Confessions of a Castleholic

Situated south-west of Hamelin, the small German town famous for its Pied Paper, Burg Aerzen was firstly mentioned in 1293 as borch Artelsen . At the time, the Burg and surrounding village was owned by the Lords of Everstein. Towards the end of the 12th century, the Eversteins had risen through the ranks of the nobility as supporters and relatives of the Hohenstaufen rulers after the defeat of the Guelph ruler Heinrich the Lion. The tides turned, however, and as a conclusion of peace Hermann VII of Everstein forged the engagement of his daughter, only four years old at the time, to the future Duke Otto IV of Brunswick-Lüneburg. Burg Aerzen formed part of Elisabeth von Everstein's dowry. After it came into the hands of the Guelph family, Burg Aerzen was given to the Bishopric of Hildesheim. It handed the castle and village over as a joined fiefdom to Stacius von Münchhausen and Heinrich von Hardenberg, both of very well-known noble families of the area, in 1508....

Some villages have all the luck in the castle department... Example needed? Apelern near Hanover. Number of inhabitants: 1,500. Number of castles: Two. One of them we already previously talked about, Schloss von Hammerstein . The second one is - unsurprisingly considering the title of this post - Schloss von Münchhausen . Both castles have a ' von ' (of) in their name because they are simply named after the families that have been the owners of the estates for generations. If you have been following Confessions of a Castleholic  for the last couple of weeks, the name Münchhausen will already seem familiar to you - and if you remember a little more about the family history: This Schloss was once home to the White Line of the family yet is now owned by the Black Line. Already during the 14th century, Apelern was given as a fief by the Counts of Schaumburg to the Münchhausen family. It was Baron Börries of Münchhausen (1515–1583) who commissioned the current castle from ...

It's time to have a look at yet another castle of the Münchhausen family : This time around it is Schloss Schwedesdorf , one of the three castles in the village of Lauenau near Hanover. While they are most famous for their family member who liked to tell tall tales, the Münchhausens made a considerable fortune during the 16th and 17th century as leaders of mercenary forces fighting for various European rulers. With their new-found wealth, they became some of the most important castle builders of the Weser-Renaissance period. While the Black Line of the Münchhausens may have had more famous family members, the White Line was also quite successful - and it was a member of the White Line who built today's castle. Already since 1377, the Münchhausens held a fiefdom granted by the Counts of Schaumburg and Holstein in the municipality of Lauenau, at the time still known as Schwedesdorf. In 1594, three brothers divided the family's assets amongst themselves. While the olde...

Münchhausen is a pretty famous name in Germany and all around the world. An old noble family from Lower Saxony who made their fortunes as leaders of mercenary forces for various European rulers, their name was immortalised by the tall tales of the 'Baron of the Lies' even though the historical example, Hieronymus of Münchhausen, wasn't very happy about the fictionalised version of his life. Before the 'Baron of the Lies' came along, the Münchhausen family was already a household name in Northern Germany for their plentiful building activity as they invested their new-found wealth as mercenary leaders of the 16th century in the construction of various castles to represent their new status, one of the examples being today's  Schloss Schwöbber . The Black Line of the Barons of Münchhausen first came into the possession of three feudal estates in the vicinity of today's  Schloss  in 1510. In 1564, they were given the permission to establish a noble residen...

Yesterday was a ten castles kind of day in the life of this Castleholic. So where to start sharing them with you? I suppose the first one I saw on my latest castle adventure is a good beginning: Schloss von Hammerstein in the small village of Apelern near Hanover that interestingly boasts not just one but two castles. (We will get to the other one, Schloss von Münchhausen , in another post.) Now owned by the Barons on Hammerstein in the 12th generation, the history of their castle is actually also tied to the Münchhausen family. Already firstly mentioned in the 11th century, the estate came into the hands of Baron Jobst of Münchhausen in 1550 as a fiefdom by the Counts of Holstein-Schaumburg. After Jobst's line of the Münchhausen family died out in the 16th century, Anton of Wietersheim became the new owner of the estate. It was the Chancellor of the Counts of Holstein-Schaumburg who built today's Weser-Renaissance style castle between 1586 and 1590.  About 80 years l...

It’s kinda surprising I introduced you to the concept of a Rittergut only about a week ago considering that there are hundreds and thousands of them scattered all over the German countryside. A Rittergut , literally a knight’s estate, were usually and often still are owned by the untitled or occassionally lower titled nobility. Today’s knight’s estate - Rittergut Remeringhausen - owes its existence to the Münchhausen family , you may recall from one of the other times they popped up here on Castleholic. In 1565, Börries von Münchhausen inherited a feudal estate in Remeringhausen, alongside with another one in nearby Oldendorf, from his father-in-law Claus van Büschen and, in turn, later bequeathed it to his son Ludolph. It was Ludolph who, in 1594, turned the farm run by a serf into an estate run directly for the family and decided to build a manor house to rival other knight's estates. Only one wing of the Weser-Renaissance-style building dating to the year 1599...

While some castles are knight's manors, not all knight's manors are called castles. Schloss Haddenhausen near Minden falls into the former category and it sometimes also referred to as Rittergut Haddenhausen , but as I'm a Castleholic and not a manorholic we will conveniently go with the name that includes Schloss . The origins of of this knight's estate today owned by the Barons of Bussche-Haddenhausen date back a good 800 years.  Haddenhausen was firstly mentioned in 1254, when the Bishop of Minden purchased the estate. In 1385, it was given as a fiefdom by Bishop Gerhard II of Minden to Ludolf von Mönnichhausen, an ancestor of that Münchhausen  who became famous as the Baron of Lies. Almost 100 years later, the estate was largely destroyed during a feud between the Bishops of Minden and neighbouring Osnabrück. It was later rebuilt by the Münchhausen family who, in the meantime, had became the manor's owner.  During the Reformation, key members of...

To be perfectly honest with you, where I come from, you don’t think very highly of Salzgitter. To be perfectly honest once again, I had previously only been there to go ice skating and also to the local lake once. The town of Salzgitter was only founded in 1942 and it looks like it; it’s quite grey, many 1950’s to 1970’s buildings, industry as well as more industry. I knew that the town, which actually does not have a real centre, was originally made up out of several villages but I had never been to one of the village-y villages. That changed this past weekend and I must say, I was pleasantly surprised. The village of choice was Salder, which most prominently features a castle by the same name - obviously as otherwise I wouldn’t tell you about it on this blog - but also lots of other nice old building. As so many castles around Hanover and Brunswick, Schloss Salder was once owned by the Guelph family but its history started out with another few (noble) families. In the be...

If you are into royal history, you probably know the name of today castle's from at least one person, Princess Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-(Wolfenbüttel-)Bevern, the wife of Friedrich the Great of Prussia. The Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel-Bevern had been created due to an inheritance dispute between Princess Elisabeth Christine's grandfather, Duke Ferdinand Albrecht I, and his brothers.  In 1667, Duke Ferdinand Albrecht I was given the castle of Bevern located near to the town of Holzminden not far from another castle already covered on this blog, Schloss Corvey . He - and later his son Ferdinand Albrecht II - were subsequently styled as princes of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel-Bevern. In 1735, after the death of his cousin Duke Ludwig Rudolf, Ferdinand Albrecht II inherited the Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and thus the subordinate Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel-Bevern returned to the overarching Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel. Schl...