House Empel

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Haus Empel on a postcard from 1908

Haus Empel is the ruin of a moated castle in Empel , a district of Rees in the North Rhine-Westphalian district of Kleve . It is located in a nature reserve directly on the Empeler Meer , an arm of the old Rhine , and is surrounded by moats . The unsecured ruin is privately owned and is not open to the public, but in 2007 it served as a backdrop for the television film The Vow by Dominik Graf .

history

Illustration of the House of Empel on a map from 1751

House Empel is first mentioned in a document in 1240 as the property of the knight Bernard von Rees. In a document from 1256, the Emple estate is mentioned and expanded into a castle in the 13th and 14th centuries . Meanwhile, as allod to the men of Hönnepel come is for Empel 1339 for the first time, a chapel mentioned when Lutzo of Hönnepel and his wife Lisa of the local chapel bequeathed a foundation. In an inheritance dispute on August 4, 1345, Rütger von Hönnepel received "the castle ter Empel and everything within ter Empelt" in front of his seven siblings. For a long time this Rütger was in dispute with Walram von Jülich , the Archbishop of Cologne , who was supposed to have a lasting impact on the status of Empels. On May 21, 1347, through the mediation of Count Dietrich VII from Cleves, a contract was concluded between the two parties to the dispute, according to which Empel should henceforth be a fiefdom of the Electorate of Cologne . In a document from 1349, Rütger also declares Empel to be an open house in Cologne. Nevertheless, there were still conflicts, because in the following period Haus Empel was besieged by archbishop troops . In an atonement contract dated October 18, 1356, Rütger von Hönnepel had to give the Cologne Archbishop's property again as a fief and an open house. He was also forbidden to fortify Haus Empel without the consent of the Archbishop . Rütger's son Luysse succeeded his father as the owner and was the first member of his family to call himself "von Empel". In 1387 the castle was besieged by troops from the Klevian town of Wesel , and the besiegers are said to have used a stone rifle .

Portal of the Empel house in the 1890s

By pledging the office of Aspel / Rees to the Dukes of Kleve, Haus Empel had been a Klevian fief since the beginning of the 15th century. From 1482 the estate was owned by the von Wittenhorst family for a few years before it came to Heinrich von Diepenbrock in 1487 , who married Sara, the daughter of a Rütger von Hönnepel and his wife Elisabeth von Hetterscheid. But already in 1489 Johann, a member of the von Hönnepel family, was enfeoffed with Haus Empel. In 1491 he transferred it to the knight Johann von Wylich, the Klevian bailiff in the Hetter, who also owned the Hueth bei Bienen Castle . Johann von Wylich sold the Empeler castle complex again to Sara von Hönnepel and her son Rütger von Diepenbrock in 1498. The von Diepenbrock family had the medieval core of the complex redesigned in the Renaissance style in 1570 . During the Eighty Years' War the house was captured and looted by Spanish troops in 1598 . The burned Vorburg down. Under Baron Johann Hermann von Diepenbrock, Empel was raised to glory with its own jurisdiction in 1661, together with the village of Hurl and the parish of Millingen . Around 1700, the complex in the outer bailey was redesigned in the Baroque style . In 1731, the Imperial Count Friedrich von Gronsfeld-Diepenbrock (1705–1754) was enfeoffed with Empel. He was forced to sell the indebted property to his brother-in-law Christoph Ludwig von Seckendorff-Aberdar in the middle of the 18th century . Further changes of ownership quickly followed. From 1765 to 1804 Empel was owned by the von Oppeln family and in 1830 it passed to the von Weiler family. Under her, Haus Empel was no longer listed in the registers of manorial estates eligible for parliament . In 1923, Alfons Böck inherited the property.

In 1945, the buildings were completely destroyed during the fighting for Rees and were not rebuilt. The ruin was entered in the list of monuments of the city of Rees in 1983 as a ground monument and in 2002 as an architectural monument . With the purchase of the ruin by Peter Landers in 2000, the first security work began. At the initiative of the Millingen-Empel home association, further safety measures were initiated in 2010 to preserve the existing building fabric. The costs for this are estimated at 120,000 euros and should be borne by the state, the city of Rees as well as the owner and the local community.

description

House Empel with its grand bay in the 1890s

The remains of Haus Empel are on an island with the shape of a slightly warped rectangle. To the south-east of this is a square area surrounded by moats, which is divided into two equally sized halves by a path in the middle. In all likelihood, these are the remains of a baroque garden . Access to the castle island is provided by a lattice gate on the southwestern side, which is separated over half its length by a parapet-like , curved wall. The gate is flanked by two embossed gate posts with the Latin numerals MDCC (1700), on which Minerven used to sit . Busts of Roman emperors once stood on the wall . The portal and boundary wall are from a baroque renovation around 1700.

The northern part of the castle island was formerly occupied by the inner bailey, which was separated from the outer bailey area to the south by a moat. However, this trench was filled in by the 18th century at the latest. From the former three-wing main castle with slate roofs , remains of the east wing and a round tower protruding to provide water , both of which were built around 1500, have been preserved. The east wing had a 1,570-grown, ornamental pomp oriel , whose three window axes of fluted pilasters were framed. He had a shell-shaped attachment which two faunas was worn, and the inscription: ANNO DOMINI 1570. Libet DOT YOUR HERN ABOUT EVERYTHING. AND YOUR NEARBY AS YOURSELF. The curved console stones of the bay are still preserved today. Also preserved is part of the northern wing of the outer bailey from the 18th century, which adjoins the round tower of the inner bailey, as well as a slender round tower built around 1500 with a kinking, polygonal helmet on the south corner of the bailey area. In its basement there have been sockets for hook boxes .

The square main tower of the complex, known as the "Heidenturm", was demolished before 1826. The approximately 30 meter high brick building had four floors, which rose above a square floor plan and had vaulted ceilings on the lowest three floors . Its top floor was called "Pagan Temple". Legend has it that the tower was built in Roman times , but when it was demolished, a pile foundation was revealed, which identified it as a structure of the 14th century.

literature

  • Paul Clemen (ed.): The art monuments of the Rees district (= The art monuments of the Rhine province . Volume 2, section 1). L. Schwann, Düsseldorf 1892, pp. 58-60 ( digitized version ).
  • Stefan Frankewitz : Castles, palaces and mansions in Rees. BOSS, Goch 2006, ISBN 3-933969-57-3 , pp. 43-51.
  • Robert Scholten : A few things about Empel Castle near Rees. In: Lower Rhine history and antiquity friend. Volume 4. 1906, pp. 2-4, 7, 10-11, 14-15, 18-20, 22-24.
  • Hermann Terlinden: From the history of the Empel house. In: Calendar for the Klever Land for 1986. BOSS, Kleve 1985.
  • Jens Wroblewski, André Wemmers: Theiss-Burgenführer Niederrhein . Konrad Theiss , Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-8062-1612-6 , pp. 50-51 .

Web links

Commons : Haus Empel  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Sebastian Latzel: Film shooting in the ruin. In: Rheinische Post . Edition of May 1, 2007 ( online ).
  2. ↑ a b c Jens Wroblewski, André Wemmers: Theiss Castle Guide Niederrhein. 2001, p. 50.
  3. ↑ Theodor Joseph Lacomblet : Document book for the history of the Lower Rhine or the Archbishopric of Cöln, the principalities of Jülich and Berg, Geldern, Meurs, Kleve and Mark, and the imperial monasteries of Elten, Essen and Werden. Volume 2. Wolf, Düsseldorf 1846, document 425 ( digitized version ).
  4. ^ Stefan Frankewitz: Castles, palaces and mansions in Rees 2006, p. 43.
  5. ↑ a b Stefan Frankewitz: Burgen, Schlösser und Herrenhäuser in Rees 2006, p. 44.
  6. ↑ Theodor Joseph Lacomblet: Document book for the history of the Lower Rhine or the Archbishopric of Cöln, the principalities of Jülich and Berg, Geldern, Meurs, Kleve and Mark, and the imperial monasteries of Elten, Essen and Werden . Volume 3. Wolf, Düsseldorf 1853, certificate 474 ( digitized version ).
  7. ↑ Theodor Joseph Lacomblet: Document book for the history of the Lower Rhine or the Archbishopric of Cöln, the principalities of Jülich and Berg, Geldern, Meurs, Kleve and Mark, and the imperial monasteries of Elten, Essen and Werden . Volume 3. Wolf, Düsseldorf 1853, certificate 563 ( digitized ).
  8. ^ Paul Clemen: The art monuments of the Rees district. 1892, p. 58.
  9. ↑ a b Stefan Frankewitz: Castles, palaces and mansions in Rees. 2006, p. 46.
  10. ↑ Gottlob Friedrich Krebel, Gottlieb Schumann: M. Gottlieb Schumanns genealogisches Hand-Buch. Gleditsch, Leipzig 1758, p. 170 ( digitized version ).
  11. ^ A b Paul Clemen: The art monuments of the Rees district. 1892, p. 59.
  12. ↑ a b Stefan Frankewitz: Castles, palaces and mansions in Rees. 2006, p. 47.
  13. ^ Elisabeth Hanf: Contract to secure the castle ruins signed. In the west . Edition of April 22, 2010.
  14. ↑ Robert Scholten: Some about Empel Castle near Rees. 1906, p. 10.
  15. ^ Jens Wroblewski, André Wemmers: Theiss-Burgenführer Niederrhein. 2001, p. 51.

Coordinates: 51 ° 47 '37.1 "  N , 6 ° 25' 2.7"  E