Hülchrath Castle

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Hülchrath Castle, view of the high castle from the northeast

Hülchrath Castle is a former state castle in the Electorate of Cologne in the Grevenbroich district of Stadt Hülchrath in the Rhine district of Neuss . The most Gillbach located moated castle is a castle of the 12th century back and has a large part of its medieval preserved buildings.

The history of the complex clearly illustrates the typical development of a noble residence in the Rhineland : Due to continuous growth, a wooden moth changed over a two-part moated castle in the Renaissance to a palace complex , which after being destroyed in the 17th century at the beginning of the 20th century in the style of Neo-Gothic was rebuilt. In the Middle Ages, the Hülchrath complex was one of the most important regional castles in Cologne.

The palace complex is now privately owned and is partially used for residential purposes. An inside inspection is not possible. The courtyard area of ​​the outer bailey and the outdoor facilities are accessible to visitors free of charge.

Castle and place Hülchrath stand as memorials under monument protection . In addition, the castle has been protected as an architectural monument since March 27, 1985 .

history

The beginnings

When exactly the first Hülchrath Castle was built in the swampy lowlands of the Gillbach, a tributary of the Erft , is still not clear. It was probably the seat of the Counts of Gillgau , who were appointed provincial counts by the sovereign, the Archbishop of Cologne , and who administered the Gau for him. From 1122 this task was carried out by the Counts of Saffenberg , who probably came to the office through the marriage of Adolf von Saffenberg to Margaretha von Schwarzenburg, the niece of Archbishop Friedrich I. von Schwarzenburg . As early as 1120, Hülchrath was first mentioned by name as Holkerode in a document and was described there as castellum vetustissimum et munitissimum ( German  very old and strongly fortified castle ). The facility stood near an old Roman road that led from the former Roman camp in Grimlinghausen near Neuss to Kaster . A settlement around the castle, which was designated as oppidum in 1321, is likely to have formed early on . When Adolf's son Hermann died around 1175, Hülchrath came to the Count of Sayn , because Hermann's daughter Agnes had married Heinrich II von Sayn in 1173 . In 1202 the couple's son, Heinrich III. , Lord of Hülchrath. Under him, the Cologne sovereignty over the castle was apparently temporarily lost, because in a document from 1206 it was referred to as his allod . During his time as lord of the castle, the first major expansion of the complex was probably carried out by surrounding it with a polygonal circular wall with flanking towers .

When Heinrich III. He died in 1247 without descendants (his daughter had died before him), Hülchrath came to his nephew Simon von Sponheim , who exchanged it for other areas with his brother Heinrich , Herr von Heinsberg , in 1248 . This pledged castle and rule temporarily to Wilhelm IV , the Count of Jülich , later redeemed it, because when Heinrich's daughter Adelheid (also Aleidis) married Dietrich , the later Count of Kleve , on September 22, 1255 , the castle complex came as Dowry to the Counts of Kleve. After the death of Dietrich V, Hülchrath came to his son Dietrich Luf II , who called himself Count von Hülchrath from 1296. In 1298 he sold the county including the castle to his brother Dietrich VI. von Kleve and received it back as an after loan . In 1305 he was followed as the owner of Hülchrath by his son of the same name from his marriage to Elisabeth von Virneburg. Eight years later he had to grant the Archbishop of Cologne a right of first refusal to the castle, which Heinrich II of Virneburg claimed on June 12, 1314. For 30,000  Cologne marks , the castle and the county were transferred to the Cologne cathedral chapter . However, only 15,000 marks were to be paid because many of the lands belonging to Hülchrath were mortgaged. Dietrich Luf III. should keep the county until paid in full. After many delays, this was the case at the end of 1331, but as early as 1323 Hülchrath became an Electoral Cologne office.

Electoral Cologne state castle

Kurköln had the Hülchrath weir system expanded in the 14th and 15th centuries. It was then one of the most massive castles in the Rhineland and was a building designed to demonstrate power and at the same time to represent. As a state castle, Hülchrath fulfilled the same functions as the grounds of the Electorate of Cologne in Linn , Zülpich , Lechenich , Kempen and Zons . It was of particular importance as a strategically important base against the largest territorial adversary of Kurköln in this area, the Duchy of Jülich, because the neighboring Grevenbroich had belonged to the Jülich possessions since 1307. In 1499 troops of the duke of Jülich besieged the castle, but could not take it. The settlement also got away unharmed, contrary reports result from a wrong reading of the Cologne Chronicle of Johann Koelhoff the Younger .

The siege of Hülchrath in the Truchsessian War, engraving by Frans Hogenberg

During the Truchsessian War , Gebhard Truchsess von Waldburg and his wife Agnes von Mansfeld-Eisleben took refuge behind the protective walls of Hülchrath Castle, whereupon imperial troops under the leadership of Chorbishop Friedrich von Sachsen-Lauenburg besieged them, drained their moats and shot them with cannons . After thirteen days of cannonade, the castle crew finally gave up and handed the complex over to the besiegers on March 16, 1583. Gebhard Truchsess von Waldburg and his wife are said to have escaped through a secret passage beforehand . The place Hülchrath was then destroyed, the castle badly damaged. In the same year, work began on removing the damage, using stones from the previously razed upper monastery near Neuss . After the cathedral chapter had ceded the complex, which had meanwhile been converted into a castle, to the Archbishopric of Cologne in 1605, the then coadjutor and later Elector Ferdinand of Bavaria began to re- fortify Hülchrath in 1608 . The destroyed place was re-established and laid out according to plan in the northeast of the castle. It had previously been in the southeast of the facility. The village was then united with the outer bailey and the high castle to form a closed system of fortifications with bastions , ramparts and moats. She took over the function of a second outer bailey. The work on this lasted until 1612.

Illustration of Schloss Hülchrath in Matthäus Merian's Topographia Germaniae , 1646

Hülchrath was also besieged in the Hessian War during the Thirty Years' War . After five days of bombardment, Hessian-Weimar troops were able to take the town and castle in 1642, but were driven out by imperial and Bavarian soldiers only a short time later. In the Franco-Dutch War , the palace complex suffered the same fate on October 26th, 1676, this time soldiers from the Principality of Osnabrück besieged and captured the palace. In 1688 the fortifications built 80 years earlier were razed again, only the outer bailey and the prison in the high castle remained. The castle was still inhabited, but due to lack of maintenance, it gradually fell into disrepair.

The castle to this day

When, after the Peace of Lunéville in 1801, the four departments on the left bank of the Rhine, which had existed since 1798, were recognized as French national territory, secularization was carried out in 1802 . As a result, the French government sold the palace complex in 1803 for 4929  francs to the last electoral Cologne bailiff Heinrich Joseph von Pröpper. His descendants lived in the castle until the end of the 19th century, but had already sold it to Prince Alfred zu Salm-Reifferscheidt in 1874 . He sold it to Heinrich Maas in 1901, which was the first time the castle came into civil hands. After six years, the property changed hands again, because in 1907 the Düsseldorf-based Freiherr Enno Rudolf von Bennigsen acquired it and had the ruins rebuilt in the historicist- romantic style of neo-Gothic. In doing so, however, he did not fall back on the existing building fabric, but had the Renaissance-era parts laid down and completely new buildings erected in the northern part of the high castle along the curtain wall. Further changes of ownership followed. The temporary owners of Hülchrath Castle included a Mr. Queckenberg and, in the 1920s, four manufacturers from Rheydt .

After the building in 1930 of the country's peasantry Rhineland had heard followed in the Third Reich , the Nazis as a user. From 1937 on, the complex served as a small NS-Ordensburg , in which, among other things, members of werewolf groups were trained who were supposed to carry out sabotage activities after the occupation of the German Reich by the Allies. From there, for example, the murder of Aachen's Lord Mayor Franz Oppenhoff was organized. After the Second World War , the palace buildings were used temporarily as accommodation for war refugees from the former eastern German territories. In 1954 the Wennmacher family from Mönchengladbach bought the facility and had the war damage repaired by 1959. Today the outer bailey is used for residential and commercial purposes. In the meantime, a restaurant was located in the high castle, which also held numerous events on the castle grounds. In addition to knight's meals and concerts, a medieval market was also held there every year . There have been no major public events since 2019. However, the castle is still available for private events such as weddings or corporate events.

Building history and architecture

development

Hülchrath Castle went through seven construction phases in its history, all of which - with one exception - can still be read from the current state of construction.

Hülchrath on a drawing by the Walloon artist Renier Roidkin

The roots of today's complex lie in a high medieval moth that was very similar to Linn Castle. The moth hill was probably surrounded by a polygonal curtain wall with three flanking towers in the 13th century. After the Cologne cathedral chapter took over the complex in the first quarter of the 14th century, it had the complex expanded and heavily fortified in the Gothic style . The Romanesque keep of the Motte was probably also removed at that time . The expansions at the end of the 14th / beginning of the 15th century included, for example, the newly built palace on the southern curtain wall as well as an elevation of the same, giving it a shell- like appearance. When the castle was expanded, the gate tower was given the fortification function of the old, central main tower, which is why it is often incorrectly referred to as the keep. In addition, the foundation stone was laid for today's outer bailey with its farm buildings and gate tower. It was separated from the main castle by a moat , which could be overcome by a drawbridge , and was itself secured by a second moat in front. A kennel was built south of the palace in the 15th century to protect it .

In 1608, Ferdinand of Bavaria had the bastion tower built in the high castle east of the gate tower. At the same time, a new entrance gate was built between the two towers, while the old one was walled up. In the same year, the medieval palace received rich architectural decorations in the forms of the Renaissance . All of these changes were made in the course of work that united the castle, the outer bailey and the newly founded settlement of Hülchrath into a closed defense system.

Inner courtyard of the palace on a painting by F. A. Reuters

In a fifth phase, the fortified complex was transformed into a castle in the style of the Italian Renaissance in the 17th century . The style had found its way into the Rhineland via the Spanish Netherlands . A wing of the building was created along the north-western curtain wall, which had two-story arcades facing the inner courtyard . At its western end was a slender tower, which was intended for astronomical observations and had ashlar elements on the portal , windows and cornice . The Renaissance elements are no longer preserved today, but were shown in detail on four gouache paintings by F. A. Reuters from 1795 that have now disappeared .

During the baroque period , changes were made in the outer bailey. A new gate building with a stone access bridge was built on the northeast side . In keeping with the architectural taste of the time, it was flush with the entrance to the castle. The old Gothic gate tower of the outer bailey at the southern end was therefore meaningless and was abandoned. The seventh and final construction phase consisted of the romanticizing reconstruction of the high castle at the beginning of the 20th century, during which the basic medieval structure of the complex was largely retained.

description

Floor plan of the castle by Ludwig Arntz

Hülchrath Castle is a two-part complex, consisting of a high castle and a front bailey to the northeast. The high castle has the shape of a ring castle , because the 1.75 meter thick surrounding wall appears circular at first glance, but is in reality polygonal. Its shape reflects the ground plan of the high medieval predecessor complex, and the moth hill and the surrounding ditch can still be seen in the area today. The curtain wall was raised with bricks in the Electorate of Cologne , so that these new sections are very different from the older substructure. The lowest part of this consisted of horizontally layered basalt and Liedberg sandstone with leveling layers of tuff . Tuff masonry rose above it . In the surrounding wall west of the gate tower, the old, 0.7 meter high battlements of the low curtain wall can still be seen. Her heightened successor had a protruding parapet walkway at the top , which was supported by a pointed arched sandstone console frieze . It can still be seen from the outside today. The curtain wall had three semicircular shell towers as flanking. The castle chapel seems to have been located near the southeast of them . The northeastern one is called the Hexenturm and is reminiscent of a dark episode of the Hülchrath complex. This gained notoriety in the 17th through numerous witch trials in which the so-called water test was carried out in the castle moat. In 1629 13 women were burned at the stake as supposed witches in Hülchrath . A local proverb from that time said: "Whoever crosses the bridge in Hülchrath rarely or never comes back". Another half-open tower is in the northeast part of the curtain wall. The so-called bastion tower was only erected there in the 17th century.

In the middle of the area enclosed by the curtain wall is the stump of an old round tower with a diameter of 8.5 meters. These are the rebuilt remains of the former moth tower. It is not clear yet whether it is a dungeon or a residential tower has acted. However, the conjectures of building historians go in the direction of a donjon due to the small size. In the southern part of the castle courtyard are the ruins of the 35-meter-long palace, the construction of which included the curtain wall and the two southern shell towers. Numerous beam holes on the inside of the curtain wall still indicate the residential building with a cellar. On its ground floor was a large two-aisled hall with a barrel vault , which served as Dürnitz in the Middle Ages .

High castle, view from the east

The most striking component of the high castle is the 64 meter high gate tower on the north side. The five-storey building was the highest tower in the complex and not only had a defense function, but also a symbolic power. The lower part of its masonry consists mainly of basalt, while the higher parts are made of tuff. It has a high, slate-covered pyramid roof , as was typical of the Gothic period. The top floor of the approximately 8 × 9 meter tower consists of a projecting battlement floor with four pentagonal watch towers . The floor resting on a circular arc fries that of Konsolsteinen of trachyte is worn. Some of these have Hebrew inscriptions, because they are recycled gravestones from the old Jewish cemetery in Cologne, Judenbüchel , which was devastated by angry Cologne citizens in the year of the plague in 1349 and whose gravestones were used as building material. At a corner of the gate tower facing the courtyard is a slender stair tower with a wooden spiral staircase . The windows are framed by trachyte stone and thus consist of the same material as the walls of the arched main portal.

The southern part of the outer bailey including today's gate construction

The high castle is connected to the outer bailey by a bridge-like earth wall. The former separating moat is now drained but is still clearly recognizable as a deep depression. The two-storey outer bailey can be reached from the village of Hülchrath via a wide nine-arched brick bridge over the moat. It consists of three wings made of brickwork with slate roofs . Round towers with eight-sided helmets stand at the corners of the building . The two floors of the outer wing are clearly separated from each other by a block frieze. The corner towers as well as the outer walls on the field side and the former gate tower at the southern end of the outer bailey date from the 14th century. Today's castle gate with a stepped gable is located roughly in the middle of the northeast wing . The arched passage with stone walls is flanked by two pilasters . Above its architrave there is a balcony with a wrought iron railing.

The southern end of the outer bailey is formed by the former gate tower from the Gothic period. Its three storeys rise on a floor plan measuring around 8.5 × 8.5 meters. There used to be a barrel-vaulted passage behind the outside pointed arch portal, but the portal is now walled up. The still existing, framing panel is evidence of a portcullis that used to be embedded in the gate. Remains of a pointed arch frieze with machicolations can be seen on the outside of the top floor . Above it was a battlement with a warrior . This also served as a channel for the chain of the portcullis. Up until 1810 the battlements had watch towers at the corners, but these were demolished so that only their console stones are preserved today. After the building was used as a barn in the 19th century, it is now used as an apartment.

In 1995 the grounds of the palace were redesigned for the state horticultural show . In them there are still remnants of the former ditch system, some of which are widened like a pond and are fed by the Gillbach, as well as valuable trees. In addition, there are still some relics of arcades of hornbeams to see.

literature

  • Paul Clemen : The art monuments of the Grevenbroich district. (= The Art Monuments of the Rhine Province , Volume 3, Section 5.) L. Schwann, Düsseldorf 1897, pp. 43–51. ( Digitized version )
  • Dehio-Handbuch der Deutschen Kunstdenkmäler, North Rhine-Westphalia, Part 1: Rhineland . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich / Berlin 2006, pp. 444–445.
  • Brigitte and Walter Janssen: Castles, palaces and court festivals in the Neuss district . District administration Neuss, Neuss 1980, ISBN 3-9800327-0-1 , pp. 120-139.
  • Hans Kisky : Hülchrath (= Rheinische Kunststätten,. Issue 9.) Neuss printing and publishing house, Neuss 1964.
  • Hans Kisky: Castles and manors in the Rhineland . Weidlich, Frankfurt am Main 1960, pp. 41–43.
  • Werner Meyer: German castles, palaces and fortresses . Volume 1, Flechsig, Würzburg 2002, ISBN 3-88189-469-1 , pp. 137-141.
  • Gregor Spohr, Ele Beuthner: How nice to dream away here. Castles on the Lower Rhine . Verlag Peter Pomp, Bottrop / Essen 2001, ISBN 3-89355-228-6 , pp. 46-49.
  • Theodor Wildeman : Schloss Hülchrath on the Paretz pictures . In: Arnold Mock (Ed.): Niederrheinisches Jahrbuch ( ISSN  0549-1665 ), Volume 4. Verein Linker Niederrhein, Krefeld 1959, pp. 73-74.
  • Christian Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath. (= Contributions to the history of the city of Grevenbroich , Volume 18.) History Association for Grevenbroich and the Surrounding Area, Grevenbroich 2006, pp. 99-106.
  • Jens Wroblewski, André Wemmers: Theiss-Burgenführer Niederrhein . Konrad Theiss , Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-8062-1612-6 , pp. 78-81 .

Web links

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

References and comments

  1. ^ Hanns Ott: Rhenish water castles. History, forms, functions . Weidlich, Würzburg 1984, ISBN 3-8035-1239-5 , p. 146.
  2. ↑ Brief description from the monument authority on limburg-bernd.de , accessed on July 4, 2014.
  3. ↑ a b c Entry by Karin Striewe on Schloss Hülchrath in the scientific database " EBIDAT " of the European Castle Institute
  4. ↑ C. Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath , 2006, p. 99.
  5. ↑ a b c d e C. Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath , 2006, p. 100.
  6. ↑ a b J. Wroblewski, A. Wemmers: Theiss-Burgenführer Niederrhein , 2001, p. 78.
  7. ↑ a b J. Wroblewski, A. Wemmers: Theiss-Burgenführer Niederrhein , 2001, p. 79.
  8. ↑ a b G. Dehio: Handbook of German Art Monuments. North Rhine-Westphalia, Volume 1: Rhineland . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich / Berlin 1967, p. 496.
  9. ↑ Walther Zimmermann , Hugo Borger (ed.): Handbook of the historical sites of Germany . Volume 3: North Rhine-Westphalia (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 273). Kröner, Stuttgart 1963, DNB 456882847 , p. 306.
  10. ^ Theodor Joseph Lacomblet : Document book for the history of the Lower Rhine . Volume 2. Wolf'sche Buchdruckerei, Düsseldorf 1846, No. 1011 ( digitized version ).
  11. ^ Hermann Aubin (Ed.): The Weistümer des Kurfürstentums Köln. Volume 1: Office Hülchrath . Reprint of the 1913 edition. Droste, Düsseldorf 1996, ISBN 3-7700-7593-5 , p. 309.
  12. ↑ Information according to C. Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath , 2006, p. 101. According to other sources, the purchase price was 30,000 pounds of silver or 30,000 guilders.
  13. ↑ C. Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath , 2006, p. 101.
  14. ↑ C. Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath , 2006, p. 102.
  15. ^ A b Corneel Voigt , Stefan Frankewitz : Flight over the Rhineland . Pomp, Bottrop / Essen 1996, ISBN 3-89355-138-7 , p. 28.
  16. ↑ C. Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath , 2006, p. 457, note 32.
  17. ^ Friedrich Everhard von Mering : History of the castles, manors, abbeys and monasteries in the Rhineland and the provinces of Jülich, Cleve, Berg and Westphalen . Volume 7. Lengfeld, Cologne 1844, p. 114 ( digitized version ).
  18. ↑ a b C. Wiltsch: Neukirchen-Hülchrath , 2006, p. 103.
  19. ^ A b Ludger Fischer : The most beautiful palaces and castles on the Lower Rhine . 1st edition. Wartberg, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2004, ISBN 3-8313-1326-1 , p. 36.
  20. ^ B. and W. Janssen: Burgen, Schlösser und Hofesfesten im Kreis Neuss , 1980, p. 129.
  21. ↑ a b P. Clemen: Die Kunstdenkmäler des Kreis Grevenbroich , 1897, p. 44.
  22. ↑ G. Dehio: Handbook of the German art monuments. North Rhine-Westphalia, Volume 1: Rhineland , 2006, p. 444.
  23. ↑ Heinrich Hubert Giersberg: History of the parishes of the deanery Grevenbroich (= history of the parishes of the Archdiocese of Cologne . Volume 12). Bachem, Cologne 1883 ( online ).
  24. ^ Wilhelm Janssen, Little Rhenish History, Düsseldorf 1997, pp. 261–264.
  25. ↑ G. Spohr, E. Beuthner: How nice to dream away here. Schlösser am Niederrhein , 2001, p. 47.
  26. ↑ These two different statements are consistently found in the literature.
  27. ↑ a b c Käthe Maas-Krickelberg: Hülchrath Castle . In: Bergisch-Jülichsche Geschichtsblätter. Monthly magazine of the Bergisches Geschichtsverein for the Duchies of Berg and Jülich . Vol. 6, No. 6, 1929, p. 118.
  28. ↑ a b c Chronicle of the castle on schlosshuelchrath.com ( Memento from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  29. ↑ a b Volker Koop: Himmler's last contingent. The Nazi organization "Werewolf" . Böhlau, Cologne / Weimar 2008, ISBN 9783412201913 , p. 128 ( digitized version ).
  30. ↑ Westdeutsche Zeitung: Hülchrath Castle will soon be quiet. Retrieved February 29, 2020 .
  31. ↑ a b c d e f J. Wroblewski, A. Wemmers: Theiss-Burgenführer Niederrhein , 2001, p. 80.
  32. ↑ H. Kisky: Hülchrath , 1964, p. 6.
  33. ↑ a b J. Wroblewski, A. Wemmers: Theiss-Burgenführer Niederrhein , 2001, p. 81.
  34. ↑ a b P. Clemen: Die Kunstdenkmäler des Kreis Grevenbroich , 1897, p. 50.
  35. ^ A b Ferdinand GB Fischer : Excursion destinations on the Lower Rhine. Beautiful castles, palaces and moths from the Alps to Zons. Pomp, Bottrop / Essen 1998, ISBN 3-89355-152-2 , p. 28.
  36. ^ A b Karl Emerich Krämer : From Brühl to Kranenburg. Castles, palaces, gates and towers that can be visited . Mercator, Duisburg 1979, ISBN 3-87463-074-9 , p. 34.
  37. ^ W. Meyer: Deutsche Burgen, Schlösser und Festungen , Volume 1, 2002, p. 138.
  38. ↑ G. Dehio: Handbook of the German art monuments. North Rhine-Westphalia, Volume 1: Rhineland , 2006, p. 445.
  39. ↑ P. Clemen: Die Kunstdenkmäler des Kreis Grevenbroich , 1897, p. 49.
  40. ↑ Harald Herzog: Rheinische Schlossbauten in the 19th century (= Landeskonservator Rheinland. Arbeitshefte . Volume 37). Rheinland-Verlag, Cologne 1981, ISBN 3-7927-0585-0 , p. 66.
  41. ↑ P. Clemen: Die Kunstdenkmäler des Kreis Grevenbroich , 1897, p. 48.

Coordinates: 51 ° 7 ′ 23.7 "  N , 6 ° 39 ′ 30.3"  E