Eisenbach Castle

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View of the castle complex from the east ( B 275 )
Main castle with pentagonal keep
Coat of arms of the Knights of Eisenbach in Siebmacher's book of arms
View of the entrance portal, residential tower ( keep ) with alliance coat of arms
The castle church
South side
Gate of the outer bailey from the inside

Eisenbach Castle was first mentioned in a document in 1217 and is located around three kilometers south of Lauterbach in the Vogelsbergkreis on the northeastern edge of the Vogelsberg Mountains. The castle is also known as the " Wartburg Upper Hesse ".

location

The castle is located about 1.8 km southeast of the Lauterbach district of Frischborn am Eisenbach , a tributary of the Lauter , and about 3.7 km south of the district town of Lauterbach. The volcano cycle path leads directly past the extensive castle park at the foot of the facility . From the cycle path , section Glauburg - Schlitz, you have a good view of the entire complex of the castle.

history

The Eisenbach castle was probably built as a road safety castle by the Counts of Ziegenhain as chief bailiffs of the Fulda monastery around or before 1200 and given to the knights of Eisenbach as a fief. The castle was first mentioned in 1217 under Cunradus de Isenbach in the Hanau documents, but was then destroyed in 1269 by the Fulda abbot Bertho II von Leibolz in the course of his fight against robber barons (Fuldische Stiftsfehde). The feudal knight Eisenbach rebuilt it within ten years. After the Eisenbachers died out in 1429, Hermann Riedesel (the "Golden Knight") received the fief. The lords of the castle now called themselves Riedesel zu Eisenbach . In 1432 they became Landgrave Hessian hereditary marshals . When the Riedesel was later divided into different lines, Eisenbach always remained in common ownership. Two of the lines expanded the castle into a palace in the 16th century. Because of its key role in the introduction of the Lutheran Reformation, Eisenbach Castle was given the popular nickname "Upper Hessian Wartburg". Hermann IV. Riedesel zu Eisenbach had accepted the Lutheran faith through his connection to the Landgrave of Hesse at an encounter with Luther's co-reformer Philipp Melanchthon and thus introduced the Reformation in 1527 in the Junkerland Riedesel . The Riedesel were given the status of baron by Emperor Leopold in 1680 .

Building history

The palace complex in its current form dates from the 16th century. It consists of a four-winged core castle , a farm yard with a chapel, barn, residential building, gate and other farm buildings and two farms to the west and north-west of the castle (rededicated farms ). The castle, or today's castle, occupies a mountain spur in the Lautertal and acted as a dam. In addition to the ring wall, the pentagonal keep and parts of the wall in the core castle have been preserved from the original castle . At the gate tower , a stair tower , is the alliance coat of arms (Riedesel- Boyneburg ) from the end of the 16th century. According to Dehio , the tower dates from 1586. A gate from 1557 leads to the courtyard of the outer bailey, which is bordered by farm buildings from 1559 to 1587 on the valley side.

Between this and the main castle is the chapel , a new building from 1671 to 1675 on a Gothic substructure and with a slated upper floor. It was the first church building in this area with a purely Protestant interior, with galleries on three sides and a richly carved pulpit from 1674, one of the few pulpits of this type in Upper Hesse. It was built by Kaspar Wiedemann in the so-called "cartilage or auricle style". The four evangelists stand in the niches of the pulpit . The crowning glory is Christ as Savior of the world. Also worth seeing are the late Gothic baptismal font and the remains of high-quality wall frescoes on the east wall from the mid-15th century.

The Anne Chapel

The main castle rises behind the moat. The gate construction from the early 16th century is flanked by a projecting pentagonal defense tower from the 15th century, which originally served as a gate tower with a drawbridge and whose gate was walled up at the beginning of the 16th century. The former gate hall located in this gate was at the same time spanned with a rich net vault. On the left, east of today's gate passage, a Renaissance extension was built in 1595 - partially built into the moat . Buildings border the small courtyard on three sides. On the east side is the former Palas , in the 16th century substructure, the superstructure with Renaissance gable and stair tower around 1580. On the west side there is a residential building with the same construction times; there is a beautiful stone portal on its stair tower . The two buildings are connected on the south side by a neo-Gothic building by the architect Hugo von Ritgen from the mid-19th century.

The inscription in the gatehouse notes: "The Riedesel Freiherrn zu Eisenbach hereditary marshals of Hesse have been maintaining and maintaining this property for 500 years". The palace complex can be viewed from the outside.

Castle Park

The extensive castle park is freely accessible to visitors. It was created as a mountain park and has a rich population of trees. The Catholic Annenkapelle from 1517 from the pre-reformist period also stands there directly on the Eisenbach. The builder Hermann IV von Riedesel built this at the request of his wife Agnes von Hopfgarten. Ten years later he introduced the Reformation in Lauterbach. The Anne's Chapel is the only completely preserved late Gothic building in Lauterbach and thus provides an insight into the piety of the believers before the Reformation. The cemetery of the Riedesel family is integrated into the park. There are several monumental trees in the park and the extended park area:

Former train stop

The Eisenbach (Oberhess) train station was a stop on the Oberwaldbahn , which ran from Stockheim to Lauterbach (Hess) until 1975 . Today there is a covered resting place on the volcano bike path . The breakpoint - at the end a wooden shelter - used to have a small station building made of stones, which was later demolished due to its poor structural condition. The station served on the one hand as a timber loading point and on the other hand as a boarding option for residents and employees of Schloss Eisenbach.

literature

  • Adalbert Brauer: Castles and palaces in Hessen. According to old engravings . Weidlich publishing house, Frankfurt / M. 1959.
  • Georg Dehio (greeting), Ernst Gall (editing): Nördliches Hessen ( handbook of German art monuments ). 3rd edition Deutscher Kunstverlag, Berlin 1950.
  • Rudolf Knappe: Medieval castles in Hessen. 800 castles, castle ruins and fortifications . 3. Edition. Wartberg-Verlag, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2000, ISBN 3-86134-228-6 , pp. 224-226.
  • Hermann Knott: Eisenbach Castle . In: History sheets for the Lauterbach district , vol. 2 (1913), no. 11/12, pp. 161-183.
  • Friedrich Schwarz: Lauterbach - Gem on the Vogelsberg (Volume 23 of the local history book series of the Lauterbacher Fotoclub eV). Verlag Euler, Lauterbach 2000, ISBN 3-933983-18-5 .
  • Heinrich Meyer: Invitation to reflection in the castle church in Eisenbach. From the history of Eisenbach. Lauterbach (Mergard) 2015

Web links

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

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Heinrich Reimer (arrangement): Hessisches Urkundenbuch . Section II: Document book on the history of the Lords of Hanau and the former Province of Hanau , Volume 1: 767-1300 , publications from the royal Prussian state archives, 1891.
  2. ↑ Monumental trees in the park of Eisenbach Castle in Lauterbach, Hessen, Germany . Retrieved May 20, 2018.

Coordinates: 50 ° 36 '8.71 "  N , 9 ° 23' 18.6"  E