Waldeck castle ruins (Upper Palatinate)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Waldeck castle ruins
View of the Waldeck castle ruins from the north

View of the Waldeck castle ruins from the north

Creation time : First mentioned in 1124
Castle type : Höhenburg, summit location
Conservation status: ruin
Standing position : Landgraves
Place: Kemnath
Geographical location 49 ° 51 '29.9 "  N , 11 ° 56' 52.1"  E Coordinates: 49 ° 51 '29.9 "  N , 11 ° 56' 52.1"  E
Height: 640.7  m above sea level NN
Waldeck castle ruins (Bavaria)
Waldeck castle ruins
Waldeck castle ruins (Upper Palatinate), aerial photo (2016)

The castle ruin Waldeck is the ruin of a summit castle on the approximately 641 meter high basalt cone of the Waldecker Schlossberg near Waldeck , about five kilometers east of Kemnath in the Tirschenreuth district in Bavaria . It was one of the oldest castles in the Upper Palatinate .

history

Waldeck Castle was first mentioned in a document in 1124. At that time it was owned by Gebhard, Landgrave von Leuchtenberg . The castle came to the Leuchtenburger by marriage. It is assumed that the Lords of Pettendorf-Lengenfeld-Hopfenohe built the castle; after the death of the last Pettendorfers 1119 of part of the property to Kemnath went over the heiress Heilwiga of Lengenfeld on the Heiratsweg to the Landgrave of Leuchtenberg about (the order Lengenfeld location possession came over the other daughter Heilika of Lengenfeld on the Heiratsweg to the Wittelsbach ). The Leuchtenburgers remained the masters of the superiori castro in Waldeck for 164 years ; accordingly their ministerials called themselves “Obernburger”. In 1283, Landgrave Friedrich II von Leuchtenberg sold the castle with parts of the surrounding Waldeck estate to Duke Ludwig of Bavaria . After the house contract of Pavia of 1329 the castle came to the Kurpräzipium of the Palatine Wittelsbacher .

The remaining parts of the Waldeck rule (including Weissenstein Castle ) were sold by the Counts of Leuchtenberg to Burgrave Friedrich III. from Nuremberg.

The Electors of the Rhineland-Palatinate remained the lords of Waldeck-Kemnath until the Thirty Years' War . After General Tilly's victory in the Battle of the White Mountain over Elector Friedrich von der Pfalz , Duke Maximilian received the Upper Palatinate from Emperor Ferdinand as a pledge for the war costs he had spent, in 1623 he received the electoral dignity and in 1628 he was given the Upper Palatinate as property. During the Thirty Years' War, the castle became a refuge for citizens of the city of Kemnath and nobles from the area. In 1648 the castle was besieged by General Königsmarck von Falkenberg, who was in the Swedish service . Terrified by the bombardment of the castle, the district judge Nikolaus du Quesnoy urged the castle commander to hand over the castle. The district judge was then arrested and the musketeers in the castle, including the commanding officer, transferred to Swedish services. Despite the armistice signed on October 24, 1648, the occupation of the castle did not end until October 5, 1649. During the occupation, the defenses of the castle were improved and 22 houses in the village below were demolished to expand the field of fire. Until 1698 the castle was the seat of the Waldeck-Kemnath district judge's office .

Representation of the siege in 1704

During the War of the Spanish Succession , the castle was besieged by imperial troops and taken in October 1704. On the orders of Emperor Joseph I , it was razed in 1705, with craftsmen and "specialists" from Nuremberg, Amberg, Kemnath and Waldeck taking part. This was done after two weeks, whereby the demolition costs amounted to 332 fl , 7 kr and 2 ₰ . The remaining castle complexes, farm buildings and stables were only demolished in 1707 at the instigation of the Franconian district judge Hemmel zu Kemnath and the lieutenant Gratiani. Although the castle was rebuilt, it burned down in 1794 and has been in ruins ever since. It has been excavated and restored since around 1982.

literature

  • Ulrich Kinder: The fortifications in the Tirschenreuth district . From the series: Works on the Archeology of Southern Germany, Volume 28 . Publishing house Dr. Faustus, Büchenbach 2013, ISBN 978-3-933474-82-7 , pp. 234–242.
  • Ursula Pfistermeister : Castles of the Upper Palatinate . Verlag Friedrich Pustet, Regensburg 1974, ISBN 3-7917-0394-3 , p. 97.
  • Anton Reger: From the history of the city of Kemnath. Homeland book (edited by the city of Kemnath). Pp. 20-46 and 70-95. Verlag Laßleben , Kallmünz 1981, ISBN 3-7847-1134-0 .

Web links

Commons : Burg Waldeck (Upper Palatinate)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Waldeck in the Topographia Bavariae (Matthäus Merian)  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ From the history of the city of Kemnath ( Memento from April 13, 2010 in the Internet Archive )