Ottenfeld Castle

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Gate tower of Ottenfeld Castle

The Castle Ottenfeld , even Good Ottenfeld and Otten Hof called, is a mansion with adjacent farm in Alsdorf district Duffesheide . The building complex is located on the federal road 57 from Würselen to Alsdorf in the lowlands of the Broicher Bach and is one of the oldest farms in the Alsdorf community. It is privately owned and cannot be viewed.

description

Ottenfeld Castle can be reached via an avenue around 190 meters long , which leads past a small Marienkapelle . The facility is divided into a three-winged utility wing with a gate and a representative manor house.

The east wing of the utility wing consists of several buildings with brickwork , the southernmost of which has two stepped gables . The most striking construction of the wing is the two-storey gate tower , which rises on a rectangular floor plan and is closed off by a hipped roof. The cordon is by a round arch frieze highlighted. The arched gateway is framed on the east-facing outside by bright stone blocks made of bluestone . In the middle above the archway there are two stone heraldic shields under a crown. One represents the coat of arms of the Blankcart family. The keystone of the archway bears the year 1882.

The manor house to the west of the service wing is a three-story brick building from the last quarter of the 19th century. On a rectangular floor plan, two residential floors rise above a high basement, which are clad with slate shingles on the south and west sides . The house is used for residential purposes and has large arched windows on all sides. The entrance portal in the basement - like the two flanking windows - has a frame made of light-colored house stone. On the north side of the building are two very short, tower-like wings, which have a stepped gable with a round arch frieze on their front sides. These stepped gables are repeated as a decorative element on the dormers of the high, hipped roof of the building. The eaves cornice is particularly emphasized by a brick frieze.

history

Not much is known about the history of the castle, because when American soldiers were billeted in 1945, the castle archives and with it much information about the property's past were lost.

The Ottenfelder Hof was first mentioned as Kurmut in 1420 in the so-called Weistum der Herrlichkeit Alsdorf. Around 1500 it was - called Gut Otenfahrt - owned by the Aachener Kreuzherren, who let a tenant manage it. It is uncertain whether they came into his possession through purchase or donation.

Around the 17th century the property came to the baronial von Blanckart family , who also owned Alsdorf Castle . At that time it was a typical Rhenish estate, which was grouped as a closed four-wing complex around an inner courtyard.

In the early 19th century, there was another change of ownership for unclear reasons. A French plan drawing of the complex, which was made in June 1809, still shows a Baron von Blanckart as the owner, but as early as 1846 the buildings were owned by Julius and Noel Harf, two Jews living in Jülich . From them Josef von Blanckart, brother of the owner of the Alsdorf castle, bought the estate back for his family that year. In 1868 he also bought the Alsdorfer Ölmühle (now the Wintgens farm) and the Alsdorfer Kornmühle (now Linkens Mühle). Married to a Belgian Countess van Lindekerk, he later moved to Belgium and left Ottenfeld to his son Karl. In 1878 he initiated a new building of the house similar to a castle , so that the manor was called Schloss Ottenfeld from that time on .

The property was inherited by the children of the Belgian Countess Fritz von Borchgrave zu Lexhi, who are still the owners today.

literature

  • Dirk Holterman, Holger A. Dux : The Aachen Castle Round. Cycling between Wurm and Inde . Rau, Düsseldorf 2000, ISBN 3-7919-0749-2 , p. 72 ( online ).
  • Albert Kraemer: Alsdorf. History of a city . Revised by Friedrich Schmitz with the assistance of Rudolf Bast. Alsdorf 1971 ( online ; PDF , 85 kB).
  • Karl Emerich Krämer : Castles in and around Aachen . 1st edition. Mercator, Duisburg 1984, ISBN 3-87463-113-3 , p. 34.
  • Jakob Steinbusch: Gut and Schloss Ottenfeld. In: Heimatblätter of the Aachen district. Vol. 35, No. 2-4, 1979, pp. 39-40.

Web links

References and comments

  1. ^ Karl Emerich Krämer: From castle to castle between Cologne and Aachen . 2nd Edition. Mercator, Duisburg 1984, ISBN 3-87463-117-6 , p. 83.
  2. ↑ Information according to the German basic map (DGK5) available online
  3. ↑ Geocoordinate: 50 ° 51 ′ 42.5 ″  N , 6 ° 8 ′ 32.1 ″  E
  4. ^ D. Holterman, HA Dux: The Aachen Castle Round. 2000, p. 72.
  5. ^ KE Krämer: Castles in and around Aachen. 1984, p. 34.
  6. ^ J. Steinbusch: Gut and Schloss Ottenfeld. 1979, p. 39.

Coordinates: 50 ° 51 ′ 46.9 ″  N , 6 ° 8 ′ 22.6 ″  E