Hunting Lodge Happy Coming
The Hunting Lodge Fröhliche Wiederkunft in Wolfersdorf near Stadtroda in Thuringia is a former hunting lodge built between 1548 and 1550 by Nikolaus Gromann on behalf of Elector Johann Friedrich the Magnanimous . It stands on an island in a small lake in the middle of the village.
history
Already at the beginning of the 16th century there was a princely hunting lodge in Trockenborn. It was destroyed in the Schmalkaldic War in 1547 . In 1547, Elector Johann Friedrich I commissioned the architect Nikolaus Gromann to build a new hunting lodge in the neighboring village of Wolfersdorf. It was completed within three years (1548–1550) as an L-shaped, two-storey half - timbered building on a stone base with eight heated rooms and eleven chambers. A wooden stair tower opened up the upper floors. This building is still largely preserved today. The core building was surrounded by commercial buildings, which were largely renewed and changed in the 19th century. In 1552 the elector was released from captivity, met his family on September 24th in Wolfersdorf and therefore called the new palace "Happy Return".
In the 16th and 17th centuries it was used extensively as a hunting lodge by his successors. From around 1650, the hunting parties relocated to Hummelshain Castle . The Happy Second Coming was used by the princely hunting authorities and began to deteriorate. From 1858 to 1865 the castle was restored on behalf of Duke Joseph von Sachsen-Altenburg , who resigned in 1848, and rebuilt and expanded in the neo-Gothic style. Four large-format painting panels with scenes from the life of Elector Johann Friedrich I came into the palace.
In 1918, Duke Ernst II of Saxony-Altenburg abdicated and in 1922 moved from Altenburg Castle to Wolfersdorf Castle. Among other things, he had a modern observatory built in, with Kurd Kisshauer supporting him. In 1945/46 the castle was expropriated as part of the land reform . However, Ernst II received lifelong right to live in the castle from the Soviet occupying power , lived there until 1955 and died as a GDR citizen. In 1955 the castle was transferred to public ownership. Among other things, the inventory was moved to the Leuchtenburg . The four panels ended up in the Berlin armory , today's German Historical Museum . The palace was then used as a youth work yard and from 1990 as a "youth learning yard". The building fabric suffered considerably.
In 1997 the pond was extensively desludged and ammunition was recovered from its bottom. In 2007 the castle was sold to a native of Jena, and extensive restoration began on the parts of the building, some of which were in danger of collapsing. The aim of the owner and a founded "Schloss Wolfersdorf Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH" is to make the castle accessible to the public again as a cultural and historical asset. The project with the support of the Free State of Thuringia and the German Foundation for Monument Protection showed clear progress in 2013. Among other things, a café on the ground floor with outdoor operations was opened. The castle can be visited with a guide. In 2012 the castle was visited by 35,000 guests.
literature
- Martin Liebeskind: To the happy return. History and use of a hunting lodge in Wolfersdorf . Master's thesis (with Christel Köhle-Hezinger ) Uni Jena 2008.
- Martin Liebeskind: The hunting lodge "For the Happy Return" in Wolfersdorf . In: Heimat Thüringen , 16 (2009), 1/2, pp. 68–70.
- Karl August Hugo Burkhardt: The imprisonment of Johann Friedrich the Magnanimous and the castle for the "happy return." Weimar 1863 MDZ Munich .
- Heiko Laß: Hunting and pleasure castles of the 17th and 18th centuries in Thuringia. Imhof Verlag , Petersberg 2006, ISBN 3-86568-092-5 , p. 405 Dissertation at the TU Aachen 2004.
- Rahel Marie Vogel: On the way to becoming a new person: re-education to a “socialist personality” in the youth work centers Hummelshain and Wolfersdorf (1961 - 1989) , Lang, Frankfurt am Main / Berlin / Bern / Bruxelles / New York, NY / Oxford / Vienna 2010 , ISBN 978-3-631-60259-1 (= Europäische Hochschulschriften / European University Studies / Publications Universitaires Européennes , Volume 1075, History and its auxiliary sciences , Volume 1075, at the same time state examination paper at the Humboldt University of Berlin 2008 under the title: Re-education to " socialist personality "in the GDR youth workshops in Hummelshain and Wolfersdorf (1961-1989) ).
Individual evidence
- ↑ The wish from the bottle , Monuments Online 6.2011
- ↑ Lioba Knipping: Political Ranküne to "Happy Second Coming" . Thuringian newspaper, July 12, 2013
- ↑ Martin Liebeskind: "Zur Fröhlichen Wiederkunft" - History and Use of the Wolfersdorf Hunting Lodge ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
Web links
Coordinates: 50 ° 47 ′ 16.1 ″ N , 11 ° 42 ′ 36.6 ″ E