Wernstein Castle (Upper Franconia)

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Wernstein Castle
Wernstein1.jpg
Creation time : First mentioned in 1376
Castle type : Hilltop castle
Conservation status: Fully preserved and inhabited (private property!)
Standing position : Seat of the von Künsberg imperial knighthood family
Construction: Renaissance building with a medieval core made of sandstone and partly of half-timbering.
Place: Mainleus -Wernstein
Geographical location 50 ° 6 '53 "  N , 11 ° 22' 56"  E Coordinates: 50 ° 6 '53 "  N , 11 ° 22' 56"  E
Wernstein Castle (Bavaria)
Wernstein Castle

The Burg Wernstein located on the western edge of the district of the homonymous municipality Mainleus in the district of Kulmbach . It is one of the most beautiful castle complexes in Upper Franconia and has been in the von Künsberg family for over 600 years .

history

Wernstein Castle was built between 1362 and 1376 , as can be seen from the Landbuch der Herrschaft Plassenberg from 1398, in place of a destroyed predecessor. When Heinrich von Künsberg zu Berneck endowed the chapel located in the Schwarzach parish in Veitlahm as a parish on January 12, 1376 , he made the provision that the clergyman there should read one or two masses a week “on the Wernstein”. This was the first time that Wernstein Castle was mentioned in a document. It has been in the uninterrupted possession of the von Künsberg family ever since. The castle was a fiefdom of the burgraves of Nuremberg . The first surviving fiefdom letter from Burgrave Johann III dates from January 20, 1395 . "Wernstein die vesten und den hag" awarded to Ulrich von Künsberg. Hans Friedrich von Künsberg was married to Ursula, an heir to Georg, the last Förtsch von Thurnau . When his father-in-law died in Peesten in 1564 , Hans Friedrich became one of the beneficiaries of Förtsch's legacy. It was probably the rich increase in ownership that prompted Hans Friedrich von Künsberg to create a residence befitting his status from 1567 by transforming his ancestral seat in Wernstein into a magnificent Renaissance castle . After his untimely death in 1571, his widow married Ursula Georg von Künsberg zu Schnabelwaid , who continued the renovation work. During the Thirty Years' War the Swedish Colonel von Rosen occupied Wernstein Castle. In 1644 Hans Heinrich von Künsberg reported that the castle with its circular walls, outer and inner courtyards, hall, brewery and kitchen had been "ruined to the extreme" by past warfare. The repair of this war damage was not long in coming.

Building description

As the castle researcher Hellmut Kunstmann emphasized, Wernstein is one of the most beautiful hilltop castles in the Franconian region . The lower castle is in front of the actual core castle in the east. It consists of an elongated, two-storey south-east wing, which Georg von Künsberg had built together with his wife Ursula in 1588, and a short north wing, which was probably built in the 18th century. On the outside, the facade of the southeast wing is enlivened by two semicircular towers, whose relief medallions are reminiscent of the beautiful courtyard of the Kulmbacher Plassenburg . Through the outer gate adorned with coats of arms, one enters the lower castle courtyard, which is surrounded by the lower castle and various farm buildings and continues with the kennel formed by the outer and inner circular walls . The building in the northwest corner of the lower courtyard once contained the medieval castle chapel . A staircase leads up to the middle castle gate, which mediates the passage through the inner circular wall. Before you reach the inner, ogival castle gate, you can see the 45 meter deep groundwater well on the left . The castle originally consisted of a three-storey two-wing building with a mighty west wing and a narrower north wing at right angles to it. In 1683 a three-storey mansard roof was built , which occupies the southeast corner of the Upper Castle. The castle is still inhabited by the descendants of its builders and can therefore not be visited.

  • Wernstein, the southeast wing of the Lower Castle

  • Wernstein, outer gate

  • Wernstein, bay window with coat of arms above the outer gate

  • Wernstein, the inner curtain wall with the Upper Castle

  • Wernstein, the middle gate with the upper castle

  • Wernstein, gate wing of the middle gate

  • Wernstein, inner gate

  • Wernstein, inner kennel with groundwater well

  • Wernstein, well winch

  • Wernstein, inner courtyard

  • Wernstein, aerial view of the Upper Castle

  • Wernstein, aerial view of the entire castle

Surroundings of the castle

A few hundred meters away is the forest cemetery of the Freiherrn von Künsberg with the graves of some members of the von Künsberg family and the grave of the pianist Wilhelm Kempff .

literature

  • Erich von Guttenberg: Historical place names book of Bavaria . In: Upper Franconia Volume I: Kulmbach rural and urban district . Munich 1952.
  • August Gebeßler : City and District of Kulmbach . In: The Art Monuments of Bavaria , Brief Inventories , III. Band . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich 1958, pp. 103-106.
  • Hans Seiffert : Castles and palaces in the Franconian Forest . 3. Edition. Helmbrechts 1963, pp. 17-24.
  • Hellmut Kunstmann : The ring of castles around Wernstein in the Obermaing area . Commission publisher Degener & Co, Neustadt an der Aisch 1978, ISBN 3-7686-4083-3 , pp. 10-29.
  • Anita Eichholz: Life pictures from Siethen and Wernstein . Publisher epubli GmbH, 2014, ISBN 3844284419 .

Web links

Commons : Schloss Wernstein (Mainleus)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files