Arenfels Castle

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Arenfels Castle, aerial view
Arenfels Castle, south side

Arenfels Castle , formerly also called Arienfels Castle , is a castle complex above Bad Hönningen in Rhineland-Palatinate , which dates back to a medieval castle from the 13th century. The castle received its present appearance in the period from 1849 to 1855, when it was extensively changed in the neo-Gothic style under the direction of Cologne cathedral builder Ernst Friedrich Zwirner . Due to its 365 windows, 52 doors and 12 towers, it was nicknamed "Castle of the Year".

description

Arenfels Castle seen from the west

The two-part complex consists of a three-wing main castle in the shape of a horseshoe, which is open to the Rhine side in the south, and a front bailey to the north with farm buildings. These two-storey economic buildings from the 19th century were used as coach houses and stables. Their ground floors have iron beams over columns and neo-Gothic tracery .

Only a Renaissance gable on the western facade reminds of the previous building of the neo-Gothic main castle with its four storeys . A high tower with a conical helmet and neo-Gothic stone spire rises from the central wing of the castle. The west and east wings of the palace are closed off at their south ends by a stepped gable with stone figures made by the Cologne cathedral sculptor Christian Mohr . The gable of the west wing shows a statue of Joan of Arc , while the stone figures of the gable on the east wing depict Godfrey of Bouillon and Richard the Lionheart . The portal in the northern central wing bears a balcony, the stone parapet of which shows the coat of arms of the von Westerholt -Gysenberg family .

The entire castle building has a plaster that was partially renewed on the side facing the Rhine in the years from 2000 to 2003 based on the old model and has a light ocher color.

Inside, the family's rooms were on the ground floor, while the first floor was used for representative rooms. Much of the architectural furnishings in the neo-Gothic style have been preserved to this day. In addition to the knight's hall and marble and Wedgwood fireplaces, this also includes a cast iron staircase connecting three floors , which was made in the Sayner Hütte according to designs by Christoph Stephan .

history

The beginnings

In the years 1258 and 1259, Heinrich II. Von Isenburg (1213–1287) or his son Gerlach (first documented mention 1246–1303) built the first weir system on a rocky plateau above the Rhine, the dimensions of which were much smaller than today's castle. The building material for this castle could be obtained directly from the rock on site. On the south side, the buildings were secured by a deep ditch , while the keep protected the north-east side. There was a deep draw well in the inner courtyard of the facility, the shaft of which reached down to the groundwater level of the Rhine.

Today's Arenfels Castle is documented for the first time as "Arenvelz Castle" in a declaration of guarantee by Gerlach von Isenburg for Countess Mechthild von Sayn on August 6, 1259.

With the exception of the walled donjon base, nothing remains of the 13th century castle.

When the Isenburg-Arenfels line was extinguished in 1371, the castle then came to the Electorate of Trier , which gave the complex as a fief to the von Isenburg-Grenzau family.

The renaissance castle

Painting of the castle as it was built around 1670
Engraving around 1830 by Christian Meichelt

Under Count Salentin von Isenburg-Grenzau , the castle was converted into a palace in the second half of the 16th century. Salentin had an east wing built in the Renaissance style and connected to the existing west wing by a central wing. Because the complex was no longer used for military purposes, old, defensive parts of the castle were removed or rebuilt during the construction work: the neck ditch was filled in, while the old keep was integrated into the central wing. Due to the lack of fortifications, Swedish troops could easily take and occupy the castle during the Thirty Years War .

When Ernst von Isenburg-Grenzau, the last male representative of this line, died in 1664, the Archbishop of Trier , Karl Kaspar von der Leyen, took the castle in as a settled fief and in 1670 enfeoffed a relative, Baron Johann Carl Caspar von der Leyen zu Adendorf the castle and the associated rulership . Johann Carl Caspar had today's farm buildings erected north of the castle and, with considerable effort, expanded the complex into the preferred summer residence of his family.

In the course of the Franco-Dutch War , Arenfels Castle was occupied by the French Marshal Henri de La Tour d'Auvergne , who at that time commanded the French army on the Lower Rhine.

Renovation in the neo-Gothic style

Old lithograph with the building stock after the redesign in the neo-Gothic style

Arenfels Castle and Lordship remained in the possession of the von der Leyen until 1848, but the family had not had the funds to maintain the complex sufficiently since the beginning of the 19th century. The result was the gradual deterioration of the buildings. In order to solve the financial difficulties, the family, who had been raised to the rank of prince in 1809, sold the palace in 1848 to the imperial count Friedrich Ludolf von Westerholt-Gysenberg , who had the dilapidated buildings repaired from 1849 and then settled there with his wife Johanna von Charlé . For the construction work he hired the Cologne cathedral master builder Ernst Friedrich Zwirner , who completely redesigned the complex according to English and medieval German models in the neo-Gothic style by 1855. The comprehensive change was actually not in the interests of the client, who initially only had the renovation of the renaissance castle in mind. But Zwirner succeeded time and again in convincing Ludolf Friedrich von Westerholt-Gysenberg of his plans for the far-reaching redesign.

In 1852 the repair and reconstruction of the east wing was completed, which was followed in 1853 by the redesign of the middle wing. In 1854, today's keep was built up to the final crenellated wreath, which received its helmet with a stone tip in 1859. The completion of the construction work in the same year marked the expansion of the west wing and the construction of the numerous small turrets on the facade. Zwirner also completely redesigned the interior of the castle. The work on this lasted until 1858. The initially estimated costs of 30,000 thalers had increased to 135,000 thalers in the end. Although Arenfels Castle is counted among the outstanding examples of Rhenish neo-Gothic, a quote from Ludolf Friedrich von Westerholt-Gysenberg shows that Zwirner's building did not meet with unreserved approval: “It will be a shame about the irretrievably destroyed Renaissance castle! I only find some consolation that many art-pennants think the castle is beautiful. "

From the 20th century

The architect and castle researcher Bodo Ebhardt carried out extensive building surveys at Arenfels Castle from 1931, which was then repaired under his direction. But the buildings were badly damaged again in World War II . In the course of the fighting over the Remagen Bridge, the castle was shelled by American artillery for eight days and suffered severe damage. The keep and the two neo-Gothic gables on the Rhine side were in danger of collapsing, and the keep gallery was partially destroyed. The roof of the west wing had burned down, and the roofs of the other two wings of the building were also partially damaged. On March 15, 1945 the castle was handed over to the Americans. When they cleared the facility after eight weeks of occupation, it was looted and heavily soiled.

In the following, environmental influences did the rest to damage the building fabric. Although numerous repairs were carried out by the owners after the war, they could not have all the necessary building security work carried out. The State Office for the Preservation of Monuments in Rhineland-Palatinate therefore initiated a renovation program in 2000, which is primarily intended to remove the stone damage to the building fabric and which continues to this day. The restoration work to date includes securing the neo-Gothic gable, applying the new plaster and replacing the heavily damaged Joan of Arc statue with a copy.

While numerous pieces of furniture were already lost in the turmoil of the Second World War, in 1951 the considerable weapons collection and the valuable books in the palace library were auctioned off. The 6,500 books are now in the possession of the Bottrop City Archives and were indexed and largely restored between 1999 and 2011.

A former owner of Arenfels Castle was Antonius Freiherr Geyr von Schweppenburg , a grandson of Fritz Graf Westerholt-Arenfels († 1951) and son of Theodor Kuno Geyr von Schweppenburg (* August 8, 1918 - September 14, 2015) and Countess Wilhelmine Westerholt -Arenfels.

The tenants Christian Runkel and Benedikt Feltens are currently organizing weddings and other family celebrations as well as conferences and company celebrations at Arenfels Castle.

literature

  • Paul-Georg Custodis: Arenfels Castle near Bad Hönningen on the Rhine. Sketches of the building history, the importance and the most recent restorations. In: Rheinischer Verein für Denkmalpflege und Landschaftsschutz (Hrsg.): Rheinische Heimatpflege . Volume 39, No. 1, 2002, ISSN  0342-1805 , pp. 1–11.
  • Paul-Georg Custodis: Arenfels Castle near Bad Hönningen on the Rhine (= Rheinische Kunststätten . Issue 486). Rheinischer Verein, Cologne 2005, ISBN 3-88094-925-5 .
  • Paul-Georg Custodis: Securing a threatened monument. The neo-Gothic Arenfels Castle near Bad Hönningen. In: Monuments in Rhineland-Palatinate. Volume 57, No. 2, 2003. Mainz am Rhein 2003, ISSN  1614-4619 , pp. 46–47.
  • Bodo Ebhardt : Arienfels Castle near Hönningen on the Rhine. The building and its history. Burg-Verlag, Marksburg near Braubach am Rhein 1932.
  • Hartmut Kahmen: Herdringen, Arenfels, Moyland. Three palace buildings by Ernst Friedrich Zwirner. Dissertation at the University of Frankfurt am Main. Frankfurt am Main 1973.
  • Heiko Laß: The Rhine. Castles and palaces from Mainz to Cologne. Michael Imhof, Petersberg 2005, ISBN 3-937251-64-2 , p. 123.
  • Heinrich Neu, Hans Weigert: The art monuments of the district of Neuwied (= The art monuments of the Rhine province . Volume 16, section 2). L. Schwann, Düsseldorf 1940, pp. 56-60.
  • Alexander Thon, Stefan Ulrich: "... like a monarch enthroned in the middle of his court." Castles on the Lower Middle Rhine. Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2010, ISBN 978-3-7954-2210-3 , pp. 12-17.

Web links

Commons : Schloss Arenfels  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Paul-Georg Custodis: Prussia on the Rhine and Moselle (= Rheinische Kunststätten. Issue 561). Rheinischer Verein, Cologne 2015, p. 16.
  2. ^ Hellmuth Gensicke : Landesgeschichte des Westerwaldes. 3. Edition. Historical Commission for Nassau, Wiesbaden 1999, ISBN 3-922244-80-7 , p. 294.
  3. ↑ Bernd Willscheid: Arenfels Castle and its residents. For the 750th anniversary on September 4, 2009. In: Heimat-Jahrbuch des Neuwied district. 2011, ISBN 3-9809797-8-4 , pp. 79-89.
  4. ↑ rheinischersagenweg.de ( Memento from May 4, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
  5. ↑ Michael Fenstermacher: Now there are guided tours. Tour through Arenfels Castle clears up false myths . In: Rhein-Zeitung . Edition of August 14, 2018.
  6. ↑ Homepage of the castle , accessed on January 4, 2020.

Coordinates: 50 ° 31 ′ 19 ″  N , 7 ° 18 ′ 26 ″  E