Rauenstein Castle (german: Schloss Rauenstein) is a castle in the village of Rauenstein in the town of Pockau-Lengefeld in the Ore Mountains of Central Europe. The castle guarded the crossing over the River Flöha along the road from

Freiberg Freiberg is a university and former mining town in Saxony, Germany. It is a so-called ''Große Kreisstadt'' (large county town) and the administrative centre of Mittelsachsen district. Its historic town centre has been placed under heritage ...

to Annaberg.

History

The castle is first mentioned in 1323, although from archaeological investigations it is postulated that it had been built by around 1200. The first lords of Rauenstein were the Schellenbergers. After several changes of ruler, the castle went into the possession of the Electorate of Saxony in 1567. The ''

Amt Amt is a type of administrative division governing a group of municipalities, today only in Germany, but formerly also common in other countries of Northern Europe. Its size and functions differ by country and the term is roughly equivalent to ...

'' of Rauenstein was given to

Wolkenstein Wolkenstein is a town in the district Erzgebirgskreis, in Saxony, Germany. It is situated in the Ore Mountains, on the river Zschopau, 22 km southeast of Chemnitz. The town is situated on a rocky spur near the confluence of Zschopau a ...

in 1596. Around 1630 large structural changes were made. The road tunnel also dates to this time. From 1651 to 1743 the castle was rented to the von Römer family, who had become very wealthy as a result of

silver Silver is a chemical element with the Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag (from the Latin ', derived from the Proto-Indo-European wikt:Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂erǵ-, ''h₂erǵ'': "shiny" or "white") and atomic number 47. A soft, whi ...

mining in the Schneeberg area. Its owner, Christian August Hähnel, who had bought Rauenstein in 1816, his nephew, Wolfgang, Freiherr von Herder (owner from 1843 to 1853) and another family member, Wilhelm Freiherr von Herder, were members of the

Saxon Landtag The Landtag of Saxony (german: Sächsischer Landtag), also known in English as the Saxon State Parliament, is the legislature of the Free State of Saxony, one of Germany's sixteen states. It is responsible for legislation, control of the govern ...

. The next owner, Gottfried Freiherr von Herder, was a German Conservative Reichstag MP from 1893 to 1898. After its confiscation as part of the land reform in the

Soviet Zone of Occupation The Soviet Occupation Zone ( or german: Ostzone, label=none, "East Zone"; , ''Sovetskaya okkupatsionnaya zona Germanii'', "Soviet Occupation Zone of Germany") was an area of Germany in Central Europe that was occupied by the Soviet Union as a c ...

in 1945, the castle was used as a children's convalescent home. It has been owned by a private family since 1998 and may now only be viewed from the outside. File:0x-rauenstein-1.jpg, East face File:Rauenstein-2.jpg, West face File:Saxonia Museum fuer saechsische Vaterlandskunde IV 56.jpg, An 1839 lithograph

Sources

External links

ins-erzgebirge.de – Rauenstein Castle

dickemauern.de – Rauenstein Castle

{{in lang, de Buildings and structures in Erzgebirgskreis Castles in Saxony Ore Mountains Pockau-Lengefeld