Moated castle Oberaulenbach

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Moated castle Oberaulenbach, northeast side, entrance area with stair tower, on the tower the coat of arms of Kottwitz von Aulenbach
Moated castle Oberaulenbach and Hofgut, view of the entrance from the direction of Unteraulenbach

The moated castle Oberaulenbach in Renaissance style is located in the Spessart Nature Park not far from the Unteraulenbach district of the Eschau market . It is located between Sommerau and Hobbach in a small side valley of the Elsava , which flows from the Spessart down into the Main at Elsenfeld . The other two castles in the valley are Mespelbrunn Castle and Sommerau Castle . In 1693 Georg Philipp Kottwitz von Aulenbach sold the castle to the Electorate of Mainz, August Maximilian Freiherr von Mairhofen .

history

The castle in Aulenbach was a Spessart forestry hatch , leaning towards the coming of the Teutonic Order in Prozelten . In 1378 a Fritz Pfeil von Aulenbach is mentioned in a document. The Stang von Zellingen, called Kottwitz with the surname von Aulenbach, have been appearing since 1420. Accordingly, the family came into possession of the castle in the early 15th century.

After building examinations during renovations in 1912, it was found that the central building of the small complex could already date from the 15th century. Then the builder would be the Franconian nobleman Leonard Kottwitz , according to research by the district home keeper and historian Wolfgang Hartmann , of whom it is said that he bought and built a plot of land in the Aulenbachtal in 1474. It probably replaced an older castle nearby, possibly lost during the Magdalen flood in 1342 . Leonards inheriting cousin Walter, a former robber barons, was by 1483 the archbishop of Mainz for the first time as a bailiff with the Hofgut invested that his descendants, who now is Kotwitz of Aulenbach , increased called could. The castle was damaged in the Thirty Years War . In 1693 Georg Philipp Kottwitz von Aulenbach sold the castle with the other possessions in Klingenberg am Main to August Max Freiherrn von Mairhofen, whose descendants are still in his possession today.

The Kottwitz and the Lords of Fechenbach were joint owners of the Sommerau moated castle until 1550. After taking over the Kottwitz shares, the Fechenbachers were the sole owners of the palace in Sommerau .

According to the Historical Atlas of Bavaria Unterfranken-Obernburg, Aulenbach Castle and Forest was separated from Hobbach in 1838 and Sommerau was incorporated. At the same time, the whole complex came from the Obernburg Regional Court (Hobbach) to the Klingenberg Regional Court (Sommerau).

Moated castle Oberaulenbach, panorama south side

Building description

Moated castle Oberaulenbach, coat of arms of those of Mairhofen , south side moated castle, below the middle gable
Information board for the Spessart circular route to the von Mairhofen castle and family

The entire complex of buildings can be divided into two parts. The older residential building in the south-west corner, which is surrounded by a moat , is joined to the east by the newer economic buildings, forester's house and administrator's house, which enclose an irregularly square inner courtyard open to the west. Some of the outbuildings have been recently rebuilt. The Mairhofen coat of arms with an inscription from 1715 is located on the two-storey, unadorned administrator's house .

The house on the south side is enclosed by a moat over which a brick bridge leads. On this is the year 1788. A narrow kennel is presented to the north . The low kennel wall has loopholes and wall slits. The castle has an irregular floor plan. An older longitudinal building, as can be seen from the historical analysis, is adjoined by two small transverse wings on the eastern and western narrow sides; a narrow, risalit-like wing in the middle, which corresponds to the southern long side and on the north side a polygonal stair tower . The building itself is three-story. The upper floor of the main building consists of half-timbering , the wings that were added later are made of quarry stone masonry with toothed corner cuboids and corrugated gables . The windows have grooved stone walls on the sash and wooden frames on the central building. On the wings towards the inside there are arched closed entrances; the cladding is profiled, with the year 1579 at the top . The stair tower shows half-timbering on the upper floor and has a domed roof . The entrance in the basement has a straight lintel, the walls are profiled. The coat of arms of Mairhofen with the year 1693 is embedded in the lintel; this was apparently used later, as traces of an older coat of arms of the Kottwitz are still recognizable. The carved coat of arms of Kottwitz with the year 1594 is located in the half-timbered structure of the upper floor.

The central building comes from an older, late Gothic period. The residential building originally consisted of a single, three-storey house which, according to the stylistic clues, belongs to the late Gothic period and which was expanded in 1579 with the addition of wings. The side wings, the chapel extension and the stair tower were added in 1579 and 1589 in the Renaissance style . The simple farm buildings , a forester's house and an administrator's house, were rebuilt in 1755. They form a square around an inner courtyard.

There is a central plank on all floors that is accessible from the stair tower. The house chapel is on the second floor, facing south.

The moated castle can only be viewed from the outside.

  • Moated Castle Oberaulenbach, view of the castle from the courtyard side from the north-northeast

  • Moated Castle Oberaulenbach, view of the castle on the southwest side and moat

  • Hofgut east side, statue

  • Hofgut, gate east side

literature

  • Wolfgang Hartmann: On the medieval history of the moated castle Oberaulenbach and its masters. In: Spessart . April 2011, pp. 3-14.
  • The art monuments of the Kingdom of Bavaria. Volume 3: District of Lower Franconia. Issue 23: Adolf Feulner , Bernhard Hermann Röttger : District Office Obernburg. Oldenbourg, Munich 1925. (Unchanged reprint. Ibid 1981, ISBN 3-486-50477-0 )
  • Würzburg Diocesan History Sheets (PDF; 2.3 MB), Volume 57, special edition, 1995, Diocese of Würzburg, pp. 107–145 (publications by Prof. Dr. Dr. Dieter Feineis)
  • Otto Pfeifer: Historical house book of Sommerau. Hinckel-Druck, Wertheim, publisher Markt Eschau, self-published, 2010.
  • Otto Pfeifer: The history of the parish and the churches of St. Laurentius Sommerau. Hinckel-Druck, Wertheim, publisher Markt Eschau, self-published, 2012.

Web links

Commons : Wasserschloss Oberaulenbach  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Birgit Kuhn: Robber barons and bailiffs. In: Main-Echo . April 5, 2011.

Coordinates: 49 ° 50 ′ 19.3 "  N , 9 ° 17 ′ 21.9"  E