Celle Castle

Celle Castle, seen from the town church

The Celle Castle in Celle in Lower Saxony was one of the residences of the House of Braunschweig-Lüneburg . The four-wing complex is the largest castle in the southern Lüneburg Heath region .

history

Since the medieval times

Oldest view of the castle from 1643

The fortified castle and city fortifications of Celle shortly before the demolition , 1762

View 1778 - the only known oil painting of the castle in the 18th century

The Celle Castle is based on a fortified defense tower with the character of a moated castle that guarded a ford over the Aller . This first fortification, known as "Kellu", was built around 980 by a Brunonen count. Another forerunner of the castle or the expansion of the defense tower was the facility founded by Otto the Strengen in 1292 . The basement vaults and the lower floors of the watchtower are still preserved. The remains are under the palace theater. The actual "Castrum Celle" was first mentioned in a document around 1315. It was due to the city fortifications of Celle , which were built at this time and protected the city with a city wall and ramparts as well as moats. As a result of the Lüneburg War of Succession , the Dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg from 1378 moved their residence from Lüneburg to Celle and started the transformation of extended by ramparts and moats castle to castle . The palace was enlarged on a larger scale under Frederick the Pious from 1471 to 1478, and the palace chapel was consecrated in 1485. Ernst I then had the complex decorated in the Renaissance style from 1530 . At the same time, between 1520 and 1560, the fortifications in the form of ramparts and bastions were moved outwards. At that time, the castle was a typical four-wing complex around a rectangular courtyard, with massive corner towers, a large main tower and characteristic features of the Weser Renaissance .

From 1670 onwards, changes were made to the castle by Duke Georg Wilhelm , which were intended to turn the old Renaissance seat into a contemporary residence. As a typical prince of his era, Georg Wilhelm was eager to build and had representative extensions made to the castle and the surrounding area, which should remind him of his time in Italy . The facades, which were copied from Venetian models, were given their present-day appearance. The wreath of gables surrounding the roofs and the unusual shape of the domed towers are striking. The installation of the castle theater and the baroque state apartments also took place at this time.

With the death of Georg Wilhelm in 1705 the absolutist court holding of the dukes ended. The Principality of Lüneburg was inherited, together with the Principality of Calenberg , in what would later become the Kingdom of Hanover . The castle lost its political importance and then repeatedly stood empty for a long time. From 1772 it was inhabited by the former Danish Queen Caroline Mathilde , who was exiled from Copenhagen to Celle because of an alleged affair with Johann Friedrich Struensee after a divorce. The Queen held a modest court in Celle until 1775 and died here of scarlet fever at the age of 23 . In the 19th century the castle was occasionally used as a summer residence by the Hanoverian royal family . To this end, Georg Ludwig Friedrich Laves had some renovations carried out inside from 1839 to 1840.

During the First World War there was a prison camp in the castle for up to 300 "civilian prisoners of higher standing" (civil internees). From 1945 to 1958, the Kunstgutlager Schloss Celle was located here .

Georg Wilhelm, the last Duke of Celle
Coat of arms of Duke Georg Wilhelm in the courtyard of the palace
Caroline Mathilde , the queen banished to Celle Castle, portrait from 1771

The castle today

Inside the castle, various rooms and halls from the various construction phases of the castle have been preserved. Baroque state rooms were set up under Georg Wilhelm and have also been preserved. In the Gothic Hall there are changing exhibitions today and in the east wing is the Residence Museum, which opened in 2007 and shows the history of the Guelphs and the Kingdom of Hanover . The historical castle rooms, which were restored from 1978 to 1981, and the castle chapel can be visited during guided tours. In the III. On the first floor there is a special exhibition in the tower room of the south / east tower ( "Palace Chapel 3 D" ).

The castle will be renovated in the next few years for almost 13 million euros (construction will start in the second half of 2010).

Castle chapel

Palace chapel interior with the altar and the north gallery

Before the Reformation , at the end of the 15th century , the Gothic chapel was built in Celle Castle. This took place in the course of the expansion of the castle as the residence of the Dukes of Braunschweig-Lüneburg who ruled the Principality of Lüneburg . The chapel was consecrated in 1485 .

The founder of the current chapel furnishings was Wilhelm the Younger , Duke of Braunschweig-Lüneburg. His father, Duke Ernst I (the Confessor) was the first Protestant Duke of Guelph to introduce the Reformation in Celle in 1525 and throughout the Principality in 1527. Duke Wilhelm the Younger had the palace chapel completely redesigned between 1565 and 1576 and converted into a Protestant chapel. Boxes were built in as manorial estates for the nobility, as well as an altar, a pulpit and an organ. The 78 paintings in total also date from this period. The main works were created by the Flemish painter Marten de Vos with his workshop, which was commissioned with the interior decoration of the chapel. There are also 50 sandstone reliefs , more than 120 panels with biblical quotations and many carvings in the chapel . This total work of art from the Reformation period has remained largely unchanged since then. It is one of the highlights of North German sacred art and, with its Renaissance furnishings, is of outstanding art historical importance. The palace chapel is one of the most important Lutheran court churches in Europe.

Damage assessment by students at the HAWK Hildesheim

Since the early 18th century it has been proven that static problems threaten the chapel and climatic conditions endanger the paintings. In 1840, repair work was carried out under King Ernst August I. An extensive restoration took place from 1864 to 1866 under King George V. To the right of the pulpit, opposite the ruling class, a portrait of him and his wife Queen Marie was attached. In the 1980s the chapel received a static upgrade. After that, caused by the large number of tourists, there was increased humidity and considerable damage to the pictures, which were mostly painted on wood. In order to protect the works of art, the chapel has only been visible behind a glass wall since 1995 . In 2010 a working group consisting of representatives of the Lower Saxony State Office for the Preservation of Monuments , the State Construction Management Lüneburger Heide, the city of Celle, the Ev.-luth. Church district of Celle, the regional church and the University of Applied Science and Art (HAWK) Hildesheim . A feasibility study should determine how it can be made possible to make the castle chapel accessible to visitors again.

Commons : Schlosskapelle Celle - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Castle theater

The palace's court theater , one of the oldest preserved theaters of this type and one of the few baroque theaters in northern Germany, is particularly worth seeing . It is still played by its own ensemble today.

Today's palace theater was built at the instigation of Duke Georg Wilhelm , who stayed temporarily in Venice before taking office and got to know Italian opera there . Construction work on the theater began in 1670 and was largely completed in 1675. The Duke maintained changing theater ensembles, which he recruited from France and Italy, but also from neighboring Hanover. With the Duke's death, the theater became orphaned until Caroline Mathilde's brief courtship , for whom the hall was extended by a second tier .

As a courtly stage, the theater was not designed for the public, which only had access to the plays on a modest scale from the end of the 18th century. The house was regularly used until the end of the 19th century, in 1890 operations ceased and the theater fell into disrepair. A fundamental renovation began in 1935.

Castle Park

Castle park plan

Since the castle had no military use, the outer bastions of the castle were demolished between 1785 and 1802 and served as filling material for the once deeper and wider moat. From 1826 onwards, gardens were laid out in the immediate vicinity of the castle and the defensive walls were continuously razed and removed. Instead, trees and shrubs were planted and lawns were created. In the 19th century, a landscape garden was created in the immediate area around the castle . After part of the park was given up for housing construction around 1900, it has since been around seven hectares in size . To this day, the castle is located on an island around which the moat flows.

At the end of the 17th century , Georg Wilhelm had the "French Garden" laid out, a park based on French models, outside the former belt of fortifications, but in the immediate vicinity of the castle . The former baroque basic structure can only be seen in parts of the park today, because this area has also been converted into a landscape park.

The castle park
Bronze sculpture "Stallion Wohlklang" from the Lower Saxony State Stud Celle
Bridge over the moat
The castle park in autumn

literature

Horst Masuch: The castle in Celle . Lax-Verlag, Hildesheim 1983.

Peter Königfeld : Problems of the preservation of historical room furnishings using the example of the Celle castle chapel , in: Hans-Herbert Möller (Hrsg.): Restoration of cultural monuments. Examples from the preservation of monuments in Lower Saxony (= reports on preservation of monuments , supplement 2), Lower Saxony State Administration Office - Institute for Monument Preservation , Niemeyer, Hameln 1989, ISBN 3-87585-152-8 , pp. 263-266.

Uwe Albrecht : The Renaissance building of the Celle Castle . Verlag Stadt Celle, Celle 2003.

Juliane Schmieglitz-Otten (Ed.): The baroque state chambers in the Celle castle . Verlag Stadt Celle, Celle 2006.

Heiko Laß: The castle in Celle . Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-7954-2606-4 .

Ernst Andreas Friedrich : Celle Castle and Ahlden Castle , pp. 200-203, in: If stones could talk , Volume I, Landbuch-Verlag, Hanover 1989, ISBN 3-7842-0397-3

Juliane Schmieglitz-Otten (arrangement), Lieselotte Tansey (staff), Ulrich Loeper (photos): The Celle Castle Chapel. Art Worlds, Political Worlds, Faith Worlds , ed. from the Residence Museum in Celle Castle and the landscape of the former Principality of Lüneburg, Munich: Hirmer, 2012, ISBN 978-3-7774-7031-3 ; Table of contents and content text

Johann Anselm Steiger : The castle chapel in Celle. An image and writing space of the Reformation. Documentation of all images and inscriptions in their contexts . Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2018.