Alt-Kainach Castle

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The castle in May 2014

The Castle Alt Kainach is located in the village of Kleinkainach, 1.5 km north of the city Bärnbach , in voitsberg district in West Styria ( Austria ). The origins of the castle go back to the 12th century. It is currently used as a museum.

Location

The castle is located in the town of Kleinkainach , part of the town of Bärnbach , about 10 kilometers north of the town of Köflach . In the vicinity of Alt-Kainach there used to be the Kleinkainach Castle and the Kainach Tower, none of which had any military function, but were used as estate administration.

history

Alt-Kainach Castle around 1830, lith. JF Kaiser Institute, Graz
Brief description of the Alt-Kainach Castle

From the 12th century, there was a simple Meierhof on the site of today's castle , which was expanded in the 14th century and provided with a wall and a moat. Initially, the property was owned by the Kainach family before it came to the Hollenecker family. There is evidence of a dispute over the property between Rudolf von Holleneck and the neighboring Krottendorfern in 1467 . Georg von Holleneck was slain by farmers from Piber in 1480 . In order to be able to keep the rule, Georg's brother Konrad had to conclude a pact with the invading Hungarians in 1481. In 1548, the castle of Helferich von Kainach was brought into its present form, whereby the five-storey square residential tower that existed at the time was integrated into the current building.

When the last male descendant of Hollenecker died in 1580, Alt-Kainach came to Justine, the widow of the last Hollenecker, and their daughters Ursula and Johanna. Alt-Kainach was probably surrounded by a defensive wall with a wide moat and four corner towers until the late Gothic period. It was expanded into the 17th century. Johann Ferdinand Tierndl bought the castle in 1610 and his family was given the status of baron in 1665 . At that time the Alt-Kainach dominion was very small and had no subjects. When the plague broke out in the area around Bärnbach in 1680 , the servants were forbidden to go out and bring in the harvest in order to prevent it from spreading to the castle.

In 1716 Paul Ernst von Aposteln acquired the property. When it was auctioned off in 1755, Franz Josef Freiherr von Moscon was awarded the contract. Anna von Moscon sold the castle to her father Anton von Schellenbauer in the early 19th century. He was followed in 1811 by Franz Sprung, in 1818 by Anton Hofer auf Hochenberg and in 1880 by the Graz-Köflacher Railway and Mining Company . The Graz-Köflach railway and mining company set up workers' apartments in the castle. The building in need of renovation was donated to the Styrian Castle Association in 1966 by the Graz-Köflacher Railway and Mining Company. He had the castle renovated from 1968 onwards, exposing the old ceilings and removing built-in partition walls. The castle chapel was also restored and the facades renewed. A castle museum was also set up in 1972.

lock

Today's Renaissance- style castle building dates largely from the 16th to 17th centuries. It is a massive, three-storey square building with a high gable roof. Above the main wing itself there is a high and steep hipped roof which is about twice as high as the building below. Two strong corner towers with adjoining arcades are attached to the southern and western façades . These are three-story in the south while they are only available on the top floor in the west. The outward-facing semicircular canals are unique in Austria. There are set suites of rooms between the corner towers on the north and east facade. In the north-east of the castle there is a gate tower between the main wing and a small wing that may have served as a porter's house in the past . In the main wing of the castle you can still see the former, five-story and medieval residential tower .

Directly behind the entrance portal is a large arched anteroom with a wide staircase to the upper floors. There are wooden ceilings in some living rooms. Otherwise nothing of the original furnishings has been preserved due to its long-term use as a workers' residence.

The two-storey castle chapel dedicated to St. Florian is located on the ground floor of the southeast wing and is spanned by a groin vault. It received it in 1737 from Pope Clement XII. the measurement license , was only used as a storage room around 1830 and received another measurement license on April 20, 1843. From 1938 the chapel served as a carpenter's workshop and as a funeral hall for the residents of the castle and for employees of the Graz-Köflach railway and mining company . In 1946 the chapel was consecrated again and again received a mass license. The designed in the Renaissance style altar dates back to 1630 and its coming from the second quarter of the 18th century altarpiece shows Saint Florian and a view of the castle. There are also statues of Saints Sebastian and Rochus in the chapel that date from the same time as the altarpiece. In the sacristy , a medieval loopholes were uncovered during renovation work.

The castle is surrounded by a large park, which is also part of the neighboring Bärnbach Castle Bath and was created from 1966.

museum

The castle association restored the building and set up the "Castle History Museum" in it, which was opened in 1972. On the ground floor there is an overview of the Styrian castles and palaces and the legends associated with them as well as a room with a permanent special exhibition designed by Ernst Reinhold Lasnik with the title "Around the Holy Mountain " from 1996. On the upper floor there are castle models and the relationships between various Styrian personalities from politics, art and science and the Styrian castles are explained.

literature

  • Federal Monuments Office (ed.): Dehio Steiermark (excluding Graz) . 2nd Edition. Berger, Horn / Vienna 2006, ISBN 3-85028-439-5 , p. 202-203 .

Web links

Commons : Schloss Alt-Kainach  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h Entry about Alt-Kainach Castle on Burgen-Austria
  2. ↑ a b c d e Federal Monuments Office (ed.): Dehio Steiermark (excluding Graz) . 2nd Edition. Berger, Horn / Vienna 2006, ISBN 3-85028-439-5 , p. 202-203 .
  3. ^ Walter Brunner (ed.): History and topography of the Voitsberg district . tape 2 . Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv, Graz 2011, p. 12 .
  4. ^ Walter Brunner (ed.): History and topography of the Voitsberg district . tape 2 . Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv, Graz 2011, p. 13 .
  5. ↑ Alt-Kainach Castle History Museum. (No longer available online.) In: kultur.steiermark.at. Archived from the original on October 6, 2014 ; Retrieved October 5, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.kultur.steiermark.at

Coordinates: 47 ° 4 ′ 58.5 ″  N , 15 ° 7 ′ 30.5 ″  E