Wolfsegg Castle

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Wolfsegg Castle
Wolfsegg Castle - view of the west side of the Palas

Wolfsegg Castle - view of the west side of the Palas

Creation time : around 1278
Castle type : Höhenburg, location
Conservation status: Receive
Construction: Quarry stone masonry
Place: Wolfsegg
Geographical location 49 ° 6 '24.5 "  N , 11 ° 58' 35"  E Coordinates: 49 ° 6 '24.5 "  N , 11 ° 58' 35"  E
Height: 420  m above sea level NN
Wolfsegg Castle (Bavaria)
Wolfsegg Castle
Coat of arms of the Devils from Pirkensee on a landmark in the community Wolfsegg that, wrongly called the Wolf of Schönleiten referred

The Wolfsegg Castle is a late medieval hilltop castle on a 420  m above sea level. NN high rock cone above the center of the community Wolfsegg in the district of Regensburg in Upper Palatinate , Bavaria . The castle was never destroyed, probably thanks to its remote location, and is still consistently of Gothic structure.

history

The castle was built by the Wolf von Schönleiten ( Lupus de Schönleiten ), a branch of an Upper Palatinate noble family of the Wolf , which has been known since the 11th century , at the earliest around 1278 (dendrochronological investigation). It is more likely that it originated between 1325 and 1350, because it was not until 1350 that a Wolfhart Wolf named himself after Wolfsegg. Around 1419, in the 16th century, around 1721 and in the 19th century the castle was enlarged or rebuilt.

The castle was first mentioned in documents in 1358 when Ludwig, Duke of Bavaria and Margrave of Brandenburg, enfeoffed the alleged sisters Margaretha and Katharina of the builder who died in 1357 with the castle. One of the two sisters and her husband, Ulrich von Lichteneck zu Eggersberg , sold the "veste Wolfsegg" as a fief of the Duke of Upper Bavaria in 1367 to Ulrich von Laaber and his cousin Hadamar IV. Von Laaber, son of the minstrel Hadamar III. from Laber . The possessions in Wolfsegg were administered by carers , such as Ulrich the Hofmeister zu Winzer and the Gästels. The castle remained in the possession of the Lords of Laaber until the family died out in 1475. After the death of Domdechant Hadamar VII von Laber zu Salzburg, the last of his family, the possessions in Wolfsegg passed to Duke Albrecht IV of Bavaria . For a short time from 1490 Wolfsegg was owned by Hans Regeldorfer (Regendorfer), caretaker to Altmannstein and judge to Stadtamhof . He was married to Margaretha von Muggenthal zu Eichhofen ; From this marriage came only daughters and so Wolfsegg came to rule Pfalz-Neuburg after his death .

In 1508, Count Palatine Friedrich II. Wolfsegg awarded to Leonhard von Eck and 1514/1523 to Sebastian von Eck. In 1533 the Bavarian Chancellor Leonhard von Eck was enfeoffed with Wolfsegg by Duke and Count Palatine von Pfalz-Neuburg Ottheinrich and in 1550 his son, Oswald von Eck , district judge of Lengenfeld . In 1575 Wolfsegg came to Hans III as a pledge or as a purchase. Thumer von Zeitlarn zu Pruckberg from the Regensburg patrician family Thumer, owners of the house on the Heuport . He was followed by his son Hans IV. Thumer and in 1587 his widow, Martha Thumer, who was married to Christoph von Götzengrien for the second time, was the administrator of Wolfsegg and Holzheim. The last of the Thumer family was Hans Christoph Thumer, who in 1603, at the age of 17, became compulsory for the Landsassen . He died in 1616 and with him the Thumer family of Regensburg and Wolfsegg died out.

The next on Wolfsegg were the Götzengrien, of which Johann Christoph von Götzengrien zu Furthern, Rosenberg and Bruckberg, married to the widow Martha Thumer, was enfeoffed with Wolfsegg by Duke Wolfgang Wilhelm . His son, Hans Ferdinand von Götzengrien, ducal truchess and Kastner zu Teisbach, succeeded him, but he was in dispute with the Wolfseggians, as they did not want to perform group services because of the abandoned castle . After his death around 1678, his sons Max Ernst, Veit Ignaz († 1698) and Christoph Ferdinand († 1684) followed on Wolfsegg. Max Ernst received the baron diploma and called himself "Baron von Götzengirein on Furthern, Wolfsegg, Tutzing and Stadlthann". He died in 1707 without a male heir. He was followed by his nephew Franz Georg Heinrich Freiherr von Götzengrien, who was enfeoffed with Wolfsegg by Elector Johann Wilhelm . Under the Götzengriens the castle fell into disrepair, at that time the outer castle gate at the Weberturm was also open; The residents of Wolfsegg also used the castle material. After the death of Franz Georg Heinrich († September 11, 1721) the era of Götzengriens came to an end and Wolfsegg fell back to the Duke.

The brothers Gottfried Albert († 1725) and Albert Ignaz von Silbermann († 1741) applied for the transfer of the vacated Wolfsegg man fief and were enfeoffed by the elector on December 11, 1711. Presumably Albert Ignaz sold his property in 1725 to Baron Philipp Anton Leopold von Oberndorf, keeper of Laaber and Lupburg . After his death, his son Baron Ignaz von Oberndorf took over Wolfsegg. He died in 1774 and his widow Anna Franziska, born Freiin von Gaugreben, married his brother, Baron Joseph Adam von Oberndorf, chamberlain and court judge in Neuburg an der Donau . He died childless and therefore his two nephews, the children from Anna Franziska's first marriage, came to the train. In 1790 the Oberdorfer were raised to the rank of count. Count Karl August Maria Fortunat von Oberndorf, colonel, chief forest inspector and Bavarian treasurer, was enfeoffed with Wolfsegg on March 21, 1800. He too died childless in 1813 and Wolfsegg went to his nephew Count Gustav Maria Fortunat; after his death († 1879) his son, Count Karl Alexander von Oberndorf, Bavarian treasurer and cavalry master , received Wolfsegg. He sold all the goods to Wolfsegg and the castle was donated on March 20, 1886 to the community of Wolfsegg, which partly used the castle as a school and a home for poor families.

With these many changes of ownership, the castle deteriorated more and more. It was not until 1933 that the ruin was stopped with the purchase of the castle by Georg Rauchberger. He began the restoration with great personal commitment. In 1970 the Kuratorium Burg Wolfsegg e. V. founded the renovation in 1986, which was completed in 1989. Today there is a castle museum there, which can be visited from May to the end of September.

Building history

The oldest beam found dates back to 1278, but it is unlikely that castle construction began back then; maybe at that time there was a first preliminary stage of the castle. The earliest construction phase contained only the palace with a floor and without stabilizing interior walls, a semi-circular tower and the castle walls in full. The first floor was accessible via a wooden extension.

Between 1325 and 1350, a solid partition and the rubble vault were built into the hall. In the period from 1403 to 1410 the hall was raised by one floor. On the two upper floors, a transverse wall was erected north of today's central aisle. A massive wooden door frame on the 1st floor dates from this time. The so-called knight's hall on the 2nd floor was decorated with colorful tendril painting. The brick-walled stair tower dates from the 16th century. All rooms on the first floor of the Palas were vaulted and provided with a floor with square brick tiles.

Around 1721 the roof structure was erected in its current form as a crippled hipped roof . The stair tower received the top gable and a gable roof . A fireplace and a tiled stove were also installed on the first floor. The southern room was divided on the 2nd floor. In the 19th century a new chimney was built in the north wall of the access corridor on the 1st floor and the 1st floor in the northern room was divided. The tower was repaired by Georg Rauchberger in 1959 and in 1964 the construction of the battlements began.

description

The castle consists of a main castle with three-story, tower-like palace , but without a separate dungeon . Paintings from 1400 are still preserved on the upper floor of the palace. The circular wall with a semicircular wall tower is completely accessible. There is a cistern in the castle courtyard . The main castle is surrounded by an arched kennel . To the south of the castle, outside the walls, is the former castle chapel of St. Laurentius (formerly Marienkapelle); the west gallery located there was previously accessible from a side gate in the Zwingmauer through a former wall-protected footbridge. The Burgplatz is now a ground monument .

Wolfsegg Castle Cave

Below the entrance to the castle is the approximately 500 meter long Wolfsegg castle cave . The cave is registered as G 2 in the Franconian Alb cave register (HFA).

In the inaccessible stalactite cave in the rock under the castle, the skull of a five-year-old child was found alongside rubbish and other remains.

Geotope

The Burgberg in Wolfsegg is designated as an important geotope (geotope number: 375R002) and a natural monument by the Bavarian State Office for the Environment .

Castle Museum

The castle now houses a museum in which permanent exhibitions are shown about life in an Upper Palatinate castle , the minnesang in the region and the position of women in the Middle Ages. In the Knights' Hall weapons and pieces of armor from the 14th to the 18th centuries are on display. In the Landsknechtskeller there is a cave museum about the stalactite cave in the castle rock.

Say

The legend of the white woman who is supposed to go around the castle is also passed down. It is claimed that the saga goes back to the 15th century, but there is still nothing of this story in a collection of sagas from 1848. There are suspicions that this is the wife of the lord of the castle Ulrich von Laaber, Klara von Helfenstein, who had the latter killed after she had entered into a love affair with his adversary Georg Moller from the hammer mill of Heitzenhofen . But this cannot be reconciled with the historical situation, because the said Klara survived her husband by four years. The legend was also picked up by a Regensburg weekly newspaper in the 1960s. In 1968 the New York parapsychologist Hans Holzer traveled with his medium Edith Riedl from Vienna, who believed it could identify the Weizkammer as the scene of the murder. Light phenomena are also reported.

In the castle, inexplicable noises could be heard from the cave, which probably came from poachers who hid their prey there and cultivated the reputation as a ghost cave for their benefit.

literature

  • Hugo Graf von Walderdorff: On the history of Wolfsegg Castle (district office Stadtamhof) and the Wolfsegg, Schönleiten, Gögglbach, Nabeck, Nabburg, Lengenfeld, Bocksberg, Bruckberg, Au family. In: Negotiations of the historical association for Upper Palatinate and Regensburg. Volume 60, 1909, pp. 11-124. (digital.bib-bvb.de)
  • Andreas Boos : Castles in the south of the Upper Palatinate - the early and high medieval fortifications of the Regensburg area. Universitätsverlag Regensburg, Regensburg 1998, ISBN 3-930480-03-4 , pp. 433-436.
  • Gustl Motyka: Wolfsegg Castle and Village. Knight - Subject - White Woman. 2nd Edition. Michael Laßleben, Kallmünz 1991, ISBN 3-7847-1126-X .
  • Ursula Pfistermeister: Castles of the Upper Palatinate . Verlag Friedrich Pustet, Regensburg 1974, ISBN 3-7917-0394-3 , p. 98.
  • Wolfsegg Castle. In: Altbayerische Heimatpost. Issue 48, 1995.
  • Elisabeth Gäde: The Wolf von Schönleiten, builder of Wolfsegg Castle. In: The Upper Palatinate. Volume 106, 2018, pp. 74-91.
  • Helmut Lukesch : Wolfsegg in the past and present. , Verlag Friedrich Pustet, Regensburg 2019, ISBN 978-3-7917-2981-7 , pp. 168–247.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bavarian. In: Johann Siebmachers Wappenbuch, Nürnberg 1705, p. 96. Retrieved on September 7, 2017 .
  2. ↑ Bavarian. In: Johann Siebmachers Wappenbuch, Nürnberg 1705, p. 65. Retrieved on September 7, 2017 .
  3. ↑ The Wolf von Schönleiten belong to the Wolf von Nabeck family, see Hugo Graf v. Walderdorff: On the history of Wolfsegg Castle (district office Stadtamhof) and the Wolfsegg, Schönleiten, Gögglbach, Nabeck, Nabburg, Lengenfeld, Bocksberg, Bruckberg, Au family. In: Negotiations of the historical association for Upper Palatinate and Regensburg. Volume 60, 1909, pp. 11-124. Her coat of arms is described on p. 67. (  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ))@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / digital.bib-bvb.de
  4. ^ Andreas Boos: Castles in the south of the Upper Palatinate. 1998, pp. 433-435.
  5. ^ Elisabeth Gäde: The Wolf von Schönleiten, builder of Wolfsegg Castle. 2018, p. 87.
  6. ↑ Homepage of Wolfsegg Castle Museum
  7. ^ Bavarian State Office for the Environment, Geotop Burgberg in Wolfsegg (accessed on October 16, 2017).
  8. ^ Andreas Boos: Castles in the south of the Upper Palatinate. 1998, p. 435.
  9. ↑ Detlev Schwennike (Ed.): European family tables. Family tables on the history of the European states. New series (Volume XVI). JA Stargardt, Berlin 1995, plates 82 and 83.

Web links

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