Castle in front of Husum
The castle in front of Husum - so named because it was located in front of the city limits when it was built - is located in Husum in the district of North Friesland in Schleswig-Holstein . It was originally a secondary residence of the ducal house of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf and served as the occasional residence of the Danish royal family in the 18th and 19th centuries. During this time, the now “royal palace” took over the administration, which after 1864 extended to almost the entire house and remained here until the 20th century.
The castle in front of Husum is the only remaining castle building on the west coast of Schleswig-Holstein. Today it serves as a castle museum and a cultural center, is open to the public and can be visited. The castle park is a nationally known attraction during the annual crocus bloom.
history
Prehistory of the castle grounds
At the site of today's castle , the so-called Gray Abbey, one has been held since the late 15th century convent of the Franciscan , named after the color of the habits of religious. It belonged to the Custody Holstein of the Danish order province of Dacia and came in 1520 to the Franciscan reform province of Saxonia S. Crucis . Like many others in Schleswig-Holstein, this monastery was dissolved in the course of the Reformation and the lands passed to the sovereign, the Danish king. The old monastery building served as a poor and infirmary from 1528 ; With the income, the council financed the foundation of a Latin school at the suggestion of the reformer Hermann Tast .
Duke Adolf von Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf was the first sovereign of the Duchy of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf , founded in 1544 , and he underlined his rank - he was a half-brother of the Danish King Christian III. - with an abundance of new buildings in the style of the Dutch Renaissance . The numerous buildings during his reign included the castle in Reinbek , the castle in Tönning and the north wing of the Gottorf Castle, which had been medieval until then . He also planned a new castle in Husum, and the site of the former monastery was determined as the building site - as in Reinbek. The poor house was demolished for this and the so-called Gasthaus zum Ritter St. Jürgen was founded in Husum , which still exists today as a senior citizens' home.
A residence of the Gottorf family
Husum Castle was built for Adolf I from 1577 to 1582. At that time, the site was still outside of the city district, from which the current name of the castle comes, which, however, only became naturalized in the 19th century. The palace was to serve as a residence for the ducal court's stays on the west coast. The local areas of Eiderstedt , parts of North Frisia and northern Dithmarschen formed the largest contiguous possession of the Gottorf territory, which was spread over Schleswig and Holstein like a patchwork quilt. After Duke Adolf I, his successors Friedrich II , Philipp and Johann Adolf also used the Husum palace complex. But Gottorf near Schleswig remained ancestral palace and seat of government . The Husum residence played no significant role in the country's history.
From the 17th century onwards, Husum Castle, which had only been used sporadically, and Reinbek Castle, became a treasure trove , i.e. a widow's residence . Duchess Augusta , Johann Adolf's widow, lived in Husum Castle regularly from 1610 to 1639. In order to supply her, she acquired the neighboring estates Arlewatt , Hoyerswort and the Rote Haubarg . Under her and the subsequent Duchess Maria Elisabeth , the city and the castle experienced a brief cultural boom. Artists were brought to the court and the palace was expanded and furnished with early baroque furnishings. Maria Elisabeth, the widow of Friedrich III. , lived almost exclusively here from 1660 to 1684. After her death, however, the castle was hardly used and was mostly empty.
The castle is in Danish ownership
From 1721 the castle and town of Husum went to the Kingdom of Denmark as a result of the lost Northern War . The Danish royal family, which came into the possession of several castles in the Duchy of Schleswig as a result of this political development and the associated partial disempowerment of the Gottorf family, had only a moderate interest in preserving the buildings located far from the Danish heartland. For example, Tönninger Castle was razed , the baroque renovation work on Gottorf Castle was stopped and the old residence was designated as the seat of the Danish governors . The Husum castle was still empty and was only poorly maintained. It was not until the Danish King Friedrich V showed interest again in an occasional residence in the west of the duchies. So he had the Wasmer-Palais in Glückstadt , where the local castle had to be demolished in 1708 , and planned a modernization of the Husum castle, which was implemented in the major renovations from 1750 to 1752. The old and partly dilapidated Husum renaissance castle was renovated in a reduced form by the state master builder Otto Johann Müller and adapted to the spirit of the time with baroque elements.
From 1752 the castle took over the administration of the office Husum with the apartment of the bailiff . He lived with his family in the rooms north of the tower, as did the families of other royal officials. The administration consisted of three rooms on the ground floor. The rooms to the south of the tower on both floors were intended for possible stays of the king. The official administration remained in the castle, but the use of the Danish royal family was limited to a few visits. Nevertheless, in the further course of the 18th century there was renewed neglect of the building fabric. In 1792 the main tower had to be largely removed. In the first half of the 19th century, the castle was again increasingly used for royal visits. Here are especially King Friedrich VI. , who came to Husum more often in the twenties, and Christian VIII , who tried to help Husum in the 1840s (he died in 1848). Under him, the castle was partially modernized. Theodor Storm described the king's visit in 1845 very vividly in a letter to his fiancée at the time, Constanze Esmarch.
The time as an administrative building
After Schleswig-Holstein passed into Prussian administration in the 19th century as a result of the German-Danish War , the district administration of the Husum district and the district court moved into the castle. Theodor Storm served here from 1867 to 1880 as a magistrate and judge. In 1871 the writer Fanny zu Reventlow , the daughter of District Administrator Ludwig Graf zu Reventlow, was born at the castle. After the end of the German Empire , the Husum district bought the building from the former crown property. Gradually the administration expanded more and more and took up almost the whole house except for the district administrator's apartment. The castle survived the world wars of the 20th century without being destroyed.
After the merger of the Eiderstedt , Husum and Südtondern districts in 1970 to form the new North Friesland district with its headquarters in Husum, a new district administration was established on the site of the nearby former cattle market. The now functionless castle was restored from 1973 to the 1980s and put to cultural use. Under the direction of the Danish architect Karsten Rønnow, the design of the building after the renovation from 1750 to 1751 was sought. A return to the condition of the Renaissance period was no longer possible due to the later interventions in the building fabric and the associated expense.
Todays use
In 2003, the Friends of the Castle in front of Husum was founded, which is committed to maintaining the listed building and further expanding the possibilities for use. The castle houses the culture department and the music school of the district of North Friesland as well as the North Friesland Foundation . The castle museum shows the formerly royal representation salons, the castle chapel and other rooms including equipment. The collections of the house are continuously updated. It is open every day except Mondays, from April to October, in the winter months only on the weekends and between Christmas and New Year's Eve.
The castle is part of the North Friesland Museum Association and is involved in a large number of public events. In addition to the museum, there are regular concerts (for example the music festival Rarities of Piano Music ), theater performances and changing special exhibitions, which have been taking place under the restored roof truss since 2008. The castle chapel and the Fortunasaal are rented out for weddings. In the former kitchen wing there is a café, which is run by trainees from the nearby Theodor Schäfer vocational training center . The spring crocus blossom in the castle park is celebrated with the crocus blossom festival.
The palace complex
Husum Castle is located on an island surrounded by a moat that was once part of a simple fortification. The inner courtyard was provided to the west with one-story outbuildings and a small gatehouse. The castle island was preceded by a large farm yard, the buildings of which, however, were largely demolished in the 18th century. Of the former outbuildings outside the castle island, only the former gatehouse and the cavalier's house have survived.
Architecture of the castle
Husum Castle was built between 1577 and 1582. It is a two-story, three-wing building with a prominent central tower. A long central wing is followed by two shorter side wings, the southern one is extended by a single-storey commercial building, the counterpart in the north - the kitchen building - is set back towards the courtyard. The layout of the main building resembles a large "E". Built in the style of the Dutch Renaissance , the red brick building was modernized and redesigned several times around 1612, 1750 and 1792. In its more than 400-year history, the castle served longer as an administration building than as a princely residence. A main building with two separate farm buildings on the side can be found 200 years later at Matthieu Soiron's Wickrath Castle from 1746 to 1772.
Husum and Reinbek - two related buildings
The castle in front of Husum is the direct successor to the castle in Reinbek , which was completed in 1576 and also built by order of Duke Adolf I , with which it shares some similarities. When they were completed, both palaces were among the most progressive buildings in the Gottorf part of the duchies; there were no open three-wing complexes here before. Until then, the traditional type of so-called double house was preferred for aristocratic residences, and in rare cases closed, four-wing buildings were developed. The facades of both castles are made of red brick and structured with horizontal bands made of sandstone. The windows once had crosses set in stone and the towers are crowned with sweeping domes.
The names of the architects of both buildings are not known, but it is believed that the buildings were built one after the other by Dutch master builders - possibly under the direction of Peter von Mastricht . These also brought the relatively new style elements of the Dutch Renaissance with them to the Gottorf rulership.
While the Reinbeker Castle, located in a remote exclave , was intended for shorter stays and met simpler requirements, the Husum Castle was planned as a representative residence on the west coast. It was not far from the ancestral seat of the ducal house, Schloss Gottorf, which at that time looked more like a castle than a comfortable aristocratic residence. Nevertheless, the Husum Castle experienced a similar history as the older previous building. After a short courtly phase, both castles served first as widow's and then as official residence and were greatly changed by structural interventions in the 18th and 19th centuries. Both buildings were restored in the 20th century and now serve as cultural centers for public purposes.
The ducal renaissance castle
Husum Castle has one of the first symmetrical structures in the duchies. The building design was a novelty in the architectural history of the country that was not yet found in the previous building in Reinbek. The symmetrical structure was partly lost again due to the renovations under Duchess Augusta, who had the lower economic wing built. The palace complex before the renovation in the middle of the 18th century is the result of a construction process that encompasses several phases.
When construction was completed in the 16th century, the short, lateral wings of Husum Castle were originally one storey higher than the long central building and their gables were decorated with sweeping curves , as can be found in a similar way on the gatehouse. Due to the higher side wings and a higher roof structure, the castle had different proportions than today. Two slender towers with onion domes were inserted into the corners between the central wing and the short side buildings - Reinbeck Castle also has a similar tower in the southern corner of the courtyard - and several ridge turrets sat on the high ridge . The symmetrical division of the building followed a concept: the long central wing originally contained the large halls of the palace and was accessed via the central stair tower, while the north wing served the duchess and the south wing the duke. Both side wings and the corner towers of the courtyard had their own spiral stairs to the living apartments.
Construction reduction from 1750
Due to various structural damage, the castle was greatly simplified from 1750. The effect of the once representative courtyard facade with the two corner towers and the mighty main tower was completely changed by the renovations. The courtyard's slender stair towers, the outbuildings no longer needed and a gatehouse in front of the courtyard were demolished. The roof ridge was set lower, the roof turrets were removed and the side wings were reduced in height. The stone windows of the Renaissance were replaced by wooden frames. The central tower was stripped of its upper storeys and its helmet in 1792, and further minor renovations under Christian VIII followed. At the same time as the external changes, the old room sequences were modernized in baroque style and the ducal division was thus abolished. In later times the salons were gradually redesigned into administrative rooms.
Due to the redesigns that were added to the Husum Castle over the centuries, the former splendor of the building could only be guessed at. With its multi-towered silhouette it resembled other Nordic Renaissance castles such as Rosenborg or Frederiksborg until the middle of the 18th century . After the castle was just a torso for almost 200 years, the renovation in the second half of the 20th century gave it back some of its former glory. With the reconstruction of the tower helmet in 1980, the appearance of 1752 was restored.
The interior
When the construction work was completed, the castle was a modern aristocratic residence in the Renaissance style, and the living rooms were decorated with painted beam ceilings. The widows of the dukes had the palace extensively furnished in the 17th century - in 1710, for example, the inventory lists still listed 598 paintings - but only a few parts have survived to this day. Apart from the royal state rooms, the interiors are largely sober today.
The main entrance to the castle has always been through the portal of the central tower, which also contains the main spiral staircase, which was later supplemented by an open staircase. The representation rooms are on the upper floor. The original beamed ceilings of the interior rooms were partly covered with stuccoed false ceilings. The current corridors were drawn in during the renovations in the 18th century, which made it possible to better develop the rooms that had previously been strung together. Under King Christian VIII, the agricultural inspector Wilhelm Friedrich Meyer renovated the rooms on the ground floor and received, among other things, new representative doors; a furnace niche from this period is preserved in the current castle chapel. During the subsequent use as an administrative building, further changes were made to the sequence of rooms and the larger halls were partly divided into small office rooms. These changes were reversed in the restoration phase at the end of the 20th century.
The largest room in the palace is the knight's hall , which is decorated with a replica of the so-called "death struggle chimney" and occupies the entire depth of the building on the upper left floor. It is followed by the audience room and next to it the bedroom, both rooms from the royal period, which, however, only rarely had to fulfill their purpose as representation salons. On the ground floor of the south wing is the palace chapel, which was furnished by Duchess Augusta in 1616. The silver altar originally erected there is now in the Danish National Museum .
The most important pieces of equipment in the palace are the splendid Mannerist chimneys by Henni Heidtrider, remnants of the ducal painting collection, and original furniture from various eras. The palace's collection of paintings was supplemented by numerous pictures from the property of the Nissen Foundation , the city of Husum as well as private lenders and purchases by the friends' association, so that today around 100 paintings and graphics, mostly from the 17th century, can be seen again. Among the paintings, a representation of Alexander as a just judge on the front wall of the upper landing stands out due to its quality and its considerable dimensions. In the lower royal rooms, furniture from the early and mid-19th century is shown, which corresponds to the renovation period in the 1940s, as well as paintings from the “Golden Age” of Danish painting to works from the early 20th century.
The outbuildings
Only two of the outbuildings of the palace complex have survived to the present day. The former gatehouse to the castle district is located directly on Schlossstrasse, it comes from the first phase of renovation under Duchess Augusta. The building is also called Cornil's house after a later owner . It is a two-storey building from 1612, which today still has the sloping gable of the late Renaissance. A sandstone portal with double pilasters on the sides and the coat of arms of the Duchess Augusta as a crowning element belongs to the former gate passage . Next to the coat of arms there are figures of ancient goddesses: Aphrodite on the left and Athene on the right. The niche for a third figure, the Hera , had to remain empty for a long time because the figure was lost. It was found again in 2003, but it was broken into several pieces. A cast of the old figure now takes its place in the third niche, so that today the gatehouse is the only almost completely preserved building in the old palace complex. The original of the Hera is placed in the stairwell of the castle, the gatehouse is now used for administration. The local representation of the Chamber of Industry and Commerce and the economic development of the district of North Friesland are housed in it.
The so-called Kavaliershaus has been preserved as a further outbuilding . The building from the late Renaissance period is made of brick and adorned with stepped gables; it once served as a guest house. Later it was owned by Ferdinand Tönnies and his family. Today the building is outside the publicly accessible castle grounds and is used as a residential building.
The castle park
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The castle is surrounded by a five-hectare park , which is one of the most famous sights on the west coast of Schleswig-Holstein. The origin of the castle park lies in the kitchen garden of the old monastery, but there are no more traces of it. An early baroque garden was laid out in the 17th century, which, along with an orangery and a small pleasure house, was also lost in later times. After 1721 the area was partly used as arable land and pasture land.
A preserved sandstone portal from the 17th century leads to the “Great Garden” to the north and east of the castle. This outer palace garden was laid out in its current form in 1878 by the Hamburg gardening architect Rudolph Jürgens as the city park of the city of Husum. The castle park with its lawns, circular paths and groups of trees is designed as a landscape garden. The park is known nationwide for its annual Husum crocus bloom , a mass crocus bloom that forms a purple-colored carpet in the park during spring, consisting of around five million crocuses of the Crocus napolitanus species . The crocuses were probably planted at the time of the duchesses, they may even go back to attempts by the Gray Monks to obtain saffron here , which was not possible with Crocus napolitanus . The crocuses have survived as stinzen plants to this day.
Since 2008 there has been a small, formally designed ornamental garden in front of the eastern and western facades on the castle island. This duchess garden is a modern reconstruction of the early baroque garden parterres that were presented to the palace in the 17th century.
literature
- Peter Hirschfeld: Mansions and castles in Schleswig-Holstein . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-422-00712-1 .
- Henning von Rumohr : Castles and mansions in the Duchy of Schleswig . Droemer Knaur, 1983, ISBN 3-426-04412-9 .
- Castle in front of Husum. Edited by Konrad Grunsky with contributions from various authors, Husum Verlag, Husum 1990, ISBN 3-88042-204-4 .
- Dehio: Handbook of the German Art Monuments Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein . Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich 1994, ISBN 3-422-03033-6 .
- Adrian von Buttlar, Margita Marion Meyer (ed.): Historical gardens in Schleswig-Holstein. 2nd Edition. Boyens & Co., Heide 1998, ISBN 3-8042-0790-1 , pp. 320-327.
- J. Habich, D. Lafrenz, H. Schulze, L. Wilde: Castles and manor complexes in Schleswig-Holstein . L&H Verlag, Hamburg 1998, ISBN 3-928119-24-9 .
- Ulf von Hielmcrone : The castle in front of Husum . DKV art guide No. 585, Munich / Berlin 2000, DNB 960470719 .
- Margita Marion Meyer: The exterior of the palace in front of Husum. In: The wall anchor. Building maintenance in North Friesland, Dithmarschen and fishing. Vol. 21/2002, issue 2. Association of the North Frisian Institute eV, Bredstedt 2002, pp. 16-20.
- Margita Marion Meyer: A new garden for Husum Palace - contemporary landscape architecture in the listed area. In: Monument. Journal for Monument Preservation in Schleswig-Holstein. 10/2003, ISSN 0946-4549 , pp. 55-60.
- Margita Marion Meyer: A new garden for Husum Palace - contemporary landscape architecture in the listed area. In: Monument. Journal for Monument Preservation in Schleswig-Holstein. 16/2009, ISSN 0946-4549 , p. 113.
- Hans and Doris Maresch: Schleswig-Holstein's castles, manors and palaces . Husum Verlag, Husum 2006, ISBN 3-89876-278-5 .
- Eva von Engelberg-Dočkal: Culture Map Schleswig-Holstein. Discover culture a thousand times. , 2nd edition, Wachholtz-Verlag, Neumünster 2005, ISBN 3-529-08006-3 .
Web links
- Museum Association North Friesland / Castle in front of Husum
- The castle on museen-sh.de
- Garden boards of the State Office for Monument Preservation Schleswig-Holstein (PDF; 315 kB)
Individual evidence
- ^ Henning von Rumohr: Castles and mansions in the Duchy of Schleswig. Pp. 420, 421.
- ^ Dehio: Handbook of German Art Monuments Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein. P. 348.
- ^ Henning von Rumohr: Castles and mansions in the Duchy of Schleswig. P. 421.
- ↑ Brief overview of the castle history; the era of the duchesses
- ^ Henning von Rumohr: Castles and mansions in the Duchy of Schleswig. Pp. 419-421.
- ↑ Brief overview of the castle history; the renovations under Friedrich V.
- ^ Henning von Rumohr: Castles and mansions in the Duchy of Schleswig. P. 420.
- ^ Homepage of the TSBW ( Memento from January 6, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
- ^ Dehio: Handbook of German Art Monuments Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein. P. 348.
- ^ Dehio: Handbook of German Art Monuments Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein. P. 348.
- ^ Peter Hirschfeld: Mansions and castles in Schleswig-Holstein. Pp. 53-56.
- ^ Peter Hirschfeld: Mansions and castles in Schleswig-Holstein. Pp. 53, 54.
- ^ Deert Lafrenz: The Kiel Castle . Verlag Christians, 1987, ISBN 3-7672-1027-4 , p. 87.
- ↑ Konrad Grunsky (Ed.): The castle before Husum. Husum 1990, p. 41 ff.
- ^ Deert Lafrenz: The Kiel Castle . P. 89.
- ^ Schloss vor Husum ( Memento from May 22, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Historical overview of the in-house music project "Rarities of Piano Music"
- ^ Image: State of the castle in the 19th century
- ^ Deert Lafrenz: The Kiel Castle . P. 89.
- ^ The development of the palace gardens ( Memento from April 8, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
- ^ J. Habich, D. Lafrenz, H. Schulze, L. Wilde: Castles and manor complexes in Schleswig-Holstein. P. 88.
- ↑ History of the crocus blossom on Husum-Tourismus.de
Coordinates: 54 ° 28 ′ 47.5 " N , 9 ° 2 ′ 59.3" E