Burg Rückerode

Burg Rückerode stands as a late medieval spur castle ruin on a 290-metre dolomite crag above the Wechselgrund valley, a few metres east of the Rückerode farmstead. The Weiler Rückerode lies north-east of Hundelshausen, a district of the small town Witzenhausen in the Werra-Meißner district of north-eastern Hesse. A small stream flows from the spring hollow through the valley to join the Flachsbach, which in turn reaches the Werra. The site is surrounded by woodland and crossed north to south by Kreisstraße 63. The castle was probably built around 1100 as a bailiff’s seat by the counts of Bilstein, who held the county of the Germaramark. By 1301 it passed to the lords of Rengelrode, then to the lords of Hundelshausen in 1372, and in 1428 to the lords of Berge. After their line died out in 1622 it became a state domain of Hesse-Kassel. Landgrave Moritz granted the estate to his second wife Juliane of Nassau-Dillenburg in 1621 and 1623 as her jointure. In 1627 it formed part of the semi-sovereign principality of Hesse-Rotenburg until 1657, when it was sold back to Hesse-Kassel and later pledged to Wilhelm von Polhelm. Today only low stretches of wall remain on the rock outcrop east of the hamlet. A former gypsum cave was turned into a cellar, and the stone from it helped build the still-standing three-metre-high curtain wall that rings the crag. Drawings from 1627 show plans for a new curtain wall with four corner towers and a gatehouse, but these were never fully carried out. The old ascent, guarded by a tower, led to a timber-framed gatehouse connected to a single stone building called a Kemenate. Beyond it lay a U-shaped courtyard flanked by three two-storey timber-framed houses on stone foundations. The present farm buildings date from the mid to late 19th century, though one timber-framed barn is older.