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Randeck Castle (Palatinate)
Randeck Castle (german: Burg Randeck or ''Randegg'') is a ruined hill castle on the ''Schlossberg'' () roughly west of the wine growing village of Mannweiler-Cölln on the River Alsenz in the county of Donnersbergkreis in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. It was the family seat of the lords of Randeck. History The castle was probably built in the 12th century. It is first recorded in 1202 with a Henry of Randeck (''Henricus de Randeke''). He was probably a grandson of Ulrich of Wartenberg.Martin Dolch, Stefan Ulrich: Pfälzisches Burgenlexikon IV.1 O-Sp, Kaiserslautern, 2007, , pp. 198 - 206. He was succeeded in 1231 by his son Godfrey I of Randeck. The grandson of Godfrey in 1298, Dietrich of Randeck. Another grandson in 1311, George of Randeck. From here were also descended Eberhard of Randeck (d 1372), cathedral dean and Bishop-elect of Speyer. The castle was loaned in 1649 by Emperor Ferdinand III to the Teutonic knight, Hans Ludwig of Lewenstein. After the L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hill Castle
A hill castle or mountain castle is a castle built on a natural feature that stands above the surrounding terrain. It is a term derived from the German ''Höhenburg'' used in categorising castle sites by their topographical location. Hill castles are thus distinguished from lowland castles (''Niederungsburgen''). Hill castles may be further subdivided depending on their situation into the following: * Hilltop castle (''Gipfelburg''), that stands on the summit of a hill with steep drops on all sides. A special type is the rock castle or ''Felsenburg''. * Ridge castle (''Kammburg''), that is built on the crest of a ridge. * Hillside castle (''Hangburg''), that is built on the side of a hill and thus is dominated by rising ground on one side. * Spur castle (''Spornburg''), that is built on a hill spur surrounded by steep terrain on three sides and thus only needs to be defended on the one remaining side. When in the 10th and 11th centuries castles lost their pure fortress charact ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Teutonic Knight
The Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem, commonly known as the Teutonic Order, is a Catholic religious institution founded as a military society in Acre, Kingdom of Jerusalem. It was formed to aid Christians on their pilgrimages to the Holy Land and to establish hospitals. Its members have commonly been known as the Teutonic Knights, having a small voluntary and mercenary military membership, serving as a crusading military order for the protection of Christians in the Holy Land and the Baltics during the Middle Ages. Purely religious since 1810, the Teutonic Order still confers limited honorary knighthoods. The Bailiwick of Utrecht of the Teutonic Order, a Protestant chivalric order, is descended from the same medieval military order and also continues to award knighthoods and perform charitable work. Name The name of the Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem is in german: Orden der Brüder vom Deutschen Haus der Hei ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Castles In Rhineland-Palatinate
A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word ''castle'', but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble. This is distinct from a palace, which is not fortified; from a fortress, which was not always a residence for royalty or nobility; from a ''pleasance'' which was a walled-in residence for nobility, but not adequately fortified; and from a fortified settlement, which was a public defence – though there are many similarities among these types of construction. Use of the term has varied over time and has also been applied to structures such as hill forts and 19th-20th century homes built to resemble castles. Over the approximately 900 years when genuine castles were built, they took on a great many forms with many different features, although some, such as curtain walls, arrowslits, and portcullises, were ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bergfried
''Bergfried'' (plural: ''bergfriede''; English: ''belfry''; French: ''tour-beffroi''; Spanish: ''torre del homenaje'') is a tall tower that is typically found in castles of the Middle Ages in German-speaking countries and in countries under German influence. Friar describes it as a "free-standing, fighting-tower".Friar (2003), p 36. Its defensive function is to some extent similar to that of a keep (also known as a ''donjon'') in English or French castles. However, the characteristic difference between a bergfried and a keep is that a bergfried was typically not designed for permanent habitation. Overview The living quarters of a castle with a bergfried are separate, often in a lower tower or an adjacent building called a ''palas'' (an English-style keep combines both functions of habitation and defence.) Consequently, a bergfried could be built as a tall slender tower with little internal room, few vaults and few if any windows. The bergfried served as a watchtower and as a re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flanking Tower
A flanking tower is a fortified tower that is sited on the outside of a defensive wall or other fortified structure and thus forms a flank. From the defensive platform and embrasures the section of wall between them (the curtain wall) could be swept from the side by ranged weapons. In High and Late Medieval castles and town walls, flanking towers often had a semi-circular floor plan or a combination of a rectangular inner and semi-circular outer plans. There were also circular and rectangular towers. Corner flanking towers are found, for example, in the fortifications of the Alhambra and at the manor house of Hugenpoet Palace; Wellheim Castle has a square flanking tower. Semi-circular flanking towers were common in Sasanian architecture. In church architecture, a flanking tower is a semi-circular or polygonal (for example, octagonal) tower on the outer wall of the church. The church of Great St. Martin Church in Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Outwork
An outwork is a minor fortification built or established outside the principal fortification limits, detached or semidetached. Outworks such as ravelins, lunettes (demilunes), flèches and caponiers to shield bastions and fortification curtains from direct battery were developed in the 16th century. Later, the increasing scale of warfare and the greater resources available to the besieger accelerated this development, and systems of outworks grew increasingly elaborate and sprawling as a means of slowing the attacker's progress and making it more costly. When taken by an enemy force, their lack of rear-facing ramparts left them totally open to fire from the main works. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 position. For a settlement, it would refer to the main town wall with its associated gatehouses, towers, and walls. According to the 1911 ''Encyclopædia Britannica'', the term was strictly applied to the continuous line of bastions and curtain walls forming "the body of the place", this last expression being often used as synonymous with ''enceinte''. However, the outworks or defensive wall close to the enceinte were not considered as forming part of it. In early 20th-century fortification, the enceinte was usually simply the ''innermost'' continuous line of fortifications. In architecture, generally, an enceinte is the close or precinct of a cathedral, abbey, castle, etc. This definition of the term differs from the more common use of enceinte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
War Of The Palatine Succession
The Nine Years' War (1688–1697), often called the War of the Grand Alliance or the War of the League of Augsburg, was a conflict between France and a European coalition which mainly included the Holy Roman Empire (led by the Habsburg monarchy), the Dutch Republic, England, Spain, Savoy, Sweden and Portugal. Although not the first European war to spill over to Europe's overseas colonies, the events of the war spread to such far away places as the Americas, India, and West Africa. It is for this reason that it is sometimes considered the first world war. The conflict encompassed the Glorious Revolution in England, where William of Orange deposed the unpopular James VII and II and subsequently struggled against him for control of Scotland and Ireland, and a campaign in colonial North America between French and English settlers and their respective Native American allies. Louis XIV of France had emerged from the Franco-Dutch War in 1678 as the most powerful monarch ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nikolaus Georg Reigersberg
Nikolaus Georg von Reigersberg (1598 – 7 June 1651) was an imperial official, Chancellor in the Electorate of Mainz and Mayor of Aschaffenburg. He came to wider prominence as a delegate from Mainz to the negotiations at Münster that eventually ended the Thirty Years' War. Life Provenance, early years and family Born in 1598, Nikolaus Georg von Reigersberg was the son of a butcher, also called Georg von Reigersberg, in Diedenhofen and his wife Anna Gudnacht. The younger Georg von Reigersberg studied Jurisprudence at Cologne and Mainz, concluding his studies with a double doctorate in canon and civil law. His first marriage, which took place on 24 August 1624, was to Maria Salome von Faber, the daughter of the cup-bearer Nikolaus Faber. She died in 1639, by which point the marriage had produced four recorded sons and one daughter. His second marriage was to the heiress Eva Maria von Münster, who brought the Collenburg into the family. The Collenburg (hill), and a centu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Electoral Mainz
The Electorate of Mainz (german: Kurfürstentum Mainz or ', la, Electoratus Moguntinus), previously known in English as Mentz and by its French name Mayence, was one of the most prestigious and influential states of the Holy Roman Empire. In the Roman Catholic hierarchy, the Archbishop-Elector of Mainz was also the Primate of Germany ('), a purely honorary dignity that was unsuccessfully claimed from time to time by other archbishops. There were only two other ecclesiastical Prince-electors in the Empire: the Electorate of Cologne and the Electorate of Trier. The Archbishop-Elector of Mainz was also archchancellor of Germany (one of the three component titular kingdoms of the Holy Roman Empire, the other two being Italy and Burgundy) and, as such, ranked first among all ecclesiastical and secular princes of the Empire, and was second only to the Emperor. His political role, particularly as an intermediary between the Estates of the Empire and the Emperor, was considerable. Hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Löwenstein Castle (Palatinate)
Löwenstein Castle (not to be confused with the ruined medieval castle of the same name in Löwenstein, Germany) is a Late Baroque style castle built in the eighteenth century in Kleinheubach, Germany. History Prince Dominic Marquard of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rochefort acquired lordship over Kleinheubach in 1721 from Frederick Charles, Count of Erbach-Limpurg. Although this acquisition came with a castle, Dominic Marquard began construction on a new castle that same year, employing the skills of the architect Louis Remy de la Fosse and the sculptor Jakob van der Auwera. Overseen by Johann Dientzenhofer and (after Dientzhenhofer’s death in 1726) Rinscher of Mannheim, construction came to completion in 1732. Although the castle was built in a Late Baroque style, later expansions—such as a greenhouse in 1780, servant’s quarters in 1807-1824, and a riding hall in 1870—were built in a classical style Classical architecture usually denotes architecture which is more or le ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ferdinand III (HRR)
Ferdinand III (Ferdinand Ernest; 13 July 1608, in Graz – 2 April 1657, in Vienna) was from 1621 Archduke of Austria, King of Hungary from 1625, King of Croatia and Bohemia from 1627 and Holy Roman Emperor from 1637 until his death in 1657. Ferdinand ascended the throne at the beginning of the last decade of the Thirty Years' War and introduced lenient policies to depart from old ideas of divine rights under his father, as he had wished to end the war quickly. As the numerous battles had not resulted in sufficient military containment of the Protestant enemies, and confronted with decaying Imperial power, Ferdinand was compelled to abandon the political stances of his Habsburg predecessors in many respects in order to open the long road towards the much delayed peace treaty. Although his authority among the princes was weakened after the war, in Bohemia, Hungary and the Austria, however, Ferdinand's position as sovereign was uncontested. Ferdinand was the first Habsburg monar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
