Gutenstein castle ruins
| Gutenstein castle ruins | ||
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 Gutenstein castle ruins |
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| Alternative name (s): | Gutenstein ruins | |
| Creation time : | 1220 (first documented mention) | |
| Castle type : | Höhenburg, rocky location | |
| Conservation status: | Ruin, not accessible | |
| Construction: | Quarry stone masonry | |
| Place: | Community Gutenstein | |
| Geographical location | 47 ° 52 '37.3 " N , 15 ° 53' 15.1" E | |
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The Gutenstein castle ruins are the ruins of a rock castle on a steep cliff above the narrow valleys of Piesting , Längapiesting and Steinapiesting , located in the municipality of Gutenstein in the Wiener Neustadt-Land district in Lower Austria .
The then princely castle was built between 1195 and 1220 as a stone castle. It was first mentioned in a document in 1220, together with the parish of Gutenstein. From this castle three valleys could be monitored.
history
Gutenstein Castle was built towards the end of the 12th century, probably under the Styrian Otakars or even by the Babenbergers . The fortress was first mentioned in a document in 1220. It was a sovereign castle and then belonged to Duke Leopold VI. who expanded them. After the death of Frederick II, the dispute , the German Order of Knights administered the castles of Starhemberg and Gutenstein. Only at the request of Pope Innocent IV did they hand over the castles and the Babenbergs' treasure to Friedrich's sister, Margaret , in 1248 . She passed the fortress on to her second husband, Ottokar II Přemysl . From 1276 the castle was owned by the Habsburgs .
The castle was the favorite seat of Duke Friedrich III. the beautiful who waged war with the Bavarian Duke Ludwig for the German royal crown. In the Battle of Mühldorf in 1322, Friedrich was defeated, taken prisoner and then imprisoned at Trausnitz Castle in the valley . After two and a half years of imprisonment, he was released and was able to return to Gutenstein. Formally he was co-king, but was not given any powers. His wife, Isabella of Aragon , had the St. Catherine's Chapel built in 1320. Friedrich died in 1330 at the age of 41 at Gutenstein Castle. Due to a partition agreement, it fell to Duke Albrecht III in 1379 over the Habsburg possessions .
In 1407 there were again disputes over inheritance. The dispute between Duke Ernst the Iron and Duke Albrecht V could only be settled in 1417 through the intervention of Emperor Sigismund in favor of Albrecht. The later Emperor Friedrich III. did not want to hand over the castle to his ward Ladislaus Postumus . For this reason, the Viennese mercenary leader Postumus besieged it for a month in 1457 and was finally able to take it. Postumus then had his 15-year-old rival Mátyás Hunyadi brought to Gutenstein and imprisoned there. Thirty years later, Mátyás, now as King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary, conquered the fortress. After his death in 1490 it became part of the Habsburg family again.
The Turks did not succeed in taking the castle during the first Turkish siege in 1529 or in another attempt in 1532, so they devastated the area. In the 16th and 15th centuries, the castle was often in pledge possession . In 1595 it was bought by the Chamber President of Lower Austria, Ludwig Gomez Freiherr von Hoyos , whose family is still the owner of the ruin and the surrounding forests. After the purchase it was repaired by master Ulrich von Ebenfurt. As a result, the castle was also the seat of a regional court in which numerous witch trials took place. In 1641, for example, a poor housewife was sentenced to death for sorcery and incest and was then burned alive at the stake . The next major renovations did not take place until the 16th century. In the years 1600 to 1630 a difficult reconstruction of the complex, which according to the building report was badly damaged, took place.
In 1674 Johann Balthasar II von Hoyos built the new castle in the village. The castle was then abandoned and slowly decayed. During the second Turkish siege in 1683, it served as a place of refuge for the surrounding population. With the help of 200 soldiers, it was successfully defended against the Ottomans.
In 1708 a major fire caused severe damage. In 1842 the Hoyos-Sprinzenstein had the keep re-roofed and the kitchen repaired, but this did not change much in the further deterioration of the castle. Around 1980 the local castle association began to work on security, but today entering the castle is no longer permitted for security reasons.
architecture
Gatekeeper
The gate kennel was built around 1240. It consisted of rubble stone masonry from stock . The late Romanesque defensive wall with battlements has been preserved. In the 16th century the gate area was renewed. Remains of a protruding defense platform can still be seen above the gate . The outer walls were last restored, raised and provided with small rectangular notches in the 17th century.
Outer bailey
The outer bailey was built around 1240 at the same time as the gate kennel. In the first half of the 17th century it was extended to the east with a bastion-like extension. There is today's entrance through a small arched portal and a wooden staircase. In the area of the extension there is a cistern carved out of the rock . The late Romanesque outer bailey can be reached via the exposed foundations of the collapsed eastern curtain wall . On the north side, buildings stand boldly on a protruding rock. The core of the two western ground floor rooms dates back to 1240. The buildings consist of warehouse-like quarry stone masonry with rectangular slits and wooden overlays. Remains of a bay window can be seen on the east side . On the second floor of the intermediate wall there is a polished, delicately bevelled round arch portal from 1240. In the course of the repair work in 1630, the outer bailey was restored and enlarged by one room length to the east. There, in 1628 , Master Eberhard from Ebenfurth made an impressive pointed arch to span a cliff. An apotropaic stone ball is set in the outer shell of the east wall , which is supposed to avert harm. The remains of the gate from the 16th and 17th centuries can still be seen on the southern wall of the outer bailey. This was originally accessible via a ramp construction cut out of the rock.
kitchen
On the way to the keep is the free-standing castle kitchen with a pyramid helmet . It was built in the second half of the 16th and first half of the 17th century and is a west-vaulted room with a small opening. The circular wall in the west was built around 1240. The wall consists of rubble stone masonry with simple light slits. Worth mentioning is the bar remains are one outwardly projecting battlements from the walled-today portal stone led.
Keep
The three-storey keep is actually a keep-like gate tower with a chapel on the second floor. This was built around 1220 from stock rubble masonry, partly with basement screed , and expanded in 1240. When the tower was restored around 1600, an extensive change also took place. The roof with onion helmet was renewed in the 19th and 20th centuries.
The gate storey is a round arched gate wall with an external fold and was built between 1220 and 1240. It was changed in the course of the lowering of the access level in modern times . The three- bay gate hall was raised and vaulted around the year 1600. There are stitch caps above . In the center you can see groin vaults with plastered ridges and rectangular fields. Above the plaster edge, which marks the original floor division, two plaster layers can be seen as remains of the chapel's furnishings. On the lower layer there is a diamond motif with inscribed circles in red and yellow paint, which was painted around 1220. A floor board and vertical construction joints in the apse have been preserved to the east .
The second floor is the chapel floor. The castle chapel, which is Romanesque in its core, has a high entrance in the west and an apse bay window in the east. The structural details include the stone with the conical base of the apse bay window and the southern walls of the west portal. A remnant of the painted plinth area has been preserved in the vaulted area of the gate hall.
The chapel was extensively redesigned around 1600, the Romanesque apse bayern and the windows were broken out and the west portal was extended to a large, wide arch . The sacred space was enlarged by including the original third floor and a Romanesque arched opening was walled up. Remnants of the painted square frame with red grouting in the east wall are still preserved. The approaches to the vault above profiled consoles are decorated with stucco ribbons depicting leaf and ice stick motifs . A high gallery was built in the west . The southern wall has three arched windows grouped in a triangle. The baroque high altar of the parish church supposedly stood here . The upper floor, which was moved in around 1600, has small rectangular windows. The holes in the beams show that the upper aisle has disappeared .
Hochburg
The stronghold , of which the remains of rubble stone masonry can still be seen, originally extended further west. During the renovations in the 16th and 17th centuries, the stronghold was reduced in size and rebuilt without an inner courtyard. From the Romanesque structure, parts of the southern outer wall in particular have been preserved, in particular the negative beam of a residential building, in which the vertical construction joint visible from the south documents the later addition of the keep. From the south, on the third floor of the south wall, you can see the remains of a bifore window that was reused around 1600 . This was walled up again in the 17th century. The slender column of the window stands on a profiled base, the side walls are chamfered. The monolithic lintel with two beveled three-pass arches is now in the Gutensteiner Heimatmuseum .
The three-storey stronghold was largely built around 1600 from mixed and brick masonry. A partially bricked basement floor filled with rubble is followed by two residential floors, each of which is divided into at least five living rooms with large rectangular windows. The cantilevered window sills are only partially preserved. In the east there was originally a vaulted single-pillar room with an octagonal pillar. The remains of a stairwell can be seen in the southeast corner. In the south-western room on the second floor there are profiled stone consoles with vaults. In the north-western area, they were subsequently reworked as paneling . In this room and in the room directly above there is a toilet bay facing west .
Around 1600 a wedge-shaped shield wall was built against the western rock ridge to end the modern stronghold .
Others
Gutenstein's old coat of arms
Current coat of arms
In addition to the church on Mariahilfberg , the ruin is also adorned with the old coat of arms of the Gutenstein community.
literature
- Peter Aichinger-Rosenberger (among others): Lower Austria south of the Danube. Band 1: A to L . Dehio-Handbuch , Die Kunstdenkmäler Österreichs, topographic monuments inventory. Berger, Horn / Vienna 2003, ISBN 3-85028-364-X .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Gutenstein castle ruins , accessed on January 31, 2014.
- ↑ Entry about Gutenstein Castle ruins on Burgen-Austria
- ↑ a b c d Aichinger-Rosenberger: Lower Austria south of the Danube. P. 635
- ^ Aichinger-Rosenberger: Lower Austria south of the Danube. P. 635f.
- ^ Aichinger-Rosenberger: Lower Austria south of the Danube. P. 635.