Salzburg Castle

This article is about the castle in South Germany. For the fortress at Salzburg, Austria, see Hohensalzburg Castle.
Salzburg Castle
Burg Salzburg
Bad Neustadt an der Saale

The Salzburg – northeast side
Salzburg Castle
Coordinates 50°19′14″N 10°13′48″E / 50.3206°N 10.2300°E / 50.3206; 10.2300Coordinates: 50°19′14″N 10°13′48″E / 50.3206°N 10.2300°E / 50.3206; 10.2300
Type hill castle, spur castle
Code DE-BY
Height 300 m above sea level (NN)
Site information
Condition Wholly or mainly preserved
Site history
Built around 1150
Materials chalk, sandstone
Garrison information
Occupants ministeriales

Salzburg Castle (German: Burg Salzburg) stands on the edge of a plateau above the town of Bad Neustadt an der Saale in Lower Franconia in southern Germany. The large Ganerbenburg (jointly inherited castle) is still partly occupied today and not all areas are accessible to the public.

Geographic location

The castle was built about a kilometre east of Bad Neustadt on the western end of the plateau above Neuhaus and is separated from the land in front of it by a roughly 160-metre-long neck ditch. Until the 19th century the whole hillside was cleared and was used as early as the High Middle Ages for viticulture. The present, thickly wooded ridge on which the castle stands is also the site of the extensive Franconian Clinic (Rhön-Klinikum AG), which dominates the landscape.

History

Early Middle Ages

By the Carolingian era, the Salzgau around Neustadt was already very important. An imperial palace (Pfalz) was even built here; it was given to the Bishopric of Wurzburg in 1000 A.D. by Emperor Otto III. This palace was probably on the site of the present village of Salz or in its immediate vicinity. A castle was built on the nearby Veitsberg hill, probably in Ottonian times during the period of the Hungarian invasions, to protect the local populace. A fortified enclosure of unknown date may have been located on the site of the present castle of Salzburg. These fortifications, too, may have been upgraded in the first half of the 10th century into a refuge castle in the face of attacks by the Magyars.

The first record of the Salzburg occurs in a copy of a deed by Emperor Louis the Pious dated around 1160. The original document is missing and could have been inadvertently and mistakenly amended by its scribe, Friar Eberhard of Fulda Abbey, to show the place of publication (Actum-Zeile or Ausstellungsort) as the Salzburg or Salzberg: "Act(um) in Salzb. Curia regia".[1]

The copy of this early medieval document clearly suggests that the royal palace of Salz was actually located on the castle hill and older research invariably locates this royal court on the site of the more recent castle. Later on, the Veitsberg near Salz was generally reckoned to be the location of the palace while, today, historians favour the village of Salz or its immediate surroundings as the likely site. Friar Eberhard may have only knew of the new site of the castle and replaced the village name of Salz by the abbreviation "Salzb." (Salzburg) throughout his transcript.

High and Late Middle Ages

The bergfried of the "Voitscher Ansitz" in the south of the site

The walled stone castle replaced an older palisaded ditch hewn from the limestone rock. This discovery was only made in 1984 during an official excavation of the foundations. This originally wooden, protective rampart is about a metre behind the stone wall and was probably a provisional enhancement to protect the site. The oldest curtain wall was obviously not fully developed. The elements of the fortified site datable to the first phase of construction are up to four metres high, but there are long stretches where only the foundation seems to have been laid. Whether the Bishop of Würzburg intended to form a major administrative centre or even a fortified village, here, remains speculative.


Gallery

See also

References

  1. ↑ Hessian State Archives, Marburg (Hessisches Staatsarchiv Marburg), K425. Codex Eberhardi, fol. 82r and v.

Literature

External links

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