Wittelsbach Castle (german: Burg Wittelsbach) was a castle near

Aichach Aichach (; Central Bavarian: ''Oacha'') is a town in Germany, located in the Bundesland of Bavaria and situated just northeast of Augsburg. It is the capital of the district of Aichach-Friedberg. The municipality of Aichach counts some 20,000 inh ...

in today's Bavarian Swabia. The castle was first mentioned around the year 1000. In 1119,

Otto IV, Count of Scheyern Otto V, Count of Wittelsbach ( – 4 August 1156), also called Otto IV, Count of Scheyern, was the second son of Eckhard I, Count of Scheyern and Richardis of Carniola and Istria. Otto named himself ''Otto of Wittelsbach'', after Wittelsbach Ca ...

moved into the castle of Wittelsbach and converted his previous seat into

Scheyern Abbey Scheyern Abbey, formerly also Scheyern Priory (german: Kloster Scheyern), is a house of the Benedictine Order in Scheyern in Bavaria. First foundation The monastery at Scheyern was established in 1119 as the final site of the community founde ...

. The castle's name, "Witilinesbac", is however already mentioned as the place of origin of Otto IV in a document by

Henry V Henry V may refer to: People * Henry V, Duke of Bavaria (died 1026) * Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor (1081/86–1125) * Henry V, Duke of Carinthia (died 1161) * Henry V, Count Palatine of the Rhine (c. 1173–1227) * Henry V, Count of Luxembourg (121 ...

dating from 1115. From 1120, the Counts of Scheyern were

Counts Palatine A count palatine (Latin ''comes palatinus''), also count of the palace or palsgrave (from German ''Pfalzgraf''), was originally an official attached to a royal or imperial palace or household and later a nobleman of a rank above that of an ord ...

of Wittelsbach. The castle thus became the ancestral seat of the

House of Wittelsbach The House of Wittelsbach () is a German dynasty, with branches that have ruled over territories including Bavaria, the Palatinate, Holland and Zeeland, Sweden (with Finland), Denmark, Norway, Hungary (with Romania), Bohemia, the Electorate ...

, the later Electors and Kings of Bavaria and Electors of the Palatinate. According to local tradition, the castle was destroyed in 1209 after Count Otto of Wittelsbach murdered

King King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...

Philip of Swabia Philip of Swabia (February/March 1177 – 21 June 1208) was a member of the House of Hohenstaufen and King of Germany from 1198 until his assassination. The death of his older brother Emperor Henry VI in 1197 meant that the Hohenstaufen rule (whi ...

, and it was not rebuilt. An archaeological excavation undertaken from 1978 to 1980 found no evidence of a sudden destruction of the castle, however. From the archaeological evidence, it appears the castle's walls were used as a quarry after the castle itself was abandoned. In the 15th century, the

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

church ''Beatae Mariae Virginis'' was built on the former castle site. The church, still standing today, became the nucleus of the village of Oberwittelsbach ''(Upper Wittelsbach)''. In 1834, the Wittelsbach family erected a monument on the site of their former castle. In memory of the castle, parts of the

district A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions o ...

Aichach-Friedberg are today called ''Wittelsbacher country''. In 1838

Duke Maximilian Joseph in Bavaria Duke Maximilian Joseph of Bavaria (4 December 1808 – 15 November 1888), known informally as Max in Bayern, was a member of a Duke in Bavaria, junior branch of the royal House of Wittelsbach who were Kings of Bavaria, and a promoter of Bavarian f ...

, the father of

Empress Elisabeth of Austria Duchess Elisabeth Amalie Eugenie in Bavaria (24 December 1837 – 10 September 1898) was Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary from her marriage to Emperor Franz Joseph I on 24 April 1854 until her assassination in 1898. Elisabeth was ...

, acquired a castle in the nearby village of Unterwittelsbach ''(Lower Wittelsbach)'', built in 1537 on the site of another, older castle dating from the Middle Ages; it remained in the possession of the junior ducal branch (named

Dukes in Bavaria Duke is a male title either of a monarch ruling over a duchy, or of a member of royalty, or nobility. As rulers, dukes are ranked below emperors, kings, grand princes, grand dukes, and sovereign princes. As royalty or nobility, they are rank ...

) of the royal

until 1955 and now houses a museum devoted to Empress Elisabeth. File:Kirche Beatae Mariae Virginis Oberwittelsbach.jpg, The 15th century church ''Beatae Mariae Virginis'' File:Schloss Unterwittelsbach.jpg, Unterwittelsbach Castle

References

* Robert Koch: Die Ausgrabungen in der Burg Wittelsbach bei Aichach 1978-1979. In: T. Grad (ed.): Die Wittelsbacher im Aichacher Land, 1980 * Horst Lechner, Wolfgang Brandner: Aichach bei Wittelsbach - Historische Ansichten aus vier Jahrhunderten. Augsburg, 1999. {{Coord, 48, 28, 6.96, N, 11, 10, 34.32, E, display=title

Wittelsbach The House of Wittelsbach () is a German dynasty, with branches that have ruled over territories including Bavaria, the Palatinate, Holland and Zeeland, Sweden (with Finland), Denmark, Norway, Hungary (with Romania), Bohemia, the Electorate o ...

House of Wittelsbach Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor