Kastellaun Castle () is a ruined medieval

castle A castle is a type of fortification, fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by Military order (monastic society), military orders. Scholars usually consider a ''castle'' to be the private ...

Kastellaun Kastellaun () is a town in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis (district) in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the like-named ''Verbandsgemeinde'', a kind of collective municipality. Geography Location The town lies in the eastern Hunsrüc ...

in the Rhein-Hunsrück district in

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; ; ; ) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the sixteen states. Mainz is the capital and largest city. Other cities are ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

Location

The ruins of the castle are on the castle hill above the town of Kastellaun and are connected to the former wall of the town.

History

Constructed in the 13th century, the castle is first mentioned in 1226 as ''Kestilun'', a possession of the Count of Sponheim. In 1301 it was the residence of Simon II, Count of Sponheim-Kreuznach. In 1321, Archbishop Baldwin of Trier besieged the castle. In 1325 he built the neighbouring Burg Balduinseck as a challenge to Sponheim. After Walram of Sponheim-Kreuznach abandoned Kastellaun in 1340, the castle was administered by

bailiff A bailiff is a manager, overseer or custodian – a legal officer to whom some degree of authority or jurisdiction is given. There are different kinds, and their offices and scope of duties vary. Another official sometimes referred to as a '' ...

s and '' burgmänner''. The line of the counts of Sponheim subsequently died out and the castle descended with the title to Bernhard II, Margrave of Baden and Count Friedrich of Veldenz, who ruled jointly in a "

condominium A condominium (or condo for short) is an ownership regime in which a building (or group of buildings) is divided into multiple units that are either each separately owned, or owned in common with exclusive rights of occupation by individual own ...

". The last Count of Veldenz died in 1444 and his share of the rulership passed to his son-in-law

Stephen, Count Palatine of Simmern-Zweibrücken Stephen of Simmern-Zweibrücken () (23 June 1385 – 14 February 1459, Simmern) was Count Palatine of Simmern and Zweibrücken from 1410 until his death in 1459.Ludwig Molitor: Vollständige Geschichte der ehemals pfalz-bayerischen Residenzstadt ...

. This drew the Rear County of Sponheim into the Palatine sphere of influence, involving it in war and the possession of the Palatinate. In 1594

Edward Fortunatus Edward Fortunatus (or in German Eduard Fortunat) of Baden (17 September 1565 – 8 June 1600) was Margrave of Baden-Rodemachern and Baden-Baden. Life and work Born in London, Edward was the son of Christopher II, Margrave of Baden-Rodemacher ...

retreated to Castle Kastellaun after losing the Margravate of Baden, and it became a residence again. During the

Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War, fought primarily in Central Europe between 1618 and 1648, was one of the most destructive conflicts in History of Europe, European history. An estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians died from battle, famine ...

, from 1618 to 1648, the castle was occupied. During the

War of the Palatine Succession The Nine Years' War was a European great power conflict from 1688 to 1697 between France and the Grand Alliance. Although largely concentrated in Europe, fighting spread to colonial possessions in the Americas, India, and West Africa. Relat ...

, in 1689, it was destroyed by French troops and was not rebuilt. In 1820 the ruins came into private hands. In 1884 the municipality of Kastellaun bought them and made the first repairs to stabilise them. From 1990 to 1993 the hill and the ruins there were cleaned up. The lower castle and access were restored.

Architecture

The castle consists of an inner and

outer bailey An outer bailey or outer ward is the defended outer enclosure of a castle.Friar, Stephen (2003). ''The Sutton Companion to Castles'', Sutton Publishing, Stroud, 2003, p. 22. It protects the inner bailey and usually contains those ancillary bui ...

s. The inner ward includes the remains of the defensive ''

bergfried ''Bergfried'' (plural: ''bergfriede''; English: ''belfry''; French: ''tour-beffroi''; Italian: ''torrione''; Castilian: ''torre del homenaje'') is a tall tower that is typically found in castles of the Middle Ages in German-speaking countries an ...

'', the

enceinte Enceinte (from Latin ''incinctus'' "girdled, surrounded") is a French term that refers to the "main defensive enclosure of a fortification". For a castle, this is the main defensive line of wall towers and curtain walls enclosing the positio ...

and two residential buildings. The older east building dates to the 14th century; excavations in 1990-93 uncovered its cellar. The ruin on the west side of the inner bailey that can be seen from far away is what remains of the east end of the ''

palas A ''palas'' () is a German term for the imposing or prestigious building of a medieval '' Pfalz'' or castle that contained the great hall. Such buildings appeared during the Romanesque period (11th to 13th century) and, according to Thompson ...

'' and the adjacent rectangular powder tower. Both of these buildings were probably built no earlier than the 16th century. On the east side, facing the town, there is a secondary defensive wall or ''

zwinger A () is an open kill zone area between two defensive walls that is used for defensive purposes. s were built in the medieval and early modern periods to improve the defence of castles and town walls. The term is usually left untranslated, ...

''. In the outer bailey, two modern buildings now stand on old foundations. Originally entry to the castle was by way of a

gate tower A gate tower is a tower built over or next to a major gateway. Usually it is part of a medieval fortification. This may be a town or city wall, fortress, castle or castle chapel. The gate tower may be built as a twin tower on either side of a ...

in the north corner. The current entrance is modern.

Present-day use

The former ''

'' (residential building with the

great hall A great hall is the main room of a royal palace, castle or a large manor house or hall house in the Middle Ages. It continued to be built in the country houses of the 16th and early 17th centuries, although by then the family used the great cha ...

) is used as an open-air stage for theatrical performances. Restaurateurs now operate in the castle cellars and parts of the new buildings constructed on old foundations in the lower castle during 2006-07. They offer among other things medieval-style feasts. In addition, on Sundays in summer the municipality of Kastellaun offers a children's activity programme. Further special events attract particularly large numbers of visitors to the ruin. On 9 September 2007, a documentation centre was dedicated in the lower bailey. It issues a pamphlet on the most important events in the region from early times to the present. On the ground floor, in a "House of Regional History", the primary stages of the Celtic and Roman past of the Kastellaun region are displayed. A reconstruction of the wagon burial discovered in

Bell A bell /ˈbɛl/ () is a directly struck idiophone percussion instrument. Most bells have the shape of a hollow cup that when struck vibrates in a single strong strike tone, with its sides forming an efficient resonator. The strike may be m ...

in 1938, remains of

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

pottery, fibulæ and jewellery, and a model of a Roman legionary's helmet convey an impression of how our ancestors once lived. The first floor depicts the life of the knights and nobility in castles in Hunsrück during the Middle Ages. On the upper floor are models and information about the former Pydna missile base and the Hunsrück

peace movement A peace movement is a social movement which seeks to achieve ideals such as the ending of a particular war (or wars) or minimizing inter-human violence in a particular place or situation. They are often linked to the goal of achieving world pe ...

as well as the current usage as a federal defence installation and festival site (

Nature One Nature One is one of the largest European open-air electronic music festivals, featuring many renowned DJs from Germany and all over the world. In significance it is not as big as Mayday nor as old, having started three years later than the M ...

References

* Hubert Leifeldt, "Burg Kastellaun - Neue Forschungen zu einer Sponheimischen Burg im Hunsrück", in Olaf Wagener (ed.), ''Die Burgen an der Mosel. Akten der 2. Internationalen Wissenschaftlichen Tagung in Oberfell an der Mosel'', Koblenz 2007, pp. 168–89. * Gustav Schellack and Willi Wagner, ''Burgen und Schlösser im Hunsrück'', Cologne 1979. * Gustav Schellack and Willi Wagner, ''Burgen und Schlösser im Hunsrück-, Nahe- und Moselland'', Kastellaun 1976.

External links

Castle Kastellaun homepage

Reconstruction drawing
by Wolfgang Braun {{Authority control Buildings and structures completed in the 13th century