Strahlenburg

The Strahlenburg is a ruined hilltop castle above the town of Schriesheim in the Rhine-Neckar district of Baden-Württemberg. It sits on the lower slope of the Ölberg, also called the Schriesheim Schlossberg, with the town spread out directly below. From the ruins visitors look out over a wide stretch of the Rhine plain, where villages line both the Neckar and the Rhine. On clear days the view extends to the edge of the Palatinate Forest, and in exceptionally fine weather as far as the Donnersberg. The Kanzelbach valley, which rises near Altenbach, cuts into the Odenwald massif beside the Ölberg. The castle was begun about 1235 by Conrad I of Strahlenberg as his family seat. By 1240 he appears in records as vogt of Schriesheim, and the original thirty-metre-high bergfried and the inner ward date from this period. The palas was probably added in the 14th century. Financial difficulties led Rennewart of Strahlenberg to pledge the castle and town to Hartmut V of Cronberg in 1329; after Hartmut’s death in 1334 the Cronbergs carried out extensive alterations. In 1347 the Strahlenberg passed to Elector Rupert I of the Palatinate, and later to his youngest son Otto of Palatinate-Mosbach. Otto then pledged it to his brother Stephen, who in turn handed it to his son Louis I of Palatinate-Veldenz-Zweibrücken in 1450. Louis fought several wars against his cousin Elector Frederick I of the Palatinate, culminating in the siege of May 1470. The castle was stormed, the defenders captured, and the town forced to pay a heavy fine and surrender its wine. The fortifications were dismantled, and in the peace of 1471 the castle reverted to the Palatinate. Today only the roughly twenty-seven-metre-high bergfried and the roofless rectangular palas remain of the original five-sided enceinte. The bergfried cannot be climbed because of structural defects. Three early-Gothic lancet windows with roundels survive in the palas, dating from before or around 1237. Outside the castle walls a modern inn, the Burggasthof Strahlenburg, serves food and drink. The ruins themselves are closed when the inn is not open.