Ahlsdorf Castle
The Ahlsdorf Castle is a baroque palace in the district Ahlsdorf of Schönewalde in the Elbe-Elster in Brandenburg . It is privately owned and rented out for weddings and events.
Location and appreciation
The castle, located east of Dorfstrasse, at the height of the church, is clearly set back from the Anger and separated from the village by the farm yard in front. The spacious park adjoins to the east. Due to its dimensions, spatial arrangement and the abundance of preserved equipment details as well as its integration into the spacious park and farm yard, Schloss Ahlsdorf is one of the most sophisticated and representative aristocratic residences from the first third of the 18th century in the Saxon-Brandenburg border region. The preserved, high-quality interior details in particular testify to the upscale living culture of the castle owners. The castle is also of historical importance as the residence of Johann Georg von Siemens , one of the leading business representatives and co-founder of Deutsche Bank .
history
The building is an angular, baroque two-wing complex. The east-west facing main building was built in 1709 and expanded around 1720 by a north-south wing. Additions and changes to the interior took place in 1859 and 1895. At the site of today's castle there was a fortified noble residence of unknown appearance, mentioned in a document in 1428. From 1419 to 1421 Hans von Lochow, 1444 Bertram von Burg, the von Rauchhaupt family in the early 15th century and the von Löser family from 1479 to 1699 resided here. In the years 1700 and 1857 the von Seyffertitz owned the manor Ahlsdorf. Anton Friedrich von Seyffertitz initially had the east-west main wing built in 1709 with a three-storey, four-axis risalit and its own mansard roof on the north facade, as evidenced by the dated coat of arms on the keystone of the courtyard portal. Around 1720, the existing building was expanded by adding a second wing to the angular structure. In 1857, the judicial councilor Georg Siemens (from 1847–1854 co-owner of Siemens & Halske ) acquired the manor. He arranged for a repair, the revision of all facades and changes inside (coat of arms of the Siemens family on the courtyard front, dated 1859). He was followed by his son Johann Georg Siemens (ennobled in 1899), banker and founder of Deutsche Bank. His widow, Elise von Siemens, had a winter garden added to the south side of the palace in 1910 .
architecture
Exterior
The angular two-storey plastered building with a base and mansard hipped roof delimits a building-deep, raised terrace that faces the driveway and the farmyard. On the terrace wall is the relief of a drinking boy kneeling in a grotto, signed »LH«, which was installed after 1945. The structure of the palace is structured by almost regularly arranged cross-storey windows as well as low rectangular basement windows on the courtyard side and high, flat-arched basement windows on the garden side. On the main building, the windows have sandstone walls, otherwise simple plaster walls. The entrance on the courtyard front with a sandstone portal and coat of arms keystone from 1709 sets a special accent. The rest of the architectural decoration - the corner rustication, the profiled eaves cornice and the cornice cornice - can be traced back to the renovation work of the Siemens family.
Interior
Inside, the baroque room structure and a number of remarkable equipment details have been preserved. The low basement rooms of the main wing are barrel vaulted, the high ones of the younger side wing are groin-vaulted. On the ground floor, all rooms in the main wing have original stucco ceilings from 1709, with the exception of the south-eastern corner room with a baroque groin vault and the adjacent room with a shallow barrel and stitch caps. The stuccoed ceiling with its chimney from 1730 in the head room of the side wing is designed in rich Regency forms . The large entrance room is accentuated with a finely crafted stucco ceiling from 1709 and a surrounding canvas frieze with image fields that are separated by painted columns (around 1860). A similar frieze continues in the corridor of the side wing. The two-flight baroque staircase from 1709 with three-dimensional balusters leads from the hall to the upper floor. These rooms are also provided with original stucco ceilings. The hall above the entrance hall has an elegant ceiling with delicate frame stucco , the ligated monogram AFVS (Anton Friedrich von Seyffertitz) and the year 1709.
The southwest corner room is particularly lavishly furnished: high -quality canvas wallpapers from the last quarter of the 18th century with tendrils and rocaille cartouches are painted with landscape, architectural and social scenes, the window reveals are equipped with wooden panels and open shelves from the beginning of the 20th century. A closet is embedded in the southern outer wall. In the north-western corner room, under the cove of the stucco ceiling, there is a wraparound canvas frieze with similar motifs and portrait medallions. The lower part of the roof has been converted into attic rooms. In the undeveloped, upper part there is a lying roof truss, on top of which a standing roof truss with trusses and longitudinal reinforcement by frames and pointed columns. The very elaborate roof structure with its gate-sawn beams dates from 1709 and around 1720. The unusually artistically valuable furnishings include a majolica stove in the foyer from the early 20th century, which is provided with sketchy, naive depictions of urban and rural architecture, including properties of the Siemens family. On the upper floor there are two early classical high quality white tiled stoves and a niche stove, around 1860, as well as a Renaissance cabinet with biblical scenes and original fittings, dated 1641.
Surroundings
park
When the palace was built, a baroque garden was laid out. In 1707 Wilhelm Gottfried Bachmann was named as a pleasure gardener. The design of the garden shown on a map from 1722/1723 was influenced by the baroque gardens of Dresden: To the east of the palace there is a symmetrical broderie parterre consisting of eight segments with a pavilion in the center. Unusually for a baroque design, the garden only had an axial relation to the castle in a minor axis. The castle with the Broderieparterre and a building that still existed at that time were enclosed by a regular, rectangular system of ditches. To the west of it is the farmyard. To the east, connected by a bridge in the axis of the Broderieparterre, is a semicircular part of the garden surrounded by ditches and with round water basins. Outside of this part of the garden there was an “ice pit” to the northeast and “Der Herrschetzt HirscheGarten” and a “Grube zum Fuchs Kirren” to the southeast. The baroque garden was maintained until the end of the 18th century, various art and pleasure gardeners can be proven. The original measuring table from 1851 shows the basic structures of the baroque complex with its moats. Under the judiciary Johann Georg Siemens, the redesign of the old gardens into a landscape park began. Art gardener was Johann August Ferdinand Kownick from Arnswalde in 1857/1858. The former broderie parterre was kept as a closed ornamental garden. The upstream, semicircular part of the garden and the waters were redesigned, the areas adjacent to the north and south are included in the design.
The regular system of ditches surrounding the castle as well as some ditches to the south to create a large meadow area have now been filled. The tree plantings from this time still determine the space here today. Under Johann Georg Siemens, Adolf Ferdinand Schulz from Giesen in Pomerania is mentioned as a manorial court gardener from 1892–1899. Comprehensive redesigns and a significant expansion of the park to the east were carried out under Elise von Siemens. Around 1912 the tea house was built as a point de vue at the north end of a magnificent, elongated meadow in the newly created part of the park and the exedra opposite the castle. The former broderieparterre was equipped as a rose garden with sculptures and plantings and bordered with extensive, white treillings . Several memorial stones were set up in the forest-like part of the park of the first and second extensions. To the northwest of the tea house, a hedge theater decorated with busts was created from cut spruce trees. Extensive plantings, including numerous conifers, took place in the park, near the castle and at the farm yard. Head gardener at this time was Oswald Reinhold Arthur Lichey. Around 1960 it was converted into a "rural cultural park" and the associated interventions in the park design. The approximately 18 hectare park area shows three clearly differentiated areas. Due to the old, dense forest-like tree population, there is no spatial connection between the first two and the area of the last expansion from the beginning of the 20th century.
The part to the east of the castle near the house retains the basic shape of the baroque pleasure garden. Immediately in front of the castle is a rose garden in the area of the former Broderieparterre, today there is a lawn with sparse plantings. Here is a sundial from the 18th century. To the east lies the second, formerly baroque, semicircular part of the garden, today a meadow with the limestone exedra with the inscription: “WE ALWAYS REMAIN ALWAYS OF THE SAME, ONE TO THE OTHER HEART”, with an alliance coat of arms .
The second area includes the park expansion from 1857 with numerous existing trees from this time. A narrow, dense wooded area joins the semicircular meadow space in the area of the former baroque part to the east and continues as a narrow, forest-like strip to the north and south, mainly beech, linden, oak and chestnut. A double system of paths opens up the northern part. In a path axis as a point of view from the north, a memorial stele without an inscription, at the beginning of the 20th century, is set up east of the exedra. To the south, on the same path, a sandstone bench, the so-called whisper bench (designed according to the principle of a whisper vault ). In the south is the landscaped pond, surrounded by alders, hornbeams, rhododendrons and wild spring cups. A second memorial stele of the same type is located on the western bank of the pond. To the south of the pond there is a large meadow area surrounded by a belt path and framed by solitary trees. South of the rose garden and the castle is a part of the park with solitary trees and an ice cellar , which is now part of the nursery.
Park architecture
To the east of the large meadow area within the forest strip is the hereditary funeral of the von Siemens family, which was built for Justice Councilor Georg Siemens in 1879 by their son Johann Georg. The pyramid-shaped mausoleum is designed in a heavy neoclassical form language that has been reduced to abstraction. The entrance to the crypt is elevated due to the tower-like structure. The third area includes the park extension at the beginning of the 20th century to the east and north of the second area, consisting of two elongated meadows that merge into one another, surrounded by dense woodland and a Beltweg. The wooded border consists mainly of trees planted in the early 20th century, including black pines , blue spruces , tulip trees and an antler tree .
At the north end is the tea pavilion erected around 1907, a wooden house with discreetly decorative carving, lattice windows and a tail roof, originally covered with wooden shingles. Inside there is an Italian marble fireplace. The building designed by the architect William Lossow was acquired in 1906 at the third German arts and crafts exhibition in Dresden, where it had served as an exhibition pavilion. A memorial stone in the form of a boulder for Baron von Müffling (1877–1914) is located east of the tea house on the edge of the path.
The Schlosspark Ahlsdorf, an unusually large complex, has largely retained the character of the expansion and design carried out at the beginning of the 20th century, despite some changes during its use as a cultural park, and is characterized by the elaborate furnishings, including the hereditary burial and the tea house . As a park of first-class garden design quality, it is one of the most important landscaped parks in the south of the state of Brandenburg, the individual design phases of which have also remained legible, which is why it also has special garden historical significance.
literature
- Sybille Gramlich, Irmelin Küttner u. a .: Monument topography Federal Republic of Germany - monuments in Brandenburg, Brandenburg State Office for the Preservation of Monuments and State Archaeological Museum (ed.): Volume 7.1 / 1 District Elbe-Elster - The town of Herzberg / Elster and the offices of Falkenberg / Uebigau, Herzberg, Schlieben and Schönewalde. Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, Worms 1998, ISBN 3-88462-152-1 , p. 39ff.
Web links
Coordinates: 51 ° 50 ′ 22.7 " N , 13 ° 13 ′ 19.3" E