Zenoburg

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Zenoburg
Chapel of the Zenoburg, seen from Obermais

Chapel of Zenoburg from Obermais seen from

Alternative name (s): Castel San Zeno
Creation time : before 1237
Castle type : Hilltop castle
Place: Dorf Tirol
Geographical location 46 ° 40 '25.4 "  N , 11 ° 10' 19.1"  E Coordinates: 46 ° 40 '25.4 "  N , 11 ° 10' 19.1"  E
Zenoburg (South Tyrol)
Zenoburg
The Zenoburg around 1813

The Zenoburg stands on the Zenoberg , the lowest foothill of the Küchelberg , at the transition from the Passeier valley to the Adige valley above the Merano valley basin. Today it is located in the municipality of Dorf Tirol in South Tyrol .

The Romans built a base to monitor trade routes, the Castrum Majense , at this strategically favorable location near today's city of Merano . In late antiquity , a chapel was built in memory of Saint Zeno . In the following years it attracted many pilgrims and pilgrims . Between 470 and 474 Bishop Valentin of Passau was buried here and Bishop Korbinian of Freising in 725 . At the turn of the millennium, the religious importance decreased; the bones' bones were transferred to Passau (St. Valentin, 765) or Freising (St. Korbinian, 768) and the chapel fell into disrepair.

The Zenoburg was first mentioned in a document in 1237, at that time it was under the administration of the Tyrolean Ministerial Suppan. Between 1285 and 1290 Meinhard II expanded the fortifications and the sanctuary as a separate seat of power. After Tyrol Castle was partially destroyed by fire in 1301, the residence of the Tyrolean counts was relocated here until the Zenoburg was destroyed in 1347 by the Luxembourgish Charles IV , so that the Zenoburg and the princely castle in Gries near Bolzano were under Meinhard's sons in the early days 14th century functioned as Tyrolean "branch residences". The beginning of the decay of the castle was not stopped by the Habsburgs , until in 1799 Leopold von Braitenberg, whose family owned the neighboring Stemmerhof on Zenoberg, bought the castle ruins for 2000 Florin .

In autumn 1944, the National Socialist administration of South Tyrol, led by Gauleiter Franz Hofer , held a politically functionalized harvest festival at the Zenoburg .

The Zenoburg is owned by the Braitenberg family. The ruins were secured in their holdings by Carl von Braitenberg , particularly during the 1970s and 1980s . The castle cannot be visited.

literature

  • Karl von Braitenberg : Zenoburg, the Merano Acropolis. An outline of their history . Der Schlern , Heft 1, pp. 15–35, 1934. (online)
  • Volker Stamm : On the acquisition of St. Zenoberg Castle by the Tyrolean sovereigns. Der Schlern 81, 2007, pp. 62–65.
  • Oswald Trapp : Tiroler Burgenbuch. Volume II: Burgrave Office . Athesia publishing house, Bozen 1980, pp. 117–132.
  • Günther Kaufmann: From Mais Castle to Zenoburg. In: Arx 34/2, pp. 43-51. 2012, accessed July 13, 2019 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hannes Obermair : Mosaic stones of writing. The late medieval document fragments from Castle Tyrol (=  Nearchos . Special issue 1). Golf Verlag, Innsbruck 1998, ISBN 3-900773-18-1 , p. 128–140, here p. 130 .
  2. ↑ Bozner Tagblatt , edition of October 14, 1944, p. 3 with text and photo report .

Web links

Commons : Zenoburg  - collection of images, videos and audio files
  • Entry in the monument browser on the website of the South Tyrolean Monuments Office