Falkenstein Castle (Höllental)
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Falkenstein Castle () is a
ruined Ruins () are the remains of a civilization's architecture. The term refers to formerly intact structures that have fallen into a state of partial or total disrepair over time due to a variety of factors, such as lack of maintenance, deliberate ...
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 a ...
near
Freiburg im Breisgau Freiburg im Breisgau or simply Freiburg is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fourth-largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Its built-up area has a population of abou ...
on the territory of the present-day municipality
Breitnau Breitnau is a Municipalities of Germany, municipality in the district of Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald in Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany, about 30 kilometres from the city of Freiburg im Breisgau. It is located within the High Black Forest. Ge ...
in the county of
Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald () is a (district) in the southwest of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Fifty towns and municipalities with 133 settlements lie within the district. The district itself belongs to the region of Freiburg with the region of Sou ...
in the German state of
Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg ( ; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a states of Germany, German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million i ...
. The castle site lies in a triangle formed by the entrance of the Höllental valley – the Lower Höllental and the Engenbach valley, not far from the
Buchenbach Buchenbach is a municipality in the south west of the Black Forest in Germany. It is located in the district of Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald in Baden-Württemberg. It is made up of four communities, the main town of Buchenbach and the villages of Fa ...
village of Falkensteig, on a rocky crag that is very difficult to get to today. Of the castle itself only a few wall remains are left. It is one of the less well preserved ruins in the Breisgau.


History

The castle may have been built around 1200 on a steep eminence at the lower entrance to the Höllental, also known as the ''Falkensteige'', by a Zähringen ''
ministerialis The ''ministeriales'' (singular: ''ministerialis'') were a legally unfree but socially elite class of knights, administrators, and officials in the High Middle Ages in the Holy Roman Empire, drawn from a mix of servile origins, free commoners, and ...
'' family. Its founders probably came from the Wittental valley from the lords of Weiler and Blankenberg and are first recorded from 1137 to 1148 as the lords of Falkenstein. In the ensuing period they rose to become one of the circle of important aristocratic families in the Breisgau. The valley was named ''Falkensteiner Tal'' after them and their castle, and only changed to Höllental later on. The castle was supposed to guard the important communication route through the valley which linked the
Breisgau The Breisgau () is an area in southwest Germany extending along the Rhine River and enveloping portions of the Black Forest. Part of the state of Baden-Württemberg, it centers on the city of Freiburg im Breisgau. The district of Breisgau-Hoch ...
to the Baar region and
Lake Constance Lake Constance (, ) refers to three bodies of water on the Rhine at the northern foot of the Alps: Upper Lake Constance (''Obersee''), Lower Lake Constance (''Untersee''), and a connecting stretch of the Rhine, called the Seerhein (). These ...
. The lords of the castle soon reigned over an area that extended up the valley to
Hinterzarten Hinterzarten is a resort village in the Black Forest (German: ''Schwarzwald''), located in the southwest of the state of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Although Hinterzarten is mostly famous for its ski jumping, it has many other tourist attractions. ...
and
Titisee The Titisee is a lake in the southern Black Forest in Baden-Württemberg. It covers an area of and is an average of deep. It owes its formation to the Feldberg glacier, the moraines of which were formed in the Pleistocene epoch and nowadays f ...
. Other castles built by the Falkensteins were Falkenbühl Castle, Bickenreute near Kirchzarten and Bubenstein Castle, also called Neufalkenstein ("New Falkenstein"). After the toll road, which had brought the Falkensteins substantial revenue, met with competition from the route through the Wagensteig valley built in 1310–1379, according to legend, the knights are said to have operated more and more as robber barons. In a conflict between an aristocratic coalition under the leadership of Count Eberhard II of Württemberg against the
Swabian League The Swabian League () was a military alliance of Imperial State, imperial estates – Free imperial city, imperial cities, prelates, principalities and knights – principally in the territory of the early Middle Ages, medieval stem duchy of S ...
,
Werner von Falkenstein Werner von Falkenstein ( 13554 October 1418) was a German nobleman who served as Archbishop and Elector of Trier from 1388 until his death in 1418. He was the great-nephew of his predecessor Kuno II von Falkenstein and a member of the House of F ...
, on the orders of his overlord, blocked roads and plundered the League's citizens. Affected by the economic decline of the low nobility in the late 14th century, it was probably financial pressure that drove the Falkensteins to extend this approach to innocent travellers. This behaviour was the reason that, on 6 December 1388, Freiburg attacked and destroyed Falkenstein Castle.Heinrich Schreiber, Urkundenbuch der Stadt Freiburg im Breisgau, Freiburg 1829, Vol. 2, pp.59–82 Other historians blame its destruction, however, on Freiburg's hunger for power. The castle chapel apparently survived the demise of the castle. In 1460, it is first mentioned as St. Nicholas' Chapel. In 1606 it was moved into the valley by the Höllenbach stream, today known as the Rotbach.


Description

The irregular and very inaccessible castle site rises through four levels. For simplicity, it will be described under four sections. First, is the
lower ward 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 ...
(''Unterburg'', A) whose fragmented wall remains are up to six metres high and three metres thick, and run from the southwest side of the castle rock up to, and along, its northern flank. Here, there are more, very substantial, staggered sections of wall and what is assumed to be the old entrance area and castle gate (5) above the Engenbach valley and present day entrance at its western tip. (1) Second, there is an adjoining
neck ditch A neck ditch (), sometimes called a throat ditch,
at www.roadstoruins.com. Accessed on 3 Jan 2012. is a dry
upper ward The inner bailey or inner ward of a castle is the strongly fortified enclosure at the heart of a medieval castle.Friar, Stephen (2003). ''The Sutton Companion to Castles'', Sutton Publishing, Stroud, 2003, p. 22. It is protected by the outer w ...
(''Oberburg'') or
inner ward A bailey or ward in a fortification is a leveled courtyard, typically enclosed by a curtain wall. In particular, a medieval type of European castle is known as a motte-and-bailey. Castles and fortifications may have more than one bailey, and t ...
(''Kernburg'') (C) on the ascending, elongated rocky ridge that is up to 55 metres long, between 12 and 16 metres wide and runs from southwest to northeast. Among other large sections of surviving wall at the south and southwestern tip are: a wall about ten metres long and three metres high facing the valley which is believed to belong to the castle kitchen (10); another wall, six metres wide and about 2.5 metres high (11), which could be the site of the chapel; a further prominent, tooth-like wall in the centre on the southeastern cliff edge – easily visible from the Höllental valley when approaching from Hirschsprung – and finally the remains of a quadrangle with walls measuring about nine by nine metres – probably the former ''
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 ...
'' – on a lofty site at the northeastern end of the castle rock.


References


Literature

* Max Miller: ''Handbuch der Historischen Stätten Deutschlands, Bd. 6: Baden-Württemberg'', Stuttgart, 1965. * H. Mayer: ''Falkenstein und die Falkensteiner'', in: ''Breisgauer Chronik 6'', 1914. * Alfons Zettler, Thomas Zotz: ''Die Burgen im mittelalterlichen Breisgau. Halbband 1. A - K. Nördlicher Teil''. Ostfildern. In. ''Archäologie und Geschichte. Freiburger Forschungen zum ersten Jahrtausend in Südwestdeutschland, Heft 14''. Jan Thorbecke Verlag, Sigmaringen, 2003, , pp. 57–62. * Arthur Hauptmann: ''Burgen einst und jetzt. Burgen und Burgruinen in Südbaden''. Verlag des Südkuriers, 2nd vol., Konstanz, 1984.


External links


Burg Falkenstein
auf alemannischen-seiten.de *
Artist's impression
by Wolfgang Braun {{DEFAULTSORT:Falkenstein Castle (Hollental) Black Forest