Pottenstein Castle

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Pottenstein Castle
Pottenstein Castle - general view from the south

Pottenstein Castle - general view from the south

Creation time : between the years 1057 and 1070
Castle type : Höhenburg, spur location
Conservation status: Partly preserved
Standing position : Noble, later episcopal Bamberg administrative castle
Place: Pottenstein
Geographical location 49 ° 46 '11.8 "  N , 11 ° 24' 29.3"  E Coordinates: 49 ° 46 '11.8 "  N , 11 ° 24' 29.3"  E
Height: 410  m above sea level NN
Pottenstein Castle (Bavaria)
Pottenstein Castle

Pottenstein Castle is one of the oldest castles in Franconian Switzerland and houses a castle museum . It rises on a rock above the town of the same name Pottenstein in the Upper Franconian district of Bayreuth in Bavaria .

The castle and the castle museum can be visited for an entrance fee.

Geographical location

The Spornburg is located in the Franconian Switzerland-Veldenstein Forest Nature Park at an altitude of about 410 meters on a mountain spur that protrudes to the west between the valleys of the Püttlach and Weihersbach, immediately southeast above the town of Pottenstein, about 22 kilometers southwest of Bayreuth .

There are other castles in the vicinity: to the west are the Gößweinstein castle , the Kohlstein castle and the two castle ruins in Tüchersfeld , to the east are the Hollenberg castle ruins and the Wartberg and Böheimstein castle stables .

The rock castle of Burg Pottenstein has been designated as an important geotope by the Bavarian State Office for the Environment (Geotope number: 472R157).

History of the castle

The foundation of Pottenstein Castle

The village of Pottenstein was owned by Margrave Otto von Schweinfurt around 1050 and after his death in 1057 it passed to his third daughter, Judith. Judith was married to Duke Kuno von Bayern in her first marriage . After Kuno died in 1055, Judith married Boto around 1057 , the younger brother of the Count Palatine Aribo II from the noble family of the Aribones . In 1070 he called himself comes de Potenstein , i.e. Count von Pottenstein.

The founding of the Pottenstein Castle, which bears his name (Stone of Boto), will have been made by Boto between the years 1057 and 1070. The castle probably originally served to secure the area between Obermain and Pegnitz to the southeast.

There is no clear documentary evidence of the founding of the castle by King Konrad I as early as 918.

The episcopal Bamberg official castle

Pottenstein Castle from the north-west, lithograph (around 1840) by Theodor Rothbarth after a drawing by Carl Käppel
Pottenstein Castle from the north
Pottenstein Castle from the south
Pottenstein Castle from the east (nature reserve)

Boto died in 1104 without an heir of his own and was buried in Theres Monastery. Judith had died in 1066.

From the fact that the castle was not among the acquisitions of Otto I, the saint , who held the title of bishop from 1102 to 1139 , it can be concluded that Boto still had the castle during his lifetime before or in the Year 1102 sold to the diocese of Bamberg . The castle was the residence of Bishop Otto I around 1118 and 1121.

In the centuries that followed, Pottenstein Castle was looked after by an episcopal-Bamberg ministerial family who also named themselves after the castle. The oldest known member of the family was a Wezelo von Pottenstein around 1121; In 1169 there was a Rapoto von Pottenstein. He was followed Erchenbert or Erchenbrecht of Pottenstein 1185-1221, he was also from about 1,207 episcopal bambergischer Steward . His brother Heinrich also called himself von Pottenstein. Other members of the family followed, including a Konrad von Pottenstein between 1240 and 1248, he was canon of the cathedral from 1242 .

Pottenstein Castle served as a temporary residence for Saint Elisabeth , Landgravine of Thuringia , from 1227 to 1228.

Between the years 1323/1327 and 1348 the castle became the seat of a Bamberg office . 1348 was a Gebhard Storo bailiff in Pottenstein. Pottenstein was the center of an extensive high court district . The Pottenstein administrative area expanded through the incorporation of smaller episcopal offices, the Tüchersfeld office in 1492, the Leienfels office in 1594 and the Gößweinstein office between 1628 and 1636 .

Since the beginning of the 14th century, the castle was administered by a Vogt , he had his seat in the Vogteihaus in the lower castle. This bailiwick house was called the old bailiwick in 1728 and 1743, the bailiff probably moved into a building in the city in 1728, at the latest in 1748 he moved into the bailiff's house, which had been bought in 1745 and converted in 1748/1749. The reason given was the arduous ascent to the mountain castle. The only known noble bailiff was Walter von Streitberg in 1332, the later bailiffs, who appeared at the end of the 16th century, were of the middle class .

From 1500 the officials called themselves Pfleger , they had their seat in the so-called Kemenate in the upper castle. In 1750 the keeper also moved from the castle to the Vogthaus in the city. The castle was given up as an official residence and served as a grain dump.

Warlike events

Pottenstein Castle from a north-westerly direction, steel engraving (1840) by Henry Winkles

During the bitter fighting in 1125 between King Lothar III. and the Hohenstaufen rival King Konrad III. the city of Pottenstein became a victim of flames. The castle was spared.

During the Peasants' War it was occupied and plundered by the peasants in 1525, but it was not burned out for fear that falling and burning rubble could damage houses in the town below. In addition, the farmers would have been left without protection against the troops of the Palatinate and Margrave and those of the city of Nuremberg .

The Second Federal War , in which Albrecht Alcibiades , Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach and Bayreuth undertook numerous raids and looting, which led to the destruction of many places and castles in the empire , especially in Franconia, caused severe destruction . Pottenstein Castle was shot at and taken by margrave troops on May 18, 1553. Among other things, the chapel on the upper castle was destroyed, it was no longer mentioned after 1553. The damage amount of 20,000 guilders shows that not only the outer bailey was conquered.

During the Thirty Years' War , an attack by the Swedish Colonel Cratz on the castle failed in 1634 . A trumpeter pretending to have been sent by the imperial troops appeared in front of the castle. He was let over the drawbridge , but when it was noticed that enemies were waiting outside, the drawbridge was hurried up. The trumpeter who was caught was executed after he was converted to the Catholic faith.

During the Spanish War of Succession , a garrison was placed in the castle in 1703/1704 ; it was still occupied by soldiers in 1708 and 1712. In 1703 an oven for the garrison was built into the already dilapidated keep . From a later time there are no more armed events reported around Pottenstein Castle.

Sale of the castle to private

City and Castle Pottenstein from the north, after an oil painting by Sebastian Förtsch from 1802

After the diocese passed to the Bavarian state during the secularization , the castle fell into disrepair.
In 1878 it came into the possession of the Nuremberg pharmacist Dr. Heinrich Kleemann, who owes the preservation of the castle, which was ruinous at the time and threatened with demolition. After his death in 1890, his widow sold the castle in 1900.

In 1918, Pottenstein Castle was acquired by the father of the lord of the castle, Winzelo Freiherr von Wintzingerode, who died in 2006 and whose headquarters are at Bodenstein Castle in Thuringia . His life's work was the construction of the museum and the ongoing renovation of the castle complex. The castle is still owned by the family today.

Today the castle is a privately run and inhabited museum, in which prehistoric and early historical objects, a weapon collection, books, autographs and three showrooms set up as an ensemble can be seen.

At the residence of St. Elizabeth in the year 1227-1228, the set up as memorial room reminds Elisabeth rooms in the former residential tower , the western part of the Palas .

The upper main building ( knight's hall , red salon, Elisabeth's room), remains of the former keep , the fountain house (porcelain, glass, ceramics and folklore objects) and the tithe barn (with exhibition of tithe creatures , an exhibition on the recent history of the castle and changing special exhibitions) are accessible . In addition to the impression of a well-preserved castle complex from the 16th century with medieval substance, the castle garden offers visitors a view of the city and the landscape.

The murder in the castle

On April 2, 1866 , Max Söhnlein, who had just been released from Bayreuth prison, killed the castle keeper's wife with a hoe in the presence of her toddler. Max Söhnlein was the son of a former castle keeper and committed robbery to cover up a crime. He wanted to steal clothes and money when he realized that his parents no longer lived in the castle. He was arrested shortly afterwards in Pegnitz and sentenced to life imprisonment on May 7, 1866 by the jury court in Bayreuth. Because of his youth - he was only 20 years old - the usual death penalty could not be imposed.

literature

  • Kai Kellermann: Stately gardens in Franconian Switzerland - a search for traces . Verlag Palm & Enke, Erlangen and Jena 2008, ISBN 978-3-7896-0683-0 , pp. 154-163.
  • Rüdiger Bauriedel, Ruprecht Konrad-Röder: Medieval fortifications and low-nobility mansions in the Bayreuth district . Ellwanger Druck und Verlag, Bayreuth 2007, ISBN 978-3-925361-63-0 , p. 138.
  • Ursula Pfistermeister : Wehrhaftes Franken - Volume 3: Castles, fortified churches, city walls around Bamberg, Bayreuth and Coburg , Fachverlag Hans Carl GmbH, Nuremberg 2002, ISBN 3-418-00387-7 , pp. 100-102.
  • Toni Eckert, Susanne Fischer, Renate Freitag, Rainer Hofmann, Walter Thousand Pounds: The Castles of Franconian Switzerland: A cultural guide . Gürtler Druck, Forchheim 1997, ISBN 3-9803276-5-5 , pp. 115-120.
  • Björn-Uwe Abels , Joachim Zeune, among others: Guide to archaeological monuments in Germany, Volume 20: Franconian Switzerland . Konrad Theiss Verlag GmbH and Co., Stuttgart 1990, ISBN 3-8062-0586-8 , pp. 213-215.
  • Gustav Voit, Walter Rüfer: A castle trip through Franconian Switzerland , Verlag Palm and Enke, Erlangen 1984, ISBN 3-7896-0064-4 , pp. 142–145.
  • Hellmut Kunstmann : The castles of eastern Franconian Switzerland . Commission publisher Ferdinand Schöningh, Würzburg 1965, pp. 324–343.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bavarian State Office for the Environment, Geotop Felsburg Burg Pottenstein (accessed on October 12, 2017).

Web links

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