Wittgenstein Castle

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Wittgenstein Castle by Matthäus Merian in his Topographia Hassiae
Drawing of Laasphe with lock from 1834
Photograph from 1903 by Albert Ludorff .

The Wittgenstein Castle is located between Lahn and Laasphe Bach above the town of Bad Laasphe in North Rhine-Westphalia on a 470 m high mountain.

history

A castle at this point was first mentioned in 1187 as "Widenkindigstein". Before that, in 1174, a Count Werner I named himself after the castle ( Werner I von Battenberg and Wittgenstein ), which must have existed at that time. There is currently no evidence of an earlier start-up; Perhaps the castle was built around the middle of the 12th century by a member of the Count's House of Reichenbach / Ziegenhain and a little later came into the hands of Count Werner I, who used it to build an independent rule.

In 1190, Count Werner I signed a contract with the Archbishop of Mainz , Konrad I von Wittelsbach , according to which he promised the Archbishopric to charge Wittgenstein Castle for a monetary payment and to receive it back from him as a fief . However, the archbishop owed part of the payment, so that the contract did not come into force and Werner was able to free himself from the associated dependence on Mainz after a few years. It was only in a contract with Werner's sons Werner II , Widekind I and Hermann on September 2, 1223, that the new Archbishop Siegfried II succeeded in obtaining the commission of Wittgenstein Castle to the Archbishopric and giving it to them as a fief.

In 1238 the Wittgenstein and Battenberg family was divided into a Battenberger and a Wittgenstein line by the sons of Widekind I. Wittgenstein Castle and the associated lordship on the upper reaches of Lahn and Eder came to Siegfried I , who is now Count von Wittgenstein called. For centuries the castle formed the center of a county of Wittgenstein named after it . A little later, the town of Laasphe was founded below the castle .

With the extinction of the male line of the Counts of Wittgenstein in 1359, the county with the castle fell to the Sayn-Wittgenstein family . During the Thirty Years' War the castle was occupied and heavily damaged in 1634, but it was repaired. Until 1950 it served as the residence of the princes of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Hohenstein .

After the princes had moved to the Schwarzenau mansion , Josef Kämmerling founded a boarding school with a boys' secondary school in 1954. The grammar school was added five years later. Girls have only been admitted to the boarding school since 1974, and external pupils have also been able to attend the secondary school and the Wittgenstein high school since 1974 .

In the meantime, many rooms have been converted into classrooms and regular school lessons are taking place. The existing boarding school kitchen and dining room were renovated in 2009 to cater for all-day students. In March 2010, part of the film " Jungle Child " was shot at the castle.

Building description

The irregular three-wing complex of the castle extends over a length of about 125 meters. The facility was built in several construction phases and does not have a uniform architectural style. The building is predominantly from the Renaissance and Baroque periods .

The north wing (or central building) of the castle dates from the end of the 16th century. In its western part, the foundation walls of a square tower have been excavated, whereby it can be assumed that this can be assigned to the original castle from the 12th century.

The west wing (or kitchen wing) and the east wing (chamber wing) can be found on both sides of the north wing. These were originally independent buildings, but were connected to the north wing at the beginning of the 18th century. The striking four-storey pavilion on the east wing was built in 1783.

The royal stables of the castle dates from 1736, the other farm buildings are more recent.

Little is known that the castle is built on a rock, which is important for the naming of the Wittgenstein region. The "Widukind" rock still protrudes untreated and raw into one of the glass corridors that surround the inner "rose garden". Until recently, the palace housed the princely archive, which kept historical documents from the past centuries, especially from the 17th century. After the transfer of ownership, this archive was moved to a building belonging to the Rentkammer below the castle.

There are suspicions that an escape tunnel exists between the castle and the city church. However, this has not yet been found.

chapel

The chapel of Wittgenstein Castle was first mentioned in 1325. In 1859 a renovation took place in which a new organ was installed. The pulpit was presented to the Hesselbach Chapel in 1954 ; the organ went to the Oberndorf church in 1956 . The chapel was used for church purposes until 1954.

literature

  • Alexander Thon, Stefan Ulrich, Jens Friedhoff : "Decided with strong iron chains and bolts ...". Castles on the Lahn . Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2008, ISBN 978-3-7954-2000-0 , pp. 178-181.
  • Dieter Pfau: Traces of time in Siegerland and Wittgenstein, the early and high Middle Ages (750–1250). Bielefeld 2009.
  • Karl Hartnack : Wittgenstein Castle (previous representations, old castle and palace, building, the Hofburg - no end) . In: Wittgenstein Vol. 26 (1962), H. 1, pp. 2-24 and Vol. 26 (1962), H. 2, pp. 66-88.
  • Michael Losse: The Lahn castles and palaces . Imhof Verlag, Petersberg 2007, ISBN 978-3-86568-070-9 .
  • The churches of the Wittgenstein church district in words and pictures . Edited by Johannes Burkardt, Andreas Kroh, Ulf Lückel. Bad Fredeburg, Grobbel 2001, ISBN 3-930271-86-9 , pp. 73-74 .

Web links

Commons : Wittgenstein Castle  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Pfau 2009, p. 154.
  2. ↑ Wrede 1927, p. 186.
  3. ^ Peacock 2009.
  4. ↑ August Heldmann: On the history of the court Viermünden and its families. I. The Bailiffs of Keseberg. With a stem and seal plate . In: Journal of the Association for Hessian History and Regional Studies . New episode, volume fifteenth. Kassel 1890, p. 15 ( digitized version [accessed September 7, 2016]).
  5. ^ The high school Schloss Wittgenstein provides information. privatschulverband-nrw.de, accessed on January 29, 2016 .
  6. ↑ The theatrical release is on February 17th. Siegener Zeitung, accessed on January 13, 2011 .

Coordinates: 50 ° 55 ′ 50 ″  N , 8 ° 23 ′ 48.5 ″  E