Burg Altena

Burg Altena stands in the flat Wesermarsch countryside south of Elsfleth. It was a lowland castle built by Count Gerd the Brave of Oldenburg in the 15th century. The site was chosen for its position near the Hunte river, giving the count a base for his war with the city of Bremen. Work began before 3 May 1476 and cost much money and effort. Yet the castle’s life was very short; on 19 June 1476 Bremen’s troops captured it. The failure of Burg Altena is recorded in the Rastede Chronicle. The peace treaty signed at Quakenbrück on 15 October 1476 ordered the castle to be demolished. Historians such as Hermann Lübbing have studied the chronicle’s account of the siege and destruction. Georg Sello later examined how the conflict shaped Oldenburg’s borders in the 15th century. Adolf Blumberg and Margarete Beyer also describe the episode in their history of Elsfleth. Today the site is a quiet field with no visible walls. The outline of the former moat can still be traced in the flat land. A small information board marks the spot where the castle once stood. Visitors can walk across the open ground and imagine the short-lived fortress. The surrounding farmland stretches away to the Hunte, giving a sense of the landscape Count Gerd once used.