Burgstall Sand (Todtenweis)

Burgstall sand
Burgstall Sand - The northeast section wall to the east (inside)
Creation time :	probably 9th century
Castle type :	Höhenburg, spur location
Conservation status:	Castle stable, wall and moat remains
Place:	Todtenweis -sand
Geographical location	48 ° 30 '52.5 "  N , 10 ° 55' 14.1"  E Coordinates: 48 ° 30 '52.5 "  N , 10 ° 55' 14.1"  E
Height:	490  m above sea level NN

The Burgstall Sand is an abandoned hilltop castle above the Todtenweiser district of Sand ( district of Aichach-Friedberg in Swabia ) on the Lechrain . Only the earthworks have survived from the early to high medieval fortifications.

history

View to the northwest into the moat

The crest to the west

The eastern ditch outlet

Information board at the Pfalzgrafenburg Todtenweis (Burgstall Sand)

Since 1131 the Count Palatine (Wittelsbacher) acted as guardians of the possessions of the St. Ulrich and Afra ( Augsburg ) monastery on the other side of the Lech .

Around 1150 a Kuonradus and a Sigefridus the Taintinwis can be traced as castle men of the Wittelsbach family . The count palatine obviously took over an older complex here, perhaps one of the numerous early medieval Hungarian fortifications in this area. The inner area of ​​the main castle is around 0.96 hectares, so it corresponds more to comparable facilities from the early medieval period.

The classic high medieval service man's seat was actually the tower hill castle. Such " moths " have been preserved in a few examples in the vicinity. Just a few kilometers away, above Unterach near Rehling, there is such a small castle complex on the Lechleite .

The large fortification on the "Burgseleberg" was first mentioned in 1177 as "castrum Taitenwis". At that time, Count Palatine Otto sold the castle to the St. Ulrich and Afra monastery in Augsburg . The monastery then seems to have abandoned the complex.

Under the castle (sub monte castri in Sande) there is a ducal meadow around 1270. In 1296 another Heinrich von Tettenwies appears as a seal witness.

description

The Burgstall at 490  m above sea level. NN shows no characteristics of a high medieval ministerial castle , but rather appears as an early medieval protective castle of the 9th or 10th century. However, some remnants of brick make the continued use as a high medieval servants' residence plausible. However, at that time it does not seem to have intervened particularly extensively in the stock. For this reason, the Wittelsbach castle was occasionally located elsewhere in the past, for example in the nearby “Pfarrerschanze”. This section fortification should also come from the early Middle Ages in its last stage of expansion.

The castle area is separated from the hinterland by an arched ditch up to six meters deep . A high wall was piled up over the moat, which towers over the almost flat castle plateau by two to four meters. In the west, the steep slope protects the facility. The edge of the slope was probably originally only fortified by palisades .

The wall height rises from west to southeast from 6 to 7 to about 15 meters. A shallow pit in the middle of the southwest side probably denotes the location of a building (remnants of brick). The almost flat castle plateau was used for agriculture at least until the end of the 19th century (Weber).

In front of the ditch outlets, semicircular excavated terraces or tower sites can be seen. The main castle plateau is about 50 meters above the valley floor.

In the sparse literature on the ramparts, no outer bailey is mentioned. However, remnants of ramparts and moats can be found northwest of the core castle , which indicate such a very spacious Vorwerk. In the northwest, this area ends in a high plateau, east and west are trenches or berms in front. However, the western berm could be traced back to a modern forest road. Below the bailey plateau, a double wall with an intermediate ditch, partially destroyed by the construction of the road, secures the slope edge (wall height about two meters). The total length of the fortification (main castle to outer castle plateau) is around 300 meters (estimate), the core castle is around 80 × 60 meters (according to the plan at Rischert).

Helmut Rischert (Altbayern in Schwaben, 2003), however, interpreted the approximately 60 × 60 meter plateau in the northwest as the location of the farmyard of the high medieval Palatine Castle. On the enclosed topographical survey of the main castle, however, the slope ditch or the berm (possibly a modern path) that runs to this plateau in the west of the core works is missing. The eastern slope trench can only be seen in the terrain in front of the plateau. The area between the parts of the castle may have been secured by plank or wattle fences.

Time and purpose

The layout of the castle corresponds to comparable early medieval fortifications from the 8th to 10th centuries. The ramparts are located over a wide passage through the Lechrain. A similar, very large section fortification ( Pfarrerschanze ) over the valley lies opposite only about 1000 meters to the north . The Bach castle stable is located even further north .

It is possible that there are two protective castles from the Hungarian period that were supposed to secure access via the Lechrain into the Lechfeld . The enormous size of both systems could speak for a function as a troop assembly area. The episcopal city of Augsburg is only about 20 kilometers away, the scene of the battle on the Lechfeld about 30 kilometers south. Widukind von Corvey already speaks in his chronicle of some protective castles on the Lechrain, from which the fleeing Hungarians were wiped out after the battle. Just a few kilometers to the north, on the " Eselsberg " near Thierhaupten, there is another fortification, which is dated to the Hungarian period by the preservation authorities. The castle stables over sand used to be confused with this weir system and referred to as the "Eselsberg".

From the middle of the 8th century, the Lech was considered to be the border between the tribes of the Alamanni and Bajuwaren , which were only integrated into the Franconian Empire in the course of this century . The numerous early medieval fortifications on the Lechrain could have been built as border fortifications as early as the 8th century.

Rischert (2003) sees the castle as a new construction by the Count Palatine (after 1131). The fortification seems to have consisted only of earth walls and palisades or wood-earth walls, so it would have been typologically out of date at this time. A stone residential building or a residential tower stood on the edge of the slope in the Palatinate era (reconstruction at Rischert). The castle should u. a. have prevented the development of an independent "house power" of the St. Ulrich and Afra monastery. After the fortress was sold to the monastery, the function of protecting the monastery property was transferred to Wittelsbach Castle near Aichach .

The Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation lists the ground monument as a medieval castle stable under monument number D 7-7431-0029.

literature

• Todtenweis - From the royal court and monastery village to the modern community . Todtenweis 2008.
• Helmut Rischert: The three castles of Todtenweis . In: Altbayern in Schwaben - Yearbook for History and Culture, Aichach, 2003.
• Helmut Rischert: Castle stables in the Aichach-Friedberg district (local history contributions from the Augsburg area, 1st row). Augsburg 1975.
• Franz Weber: On the prehistory and early history of the Lechrain - encircling sand . In: Journal of the historical association for Swabia and Neuburg, Volume 22, 1895, p. 31.

Web links

Commons : Burgstall Sand (Todtenweis)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Pictures of the ramparts and the bailey plateau on flickr

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation: Entry ( Memento from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive )