Lichtenberg Castle (Palatinate)

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Burg Lichtenberg

The Lichtenberg Castle is a ruined castle near spur Thallichtenberg in the district of Kusel, in Rhineland -Palatinate. The castle is 425 m in length, the longest castle in Germany.

History

The castle is first mentioned in 1214 during a dispute: The Counts of Veldenz they would have built illegally on the territory of the Benedictine monastery of St. Remigius in Reims. Although, therefore, the razing of the castle was decreed, it remained intact and still belonged to the counts, according to their extinction in 1444 the Dukes of Palatinate -Zweibrücken, until the actual end of the Duchy of 1793.

In addition to its long-standing military importance ( even in 1693 it was at the Reunionskriege occupied by French troops! ) They served a variety of purposes:

• She was a secondary residence of their masters and hosted in 1529 as guests of their masters by traveling to the Marburg Colloquy reformers Zwingli, Oecolampadius, Butzer and storm
• It was the seat of an extensive farm of their masters
• It was the seat of the official administration, which was only installed in 1755 by Duke Christian IV in the town of Kusel.

It was never conquered or destroyed by attacks and was the only undestroyed castle in the Palatinate after the Palatine War of Succession. Nevertheless, it was already 1693 - when it was still used grand - as " verwahrloßt " and described " ruinos ". By fire on October 26, 1799 it was heavily damaged and has since become a ruin. Only the castle chapel and the country scribbling survived the fire unscathed, as they were at a sufficient distance to the main castle. Occupied she continued. From 1816 the land belonged to the castle of Saxe -Coburg -Saalfeld. This enclave was named in 1819 after the castle Principality of Lichtenberg, but was only until 1834, when it was transferred to Prussia. The decline continued under the new owners.

Since 1895 the castle is a listed building. From 1922, the expansion of the outer bailey to the hostel was. 1979-1984 the tithe barn was rebuilt and furnished in her Musikantenland Museum. 1983/84 was the keep two more bullets and was roofed. In the last decade of the 20th century, the " Geoscope " was created as a branch of the Palatinate Museum of Natural History in Bad Durkheim.

Only since the local government reform in 1969, the castle belongs to the Palatine district of Kusel.

Plant

Originally, the castle consists of two small plants that are grown together over the centuries. The older was discontinued already in late middle age castle on the top of the mountain spur. She was approximately along rectangular and had a dungeon with shield wall against the defending. Receive have mainly only the perimeter walls. The most notable Baurest is the gate system with the original chapel upstairs.

Towards the end of the 13th century, several hundred meters was built above the upper castle. It originally consisted of a central square residential tower-like dungeon and an oval- shaped ring wall with edge -rise buildings with a narrow courtyard. She was much smaller than the lower castle from the surface. The entrance was on the side facing away from the attack site. In the 14th and 15th centuries the upper castle was gradually expanded by new Spacious Palasbauten. Around the middle of the 15th century castles were a common perimeter wall and thus were grown together. On the surface between the two castles is little significant buildings were erected. The chapel was built in 1755/58. From the late 15th to the 16th century, the castle was further kennel walls and bulwarks va strengthened against the defending.

Current usage

The square tower offers a beautiful view of the city Kusel in the south and the mountains to the north of Prussia. Also, now a restaurant, a hostel, the Musikantenland Museum and the fitted in the castle in the postmodern style Urweltmuseum Geoscope are located at the castle. The latter shows except paleontological finds and visualizations on plate tectonics and the peculiarities of the local geology and the history of mining in the North Palatine Uplands, with occasional additional special (eg 2006: meteorites ) are presented. The castle is also one of the venues of jazz festivals palatia jazz.