Burg Altwinnenden

Burg Altwinnenden stands above the Höfen-Stöckenhof road in the Bürg quarter of Winnenden. It was built in the early 12th century by the Lords of Winnenden on a rocky spur of the Schwäbisch-Fränkische Stufenland. The keep, raised in 1181 by Gottfried von Winnenden, rises on the outcrop behind the village. Only the round tower survives today, its 23-metre height and 7.5-metre diameter marking the former castle site. The castle passed through the hands of the Neuffen family after a marriage in the 13th century. In 1325 the Weinsbergs sold it to Count Ulrich III of Württemberg for 4,600 Heller. The Württembergers let their servants live there while the stone was gradually removed between 1536 and 1538 to build Schorndorf’s castle and town wall. The Bürg community bought the ruins and six acres of orchards and fields in 1581 for 310 gulden. Visitors see the tall keep rising above a modern hotel. The hotel’s older wings have been enlarged many times, enclosing the tower on two sides. Apart from the keep’s round shape, thick walls and bossed ashlar masonry, little remains of the old fortress. The view from the spur looks down over Bürg and across the western edge of the Stufenland.