Henneberg castle ruins

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Henneberg Castle
Keep of Henneberg Castle from the first half of the 13th century

Keep of Henneberg Castle from the first half of the 13th century

Alternative name (s): Henneburg
Creation time : before 1096
Castle type : Hilltop castle
Conservation status: ruin
Standing position : Counts (11th century), princes (from 1310)
Construction: Opus Spicatum, brickwork
Place: Henneberg
Geographical location 50 ° 29 ′ 29 ″  N , 10 ° 21 ′ 41 ″  E Coordinates: 50 ° 29 ′ 29 ″  N , 10 ° 21 ′ 41 ″  E
Height: 510  m above sea level NN
Henneberg castle ruins (Thuringia)
Henneberg castle ruins

The Burg Henneberg , even Hennesburg , is east of the Meininger district Henneberg in southern Thuringia situated castle ruins and was the eponymous ancestral home of the princely Counts of Henneberg .

location

The ruins of the hilltop castle are at 510  m above sea level. NN on the 527  m above sea level. NN high Schlossberg, a free-standing mountain cone that towers above the surrounding landscape by 130 m, belonging to the watershed between Werra and Main , which only runs flat in the south, otherwise it drops off steeply. It is on the road between Würzburg and Meiningen , which has been a traffic route between the two cities since ancient times. The castle ruins are located on a mountain spur . The mountain plateau is enclosed by a circular wall with the dimensions 120 m length in north-south direction and 65 m to the south narrowing to 20 m width in east-west direction. In front of this there is a ditch and wall system along its entire length, which is reinforced towards the south on the flat side with further walls and ditches.

investment

Of the castle, a large part of the are circular wall with of consolidated outer wall of the Palas , remains an abort condition, the dungeon , the wall shell of a bower , a part of a residential and commercial building with basement portal, a supplemented about 1880 tower, a fountain or a cistern , a Small part of the Zwingermauer, the dry ditch with partially surrounding wall and the ramparts that secure the gently sloping mountain tongue in the south have been preserved. The path to the castle rises parallel to the slope on the west side of the mountain, crosses the first gate, which was excavated in 1935, opens into the Zwinger , circles the north side and meets gate 2 in the northeast corner. Historical sources suggest a chamber gate .

history

History of construction and ownership until 1583

Main castle with the in the Palas west wall of the 13th – 15th centuries Century inserted modern round tower and foundations of the late 11th – 15th centuries. Century
Floor plan of Henneberg Castle with details of the excavations 1992–1995

The castle was first mentioned in 1096 with Count Godebold II and his brother Poppo von Henneberg. However, it cannot be concluded from this that the oldest fortification was only built at this point in time, which is also confirmed by the most recently examined archaeological findings .

The foundation of their home monastery Veßra goes back to the Counts of Henneberg in 1131, which served as a burial place for several generations. For a long time they also held the burgrave office of Würzburg . In 1190 the family was divided into the lines of Henneberg , Botenlauben and Strauf . The castle was first mentioned in a document in 1221, at the approximate beginning of the brief heyday of the complex (around 1220 to 1274). During this period, the castle was extensively rebuilt and fortified in order to meet representative requirements. In the course of this, today's keep, a hall and a large part of the curtain wall were rebuilt. The round arch of a summer arbor that is now walled up was probably based on the northern Italian region.

In 1274 the Grafenhaus was again divided into the lines Hartenberg , Aschach (later Römhild ) and Schleusingen , so that the Henneburg was no longer used as a residence. However, the enormous renovation and expansion measures of the later epochs, some of which are documented, some are archaeologically documented or have been handed down as remnants of the rising masonry, speak against a complete loss of importance.

In 1310 Berthold VII von Henneberg-Schleusingen, who had received the Henneburg in 1274, was raised to the rank of prince . At times he was the authorized representative of the Elector of Saxony and the Elector of Brandenburg , administrator of Bohemia and guardian of Crown Prince Ludwig .

In 1393 part of the castle was pledged as a dowry to the Henneberg-Römhild line, but was not triggered until this line was extinguished (1549), a division that often led to considerable disputes . From 1432 there is a contract for mutual use of the divided castle, which is of the greatest interest with its inventory of buildings and rooms. Various building measures have been handed down for the period from 1453 to 1516.

In May 1525, Henneberg Castle is said to have been taken, plundered and pillaged without a fight by the Bildhäuser Bauernhaufen as part of the Franconian peasant uprisings. The exact extent of the destruction is not known and could not be verified or refuted even by archaeological excavations. Due to the subordinate importance of the complex at that time, the castle was only partially rebuilt; systematic demolition work on the keep has even been handed down since 1576.

In 1583, with the death of the last Count of Henneberg-Schleusingen, Georg Ernst, the count family died out in the male line. However, the castle was still inhabited until the beginning of the 17th century. After the desertification, extensive demolition work began.

History of ownership and use after 1583

View from the former Gate 2 of the late medieval Palas

In 1784, Duke Georg I of Saxony-Meiningen had the courtyard of the now very ruinous complex tidied up, leveled and a pleasure house built for a party.

Around 1832, the ducal-Saxon-Meiningen chamber councilor and court book printer Johann Philipp Heinrich Hartmann carried out the first excavations on the Henneburg.

Since 1845, various security and remedial measures have been taken on the ducal instructions, including z. B. the partial reconstruction of broken out fields of the curtain wall as well as the installation of stabilizing elements on the foundation.

Between 1879 and 1883, the ducal master builder Ernst Abesser had excavations carried out at the castle in order to be able to draw up a floor plan based on the excavated and partially still uncovered foundations. Around 1935, the then chairman of the Hennebergisch-Franconian History Association, Friedrich Tenner (1883–1947), dug up and for the first time in the area around the castle and came across the foundations of the first gate and those of another bower.

Development after 1989

Courtyard view of the arcade arches of the late medieval palace, pen drawing around 1870

The period up to 1989 was marked by the German-German division , the castle was in the restricted area. The Eußenhausen / Meiningen border crossing was monitored from the keep . The Henneburg no longer existed for research. Since it became possible for the public to enter the former border area, residents of the town of Henneberg have volunteered for the Henneburg, a castle club was founded for this purpose. Since the Henneberg Castle ruins were taken over by the Thuringian Palaces and Gardens Foundation on September 12, 1995, security and renovation work has been taking place.

From 1992 to 1995 and 2000 to 2001 excavations were carried out by the Thuringian State Office for Archaeological Monument Preservation Weimar (Ines Wal), the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg ( Heiner Schwarzberg ) and the Otto Friedrich University Bamberg (Christoph Wojaczek).

curiosity

In 1887, the landowner Albert Henneberg had a miniature replica on a scale of 1: 4 built on his property in Hamburg-Poppenbüttel above the reservoir near the Alster lock , which was intended to be a garden house reminiscent of the Henneberg family castle near Meiningen. This " Henneberg Castle " is part of the list of cultural monuments in Hamburg-Poppenbüttel .

Miniature replica from 1887 on the Henneberg private property in Hamburg-Poppenbüttel

literature

  • Ralf Küchenmeister: Excavations at the "Henneburg" castle, district of Schmalkalden-Meiningen. In: Excavations and finds in the Free State of Thuringia. Vol. 6, 2002, ISSN  1433-6979 , pp. 35-43.
  • Heiner Schwarzberg: Excavations at Henneberg Castle, district of Schmalkalden- Meiningen. Preliminary report. In: excavations and finds. Vol. 40, 1995, ISSN  0004-8127 , pp. 265-272.
  • Heiner Schwarzberg: The excavations at Henneberg Castle. Preliminary report of the 1992–1995 campaigns. In: Scientific commemorative publication for the anniversary "900 years Henneberger Land 1096–1996". (= Yearbook of the Hennebergisch-Franconian History Association. Vol. 11). Veßra Monastery, Meiningen / Münnerstadt 1996, pp. 153–167.
  • Heiner Schwarzberg: "Room with a view". A remarkable building find at Henneberg Castle in southern Thuringia . In: Bavarian history sheets . Vol. 83, 2018, pp. 103-114.
  • Ineswalk: The old tower of the Henneburg. In: Yearbook of the Hennebergisch-Franconian History Association. Vol. 19, 2004, pp. 23-36.
  • Ineswalk, Heiner Schwarzberg: The Henneberg Castle / South Thuringia in the 11th and 12th centuries. In: Research on castles and palaces. Vol. 9, 2006, ISSN  0947-9708 , pp. 187-204.
  • Ines Walk: The archaeological investigations at Henneberg Castle in Southern Thuringia In: Castles and Palaces, magazine for castle research and monument preservation. Vol. 2, 2012, pp. 67-72.
  • Ines walk (ed.): The Henneberg castle ruins in southern Thuringia, ancestral castle of the Henneberg counts. With contributions by Kevin Bartel, Hans-Volker Karl, Oliver Mecking, Volker Morgenroth, Johannes Mötsch, Ralf-Jürgen Prilloff, Benjamin Rudolph, Tim Schüler, Corina Seidl, Wolf-Rüdiger Teegen, Gisela Wolf, Günther Wölfing. Weimar monographs on prehistory and early history. Vol. 44. Verlag Beier & Beran, Langenweißbach 2017, ISBN 978-3-95741-057-3
  • G. Voss: District Court District Meiningen. (The city of Meiningen and the country towns). (= Architectural and art monuments of Thuringia. 2: Duchy of Saxony-Meiningen. Volume 1: Meiningen district. ). Abth. 1 = H. 34. Fischer, Jena 1909, pp. 361-369.
  • Friedrich Tenner: The Henneberg Castle. Headquarters of the Henneberg Count House. (= Popular series of publications of the Hennebergisch-Franconian History Association. Vol. 1). Brückner & Renner, Meiningen 1936 (Unchanged reprint. (= Hennebergisch-Fränkischen Geschichtsverein. Special publications vol. 8). Schmidt, Neustadt / Aisch 1996, ISBN 3-89557-050-8 ).
  • Christoph Wojaczek: The Henneberg Castle. In: Eva Speitel (Red.): Southern Thuringia. (= Guide to archaeological monuments in Germany. Vol. 28 = Archaeological monuments in Thuringia. Vol. 1). Theiss, Stuttgart 1994, ISBN 3-8062-1120-5 , pp. 222-227.
  • Heinrich Wagner : On the first documentary mention of the name Henneberg. In: Scientific commemorative publication for the anniversary "900 years Henneberger Land 1096–1996". (= Yearbook of the Hennebergisch-Franconian History Association. Vol. 11). Veßra Monastery, Meiningen / Münnerstadt 1996, pp. 25–32.
  • Heinrich Wagner: Draft of a genealogy of the counts of Henneberg. In: Scientific commemorative publication for the anniversary "900 years Henneberger Land 1096–1996". (= Yearbook of the Hennebergisch-Franconian History Association. Vol. 11). Veßra Monastery, Meiningen / Münnerstadt 1996, pp. 33–152.
  • Günther Wölfing: History of the Henneberger Land between Grabfeld, Rennsteig and Rhön. (= Hennebergisch-Franconian History Association. Special publications, vol. 1). 3. Edition. Salier-Verlier, Hildburghausen 2009, ISBN 978-3-939611-20-2 .

Web links

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

Remarks

  1. ↑ In the last few decades there have been attempts to use it as a restaurant (e.g. as a wedding suite), and currently there are cultural events organized by the Henneberg Castle Foundation in Hamburg-Poppenbüttel

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ulrike Trenkmann, Ines Wal: Archeology of the Middle Ages in the Rhön in Thomas Heiler , Udo Lange, Gregor K. Stasch, Udo Verse: The Rhön - History of a Landscape , Michael Imhof Verlag, Petersberg 2015, ISBN 978-3-7319-0272 -0 , p. 134
  2. ↑ Heiner Schwarzberg: "Room with a view". A remarkable building find at Henneberg Castle in southern Thuringia. In: Bavarian history sheets . tape 83 , 2018, p. 103-114 .