on a high hill over a loop of the Durach . The river protects the fortress on three sides. In the north, two neck ditches with an intermediate wall cut off the castle square from the ridge. The outer, very deep trench was evidently created by reworking a natural erosion channel .

In the east, the narrow castle path leads to the ruins of a tower or gate security and along the main castle cone to the rectangular outer castle . In the southwest corner of this plateau, rubble walls and remains of walls mark the location of an approximately square building (approx. 16 × 18 m). The slopes fall very steeply into the valley of the Durach in the north and south. The less steep southwest side of the castle hill is secured by two short cross trenches. Here, a marked trail enables the ascent from the Durachtobel. In the valley, a comfortable hiking trail leads through the river bend. It is labeled "Wasserweg" and has numerous information boards.

The main castle cone jutting out to the west in the north of the outer bailey is still surrounded by some remains of the curtain wall. The foundations of a semicircular protruding shell tower can be seen in the southwest corner.

Slightly elevated stands in Nordosteck still up to six meters high stump of the keep (about 9.8 x 9.4 m) upright. The original high entrance has been walled up in the west wall. A stone memorial plaque is also embedded here, which was installed in 1926 on the initiative of the Kempten mayor and passionate castle researcher Otto Merkt .

The north and east walls of the large tower have completely disappeared due to the demolition around 1893. The wall thickness of the tower built from rubble stones is about two meters.

To the west, a long, in the west still more than three meter high wall section connects to the keep, which was formerly preceded by the ring wall like a fortress.

While the existing wall of the keep was carefully secured by the municipality at the end of the 20th century, most of the remaining ruins are in a desolate state. About 400 m northeast of the castle, an agricultural property reminds of the location of the castle's former building or farmyard.

The Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation lists the ground monument as a medieval castle stables with ruins under the monument number D 7-8328-0013.

literature

• Norbert Herrmann: Kempter history book. Pictures from the history of the city and district of Kempten. ( Allgäuer Heimatbücher 65). Verlag für Heimatpflege, Kempten 1963, pp. 84, 110, 115–116.
• Toni Nessler: Castles in the Allgäu, Volume 1: Castle ruins in the Altlandkreis Kempten and Altlandkreis Sonthofen . 1st edition. Allgäuer Zeitungsverlag, Kempten 1985, ISBN 3-88006-102-5 , pp. 112-121.

Web links

Commons : Neuchâtel Castle  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation: Entry ( Memento of the original from May 16, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.