Schloss Körtlinghausen is a

Baroque The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...

Schloss (château) in

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 ...

Sauerland The Sauerland () is a rural, hilly area spreading across most of the south-eastern part of the States of Germany, German federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia, in parts heavily forested and, apart from the major valleys, sparsely inhabited. ...

region, roughly equidistant between

Dortmund Dortmund (; ; ) is the third-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia, after Cologne and Düsseldorf, and the List of cities in Germany by population, ninth-largest city in Germany. With a population of 614,495 inhabitants, it is the largest city ...

and

Kassel Kassel (; in Germany, spelled Cassel until 1926) is a city on the Fulda River in North Hesse, northern Hesse, in Central Germany (geography), central Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Kassel (region), Kassel and the d ...

. It is sited on the southern bank of the River Glenne and it is surrounded by a moat. Beyond the moat it one of the country's largest and oldest

Oak An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisp ...

trees, which is more than a thousand years old. The circumference of the trunk just above ground level is .

History

The first documented mention of a castle on the site dates from 1398. The current château replaced an earlier previous

moat A moat is a deep, broad ditch dug around a castle, fortification, building, or town, historically to provide it with a preliminary line of defence. Moats can be dry or filled with water. In some places, moats evolved into more extensive water d ...

ed fortress. The manor belonged to the von Schorlemer and the von Rüdenberg families till 1447 when it was acquired by the von Lürwalds. They were followed by the von Hanxleden who were in their turn succeeded by the von Westrems in 1614. Between 1645 and 1819 it belonged to the von Weichs family. In 1714 Franz Otto von und zu Weichs instructed the architect Justus Wehmer to construct a replacement château in the fashionable

style, and the new building was completed in 1746. The von Fürstenbergs acquired it in 1830: it has remained in this family since that time. In 1945 the château was occupied by the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

and became as a holding centre for refugees rendered homeless by

ethnic An ethnicity or ethnic group is a group of people with shared attributes, which they collectively believe to have, and long-term endogamy. Ethnicities share attributes like language, culture, common sets of ancestry, traditions, society, re ...

cleansing after large parts of

eastern Germany The new states of Germany () are the five re-established states of the former German Democratic Republic (GDR) that unified with the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) with its 10 "old states" upon German reunification on 3 October 1990. The ...

had been transferred to

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

and the

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under the terms of an agreement between the

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, the

and their allies. Between 1956 and 1994 it was rented out for use as a training school for the Bundesverband für den Selbstschutz (''"National Self-defence Association"''). Between 1999 and 2004 the château underwent an extensive restoration under the direction of the then owner, Baron Dietger von Fürstenberg, whose work earned him a prize for

Historic preservation Historic preservation (US), built heritage preservation or built heritage conservation (UK) is an endeavor that seeks to preserve, conserve and protect buildings, objects, landscapes or other artifacts of historical significance. It is a philos ...

. In order to finance the work the baron sold a twelfth century German manuscript document, known as the Stammheim Missal, and which had been in his family for generations, to the

Getty Museum The J. Paul Getty Museum, commonly referred to as the Getty, is an art museum in Los Angeles, California, United States, housed on two campuses: the Getty Center and Getty Villa. It is operated by the J. Paul Getty Trust, the world's wealthies ...

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. Today the château is made available for conferences, receptions and other large functions. Buildings on the north side house administrative operations for the house and its farm estate.

Description

Exterior

The site comprises a rectangular manor house with two detached wings, one on each side, to the north of the main building. Between them these form three sides of a four sided courtyard. To the north of that runs part of the moat, across which a continuation of the courtyard is flanked by the stable block. Within the moat, the principal island is the one on which the mansion and its detached wings stand: there is also a small "unbuilt" island to the west of that. The windows of the simple rendered building are framed in sandstone. On the main building the lines of the

hipped roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downward to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope, with variants including tented roofs and others. Thus, a hipped roof has no gables or other vertical sides ...

are interrupted by gable windows, and the roof is topped off with four substantial chimney blocks. On each of the long sides of the court-yard (''"Cour d'honneur"''), it is rimmed by two short pavilion-like detached wings. On the garden (south) side the double steps approaching the main arched entrance are inscribed with the date, 1721. On the court-yard side the main entrance of the main building is topped of with a double double coats of arms of the von Weichs and (in the eighteenth century, neighbouring) von Droste zu Erwitte aristocratic families.

Interior

The main double staircase leads to the first floor via a raised mezzanine halfway up A large ground floor reception room, with rich

stucco Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and ...

decoration and frescoes on the ceiling, overlooks the park. The

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

of the Baron von Weichs who had the château built is prominently displayed along with those of each of his three successive wives.

Chapel

The chapel is directly accessible from either of the building's two main floors. The ceiling is decorated with a geometrical stucco design incorporating the image of

Mary Magdalene Mary Magdalene (sometimes called Mary of Magdala, or simply the Magdalene or the Madeleine) was a woman who, according to the four canonical gospels, traveled with Jesus as one of his followers and was a witness to crucifixion of Jesus, his cr ...

, to whom the chapel is dedicated. The ceiling was painted in 1727. The altar dates from 1739. The raised box (literally ''"patronal loggia"''), constructed to be occupied by the lord of the manor and his family during services, is particularly eye-catching.Ursula Quednau (Bearb.): '' Dehio-Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler, Nordrhein-Westfalen II: Westfalen.''

Deutscher Kunstverlag The Deutscher Kunstverlag (DKV) is an educational publishing house with offices in Berlin and Munich. The publisher specializes in books about art, cultural history, architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and bu ...

, Berlin / München 2011, , S. 944 f.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schloss Kortlinghausen Baroque architecture in North Rhine-Westphalia Buildings and structures in Soest (district)