Mühlburg (castle)
| Muhlburg | ||
|---|---|---|
 The mill castle |
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| Alternative name (s): | Muhlberg | |
| Creation time : | around 700 | |
| Castle type : | Höhenburg, spur location | |
| Conservation status: | Keep, enclosing walls | |
| Standing position : | Counts, clericals | |
| Place: | OT Mühlberg / Three Equals | |
| Geographical location | 50 ° 52 '8 " N , 10 ° 49' 56" E | |
| Height: | 375 m above sea level NN | |
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The Mühlburg , also called Mühlberg , at 375 m above sea level. NN high spur of the Schlossleite above the village of Mühlberg is the oldest castle of the Three Equals and is considered the oldest preserved structure in Thuringia .
history
A certificate from 1 May 704 who gave Thuringian Duke Hedan II. The Castello Mulenberge , along with goods in Mulenberge ( Mühlberg ) Arnestati ( Arnstadt ) and Monhora ( Großmonra ), the missionary and bishop Willibrord . It is not certain whether this fort already stood on the site of today's Mühlburg, especially since it was not a brick complex. The prehistory of the castle probably goes back to the time of the Thuringian Kingdom and its submission by the Franks in 531 .
Timeline:
- In the year 1000 the Spornburg came into the possession of the Counts of Orlamünde.
- In 1088 Emperor Heinrich IV besieged the castle and at the same time Gleichen Castle on the other side of the valley , but without success.
- In 1130 the castle came into the possession of the Archdiocese of Mainz , which enfeoffed the noble family of Meinharde with the Mühlburg, as part of the legacy of the counts of Weimar-Orlamünde , who had died out in the male line, together with Gleichen Castle .
- In 1140, Count Meinhard I. von Mühlberg received the castle as a fief.
- In 1211, Count Meinhard III. as the suitor of the Thuringian Landgrave Hermann I, for his son Ludwig, the four-year-old (!) Elisabeth of Hungary to the Wartburg.
The Meinharde, who from then on called themselves Counts of Mühlburg, acquired the neighboring Veste Wachsenburg in 1220 . You died in 1242 with Meinhard III. out and Mainz moved in the finished fiefdom .
- In 1248 Count Berthold von Henneberg became the first captain of the castle.
- In 1310 the people of Erfurt undertook an - albeit in vain - attack on the castle and then bought the castle in 1357. It was then expanded into a strong bulwark and served to secure the Erfurt trade routes until 1590, when the Mühlberg office passed to Saxe-Weimar ( Kupferstrasse ).
- In 1375 the bailiff, Edler von Hellbach, and the castle owner, the Count von Gleichen (presumably Ernst II.) Feuded.
- In 1521 Hermann von Hoff became captain of the castle and accompanied Martin Luther to the Reichstag in Worms .
- In 1592 the Duke of Weimar bought the castle and sold it to the Duke of Altenburg in 1635 .
- In 1665 Mainz again took over the office with the now badly dilapidated castle, before it came to the Kingdom of Prussia as an enclave in 1815 , surrounded by Gothic territory.
- In 1803, the town and castle fell to Prussia in the course of the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss .
- In 1806 the castle came under French rule.
- In 1815 the castle went back to Prussia and with Gleichen Castle and other possessions it became the private property of Field Marshal Müffling .
- From 1903 to 1907 the keep was expanded to a lookout tower and provided with a crenellated crown.
- Around 1930 the castle warden at the time, Richard Opel, managed to find the remains of the wall of the medieval Radegundis Chapel, which he uncovered as tall as a man.
- In 1945 the walls were removed out of ignorance, so that today only the foundation walls can be seen.
- Since the early 1970s, the castle has been gradually being repaired by the citizens of Mühlberg. Today it houses a small museum and can be visited.
- In June 1987 the 1400th anniversary of Radegundis' death was commemorated and a memorial stone was placed within the foundation walls of the chapel. A Radegundis chapel has also been set up in the tower of the St. Lukas Church in Mühlberg , where an ecumenical service is held every year on the Sunday after August 13th, followed by a procession to the former chapel on the Mühlburg.
The Mühlburg gained some fame through Gustav Freytag , whose novel The Nest of the Wrens is part of the novel series The Ancestors in the Castle. However, the Mühlburg never played an important role in the history of Thuringia and was also not owned by a family that, like the wrens, could get involved in a dispute with the German king. The Gustav Freytag hiking trail , which connects the Mühlburg with the other two castles of the Drei Gleichen (Burg Gleichen and the Wachsenburg), was named after the poet .
description
You enter the castle from the south, from the ridge between the Mühlburg and the Wachsenburg , the Schlossleite . A wooden bridge leads over the Halsgraben , part of the moat surrounding the castle , which is one of the most powerful of its kind in Thuringia. Behind the neck ditch you come across the remains of the Zwingermauer , then the curtain wall and the wall of the inner castle. Above everything is the 22 m high keep, which has a wall thickness of 2.7 m and a diameter of 7.4 m. These four obstacles made it difficult for attackers and in the 13th century were up to date in terms of defense technology for a strongly fortified castle.
Only remnants of the gatehouse as part of the kennel wall are preserved.
Within the core wall, the castle was built on natural rock. This made undermining it virtually impossible.
Not far from the castle, at the beginning of the ridge of the Schlossleite, there is a chapel dedicated to St. Radegundis . The age of the foundations of the previous chapel on which it was built has not yet been finally researched.
use
On the castle grounds there is a museum about pottery and household items from the Middle Ages as well as a restaurant . The tower can be climbed during opening times. The other two castles can be seen from here. There is also a working post box and a well on the site.
In summer, an open-air cinema organized by the Mühlberg Art and Culture Association takes place on the castle grounds.
literature
- Friedrich Gottschalck: The knight castles and mountain castles of Germany , 3rd vol. 1820, pp. 1-45
- Thomas Bienert: "Mühlburg" - Medieval castles in Thuringia . Wartberg Verlag, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2000, ISBN 3-86134-631-1 , p. 81-82 .
- Michael Köhler: "Mühlburg" - Thuringian castles and fortified prehistoric and early historical living spaces . Jenzig-Verlag, Jena 2001, ISBN 3-910141-43-9 , p. 185-186 .
- Robert Huth: The Mühlburg. Known from Gustav Freytag's novel: "The Wrens' Nest". Historical representation. Koenig, Erfurt 1932; Reprint Rockstuhl, Bad Langensalza 2006, ISBN 978-3-938997-44-4
Web links
- Mühlburg on the website of the administrative association Drei Gleichen
- Reconstruction drawing in the medieval state by Wolfgang Braun
Individual evidence
- ↑ Mühlberg Castle on www.dickemauern.de