Imperial Palace (Kaiserslautern)
| Kaiserpfalz Kaiserslautern | ||
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 Model of the imperial palace |
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| Alternative name (s): | Barbarossaburg, Kaiserslautern Castle | |
| Creation time : | 1152-1158 | |
| Castle type : | Hillside castle | |
| Conservation status: | ruin | |
| Standing position : | Emperor | |
| Construction: | Humpback cuboid | |
| Place: | Kaiserslautern | |
| Geographical location | 49 ° 26 '45 " N , 7 ° 46' 6" E | |
| Height: | 232 m above sea level NHN | |
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The to ruin become imperial palace of Kaiserslautern , also popularly known as Barbarossa castle or fortress Kaiserslautern called, is a by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in the 12th century as a royal palace built military and administrative castle in the western Palatinate city of Kaiserslautern (now Rhineland-Palatinate ).
Geographical location
The remains of the facility are at 232 m above sea level. NHN on the south-facing slope of the Rittersberg in the city center of Kaiserslautern directly on Burgstrasse below the point where the new town hall is today. In the 12th century there was still a rock plateau surrounded by the Lauter .
history
Time until the Palatinate was established
Excavations on the hill, which took place in 1991/1992, produced a burial ground with ribbon ceramic finds from the 6th millennium BC. BC to the surface. This is the earliest evidence of settlement on the castle grounds.
In the year 830 the place is attested as the Carolingian Villa Luhtra . It is believed, however, that the courtyard was already in the same place in the 7th century. Originally there was a necropolis with 188 proven graves on an area of 1400 m².
The court came to the Salians in 985 and was called curtis ( Latin for court ) in 1114 . A 1.40 m thick defensive wall built in the 10th century, in the late Salian period, along the eastern and southern borders has been proven. In view of the traditional name Rittersberg , which is still in use today , the castle-like settlement is likely to have been administered by low-nobility ministerials .
12th to 14th centuries
The complex was rebuilt as a mighty Palatinate from 1152 to 1158 by Emperor Friedrich Barbarossa, who called it his domus regalis ( Latin for the king's house ). In 1162 he appointed Gotfried von Lutra , who later became the progenitor of the Knights of Hohenecken , as castle administrator . In the following period the Palatinate was regularly visited by rulers, such as Barbarossa with his son Heinrich VI. in the year 1184. In the years 1214, 1215, 1217 and 1234 Barbarossa's grandson stayed here, who in 1220 became Emperor Frederick II . In 1215 he had the complex redesigned and held a court day there in 1234 . The first episode of the saga of the pike in the Kaiserwoog , which took place in this era, has not been historically verified.
The English King Richard married in 1269 in St. Nicholas consecrated double chapel of the castle his bride Beatrice of Valkenburg . In 1305 13 nobles were appointed as royal castle men in Lautern, including the Counts of Zweibrücken-Bitsch . The complex came to Johann the Blind in 1322 , to his son, Archbishop Balduin von Trier , in 1332 , and was last pledged to the Electoral Palatinate in 1357 . Thereupon electoral Palatinate officers were deployed to the castle. Further construction work was probably carried out in 1367, when Elector Ruprecht I was allowed to use customs revenue to expand the castle.
16th to 19th century
Count Palatine Johann Casimir had a splendid Renaissance palace built between 1570 and 1580 in the immediate vicinity of the Imperial Palace . The imperial palace and palace were both in 1635, when imperial troops of the General Campaign Master Melchior von Hatzfeld stormed the city and partially cremated it, and in 1688 in the Palatinate War of Succession by French troops. In 1703, the French set the castle on fire and finally blew it up.
In 1714, Elector Johann Wilhelm had the remains of the imperial palace expanded in a simpler form into a hunting lodge . It served as the administrative center until French Revolution troops burned it down in 1792. In 1804 the land clerk Horn got his seat in the makeshift rebuilt castle . In 1813 the French administration auctioned the complex, which later resulted in the partial demolition and massive redesign of the remains. In 1820 the north-west corner was completely torn down and the Palatinate central prison of the royal Bavarian government was built there. In 1842, the south-eastern section with the castle was expanded into the B. C. Waechter private brewery and became an imperial castle .
From the 20th century
During the Nazi era , the newer buildings were demolished in 1934. The last major change to the remains of the Johann Casimir Castle took place in 1935.
Extensive excavation and restoration work was carried out in the 1960s, but when the Kaiserslautern town hall was built in 1968, parts of the imperial palace and the palace were irretrievably destroyed. The excavations that were carried out in connection with the construction of the town hall have not yet been scientifically analyzed.
In 2010 and 2011 exploratory excavations took place on the area of the former imperial palace.
investment
From the listed complex, only the red sandstone humpbacks from the foundations of the Kaisersaal and sparse remains of the masonry of the castle's double chapel, which was built between 1160 and 1215 , are preserved today . The visible rows of walls are in the southwest corner of the site. A paving in the lower area of the town hall forecourt, which corresponds to the floor plan of the hall building (28 m × 19 m), can also be seen.
During construction work in the area around the Kaiserpfalz, further remains of masonry and underground passages were exposed. To the east of the (newer) Casimir Hall, clear traces of the path leading to the presumed old entrance to the castle can be seen. In the basement of the castle, remains of masonry can be seen, which are assigned to the Late Sali period and associated with Barbarossa's father, Duke Friedrich the One-Eyed .
The remains of the castle ruins are freely accessible, only the Casimir Hall and the underground passages can only be visited as part of guided tours.
Model of the Palatinate (as it was around 1620) from the southwest
Hunchback ashlar cladding on the south side
North side
Underground passage
basement, cellar
Say
There are various legends about the Kaiserpfalz .
The pike in the Kaiserwoog
Funeral procession through the city
Every year on June 10th, the anniversary of Emperor Barbarossa's death, Sunday children are said to see the splendid silhouette of the castle at midnight in the glow of the moonlight, as it should once have been. The knights and squires who served under Barbarossa rise from their graves and undertake a funeral procession in honor of the great deceased on ancient roads through the city. At the first crowing of the cock, the imperial castle and the entourage disappear again.
The sleeping emperor
Barbarossa is said not to have drowned in the river Saleph ; he only disappeared without a trace because he was trapped "with the Turks" for a long time. One day he was able to free himself with cunning and returned to his castle in Lautern unnoticed. But as a result of a curse by the Turks, he is only allowed to leave his castle again when the ravens are no longer circling it.
One day the knight went from the nearby Beilstein Castle out of curiosity to the vaults of the Imperial Palatinate. Down below he found the Emperor, clad in a purple cloak, sitting at a table asleep. The emperor woke up and asked the visitor: "Have the ravens gone?" When the Beilsteiner said no, the emperor lowered his head and fell asleep again.
Web links
- Location of the Kaiserpfalz on: Map service of the landscape information system of the Rhineland-Palatinate Nature Conservation Administration (LANIS map) ( Notes )
- Web presence of the support group for the preservation of the Kaiserpfalz Kaiserslautern
Individual evidence
- ↑ Map service of the landscape information system of the Rhineland-Palatinate nature conservation administration (LANIS map) ( notes )
- ↑ a b c Kaiserpfalz / Kaiserslautern - Rhineland-Palatinate: History. burgenwelt.de, accessed on March 24, 2015 .
- ↑ Elena Rey: Castle Guide Palatinate . Kaiserslautern 2003, ISBN 3-936216-15-0 , p. 31 .
- ↑ Walter Herrmann: On red rock . Karlsruhe 2004, ISBN 3-7650-8286-4 , p. 98 .
- ↑ Jürgen Keddigkeit : Kaiserpfalz and Casimirschloß . Kaiserslautern 1995.
- ^ Günter Stein : Castles and palaces in the Palatinate . Frankfurt / Main 1976, ISBN 3-426-04405-6 , pp. 39 .
- ↑ Manfred Czerwinski: Castles - proud witnesses of a great time . Palatinate and surroundings. ISBN 3-936216-07-X , pp. 40 .
- ↑ Alexander Thon: How swallows glued nests to the rocks . ISBN 3-7954-1674-4 , p. 75 .
- ↑ Jürgen Keddigkeit , Ulrich Burkhart, Rolf Übel (ed.): Palatinate Burgenlexikon . tape III . Kaiserslautern 2005, ISBN 3-927754-54-4 , p. 102 ff .
- ↑ Informational directory of cultural monuments. (1.48 MB; PDF) District-free city of Kaiserslautern. General Directorate for Cultural Heritage Rhineland-Palatinate , November 29, 2011, accessed on March 24, 2015 .
- ↑ Viktor Carl: Palatinate sagas and legends . ISBN 3-9804668-3-3 , pp. 441, 444, 449 .