Eickhof Castle
Eickhof Castle , occasionally also Eickhoff Castle , is a castle near Liebenau in Lower Saxony on a bend in the Große Aue . Today it houses a Zen monastery and is not open to the public.
history
After the division of the " Common Forest", Gut Eickhof underwent a radical change. It had already come into the possession of the Braunschweig chief hunter Marbod von Kalm through purchase. At that time, the Eickhof was an agricultural property. Most of the land was in the Wesermarsch . In 1860 the estate had 8 horses, 40 cattle, 390 pigs and 800 sheep. The Herr von Kalm enlarged his property through the acquisition of two former feudal estates as well as the purchase of the two farms Vilkmann and Hesterberg in Hemmeringhausen . The new Herr von Kalm was not interested in agriculture, he sold the estates in the Wesermarsch and bought large heather areas of the "Liebenau Forest" from the domain administration, which he had reforested . The district called "Eickhofer Heide" on older maps became a large forest estate. There was no more room in it for flocks of sheep. Von Kalm had the farms in Hemmeringhausen demolished, as did the brickworks built by his predecessors near the Jewish cemetery . On the foundations of the old manor house, the new Eickhof Palace was built after 1870 with a palace garden, gardening center and farm .
The Oberjägermeister von Kalm was often in Braunschweig and was one of the Duke's confidants there. When he once used his Gut Eickhof in a game of chance and lost it, the Duke is said to have given it back to him the next morning - with a slap in the face for his carelessness. The von Kalm family were loyal to the Welfenhaus and were anti- Prussian after the Prussian annexations of 1866 . Members of the von Kalm family, who served as officers in the Austrian army in the German War of 1866, lie in the Gutsfriedhof . The idyllic cemetery near Eickhof Palace was laid out by Marbod von Kalm around 1870. The cemetery is a listed building. The centuries-old tombstones and crypt slabs that are built into the outer wall are particularly worth seeing.
After the death of Maroboduus Kalms in 1895 the estate went as fideicommissum to Eduard Oskar Reitsenstein (1840-1911, 1900 ennobled as Eduard Oskar von Eickhof called Reitsenstein ), 1891-1903 president of the Royal Prussian railway management Hanover . The castle was the seat of his descendants until 1938, and they also used the Eickhofer cemetery during this time.
After 1938, the collecting society for the coal and steel industry bought the Eickhofer Heide from the von Eickhof-Reitzenstein family for the purpose of building an ammunition factory ( Karl der Eibia GmbH plant for chemical products ). At that time there was a Hitler Youth Leadership School in Eickhof Palace.
After 1945 the British occupying forces requisitioned the plant, parts of the plant accommodation, Eickhof Palace and a number of houses in Liebenau. In the castle they set up an officers' mess, which was operated until 1978.
In 1986, Wolfgang and Marianne Hess acquired Eickhof Palace in order to settle there in a quiet environment. In the course of the growing enthusiasm for Japanese gardens, ever larger areas of the park were redesigned in the Japanese style. Finally, in 2006 the castle, which had previously been used exclusively as a residential building, became a Zen monastery with seminars. A horticultural company also has its headquarters in the castle.
Web links
- ZEN monastery in Eickhof Castle in Liebenau
- Interview: Helga König in conversation with Wolfgang Hess, head of the ZEN monastery in Schloss Eickhof , with photos
- Eickhof Castle. In: Festschrift 850 Jahre Liebenau , download from [1] , pp. 12-13
Individual evidence
Coordinates: 52 ° 35 '44.1 " N , 9 ° 5' 30.7" E