Hollenberg castle ruins

Hollenberg castle ruins
Hollenberg castle ruins - view of the upper castle
Creation time :	Probably between 1357 and 1363
Castle type :	Höhenburg, summit location
Conservation status:	Restored ruin
Standing position :	Bohemian official castle
Construction:	Quarry stone masonry
Place:	Pegnitz- Hollenberg
Geographical location	49 ° 45 '53.3 "  N , 11 ° 28' 58.8"  E Coordinates: 49 ° 45 '53.3 "  N , 11 ° 28' 58.8"  E
Height:	540.7  m above sea level NN

The castle ruins Hollenberg was a late medieval Office burg , presumably Emperor Charles IV. Had built. It is located on a hilltop above the hamlet of Hollenberg in the municipality of Pegnitz in the Upper Franconian district of Bayreuth in Bavaria , Germany . Only a few remains of the castle and traces of the ground have survived; the upper castle now serves as a lookout point .

Geographical location

The ruins of the former hilltop castle are located in the eastern part of Franconian Switzerland , part of the Frankenjura low mountain range , on the top of the Hollenberger Schlossberg at 540.7  m above sea level. NN height. The place of the abandoned castle is about 4,150 meters west of the Protestant parish church Sankt Bartholomäus in Pegnitz about 100 meters above the valley.

Nearby there are other former medieval castles, in a north-easterly direction the Wartberg castle stables on the Warenberg via Kosbrunn , the Böheimstein castle stables on the Schlossberg near Pegnitz and a castle stables near Nemschenreuth. West lies above the city Pottenstein the imposing castle Pottenstein . Around one kilometer southwest of the Hollenberg ruins, in the middle of the Hollenberg Forest, is the Pirkenreuth Chapel , the medieval church ruins of the abandoned village of Pirkenreuth.

History of the castle

The builder of Hollenberg Castle is considered to be the Bohemian Emperor Charles IV. In 1357 he bought the free city of Pegnitz from the Landgraves of Leuchtenberg. The area around Hollenberg was also acquired by him.

In 1363 a Bohemian keeper was first mentioned at the castle, so it could have been built between 1357 and 1363. It is unclear whether a previous system existed, but it cannot be ruled out. The castle was first mentioned in writing in the Salbuch from 1366–68 as “ daz haus ” by “ Holenperg ”. Until 1387 there are still several Bohemian caretakers at the castle.

During the war between King Wenceslas of Bohemia and King Ruprecht of the Palatinate , the castle changed hands several times and also seems to have been damaged. The castle apparently fell to King Ruprecht, because after his death in 1410 it came into the possession of his son, Duke Johann von Wittelsbach, following an inheritance division . In 1465, after the conclusion of a contract between the crown of Bohemia and Duke Otto, there were again Bohemian fiefdoms about Hollenberg Castle.

Hans von Rabenstein was the last keeper who lived in the castle; it was probably destroyed in the Peasants' War in 1525. From an official invoice we can learn that Hollenberg Castle was only a ruin in 1570. It was not rebuilt.

The castle ruins are freely accessible and can be easily reached from the hamlet of Hollenberg by taking the hiking trail uphill to the south. From the castle you have a view to the west as far as Gößweinstein with its castle . Below the castle is the 97 m deep dwarf cave .

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  View of the Hollenberg castle ruins from the east

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  Wall remains of the upper castle

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  Remains of the moat

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  Panoramic view from the Hollenberg castle ruins to the west

literature

• 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. 119.
• Joachim Zeune : Hollenberg castle ruins . In: Rainer Hofmann (edit.): Guide to archaeological monuments in Germany, Volume 20: Franconian Switzerland . Konrad Theiss Verlag GmbH and Co., Stuttgart 1990, ISBN 3-8062-0586-8 , pp. 203-204.
• Toni Eckert, Susanne Fischer, Renate Freitag, Rainer Hofmann, Walter Thousand Pounds: The Castles of Franconian Switzerland: A cultural guide . Gürtler Druck, Forchheim o. J., ISBN 3-9803276-5-5 , pp. 71-73.
• Konrad M. Müller: Medieval Franconia . Stürz Verlag, Würzburg 1980, pp. 171-172.
• Hellmut Kunstmann : The castles of eastern Franconian Switzerland . Commission publisher Ferdinand Schöningh, Würzburg 1965, pp. 343–351.

Web links

Commons : Burgruine Hollenberg  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Ruin Hollenberg on the Burgenwelt.de page
• Pictures of the Hollenberg castle ruins on the naturpark-fraenkische-schweiz.de page
• Reconstruction drawing by Wolfgang Braun

Individual evidence

1. ↑ The Burgstall on the website of the Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation ( Memento of the original from January 6, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.