Berwartstein
Berwartstein is one of the most visited castles of the Pfalz. The still inhabited former imperial castle, located on a high sandstone cliff, is mentioned for the first time in 1152 when King Friedrich I. granted Bishop Gunther von Speyer the castle as a fief.
Since the beginning of the 13 th century Ministeriale are mentioned, who named themselves after the castle. Rudolf of Berwartstein is the first mentioned in 1201, then the knight Sir Walter, known as Knechtlein, little servant, named himself explicitely “Lord of Berwartstein”. An alleged breach of the public peace by Eberhard of Berwartstein, Hugo of Fleckenstein and Nikolaus of Lützelburg was in 1314 fatal to the castle. After a five weeks siege the troops of the free cities Strasbourg and Hagenau succeeded in taking the castle. They took all the stocks, the 25 to 30 defenders as prisoners and destroyed the castle.
The owners could not recover from this attack. The release of the prisoners and the huge costs of the castle’s reconstruction forced Anselm of Berwartstein to sell the castle in 1343.The buyers, the sovereigns of Weingarten, did not enjoy their property for a long time. Four years later they signed it over to the monastery Peterstift of Weißenburg for 800 pound Heller.
The following 150 years were marked by permanent quarrels concerning grazing rights between the lesser nobility, appointed by the Weißenburg abbots as castellans, and the neighbouring sovereigns of Drachenfels. These difficulties escalated in 1472 when the Eckbrechte of Dürkheim, who owned Drachenfels, occupied Berwartstein and imprisoned the castellan. The Electors of the Pfalz, who had acquired the right of entrance of Berwartstein before these difficulties, forced the Dürkheimer to hand over the fortress but were not willing to give the castle back to its legitimate owner. Elector Philip I., the Nobel, lent Berwartstein to the knight Hans von Trotha of Thüringen (Hans Trapp) in 1480, and sold it to him five years later, at which point he had become a marshal of the Kurpfalz.
The new owner extended the castle. He strengthened the fortifications with modern barbicans and bastions and an isolated turret, “little France”, at the neighbouring mountain of Nestelberg. Despite all efforts the abbots of Weißenburg did not succeed in getting Berwartstein back. The position of Hans von Trotha in political circles was so strong that even papal excommunication and the mediation efforts of Emperor Maximilian were futile. The heirs of the marshal, who died in 1503, were forced to give back some of the villages, estates and rights to the bishopric, but the castle Berwartstein remained in their property. From 1545 to 1637 the fortress was in the hands of the sovereigns of Fleckenstein until it was finally returned to the Kurpfalz. In the meantime the castle was damaged by a fire.
The new liege lord, privy councillor Baron von Waldenberg, appointed by the Kurpfalz, recultivated the estate and rebuilt the auxiliary buildings. A large part of the castle, then“burnt and a pile of stones”, stayed a ruin. The attempt of the Kurpfalz adminstration to force the new liegemen and their heirs to reconstruct the castle was unsuccessful due to the huge costs involved.
In 1785 the French chased the hereditary leaseholder from Waldenburg; in 1816 the Bavarian kingdom took the property. In 1840 the widow of the last baron received the castle ruin, but sold it shortly afterwards. The current appearance of Berwartstein reflects Theodor Hoffmann’s, also known as “von Baginsky”, 19 th century reconstruction.
