Burgstall Falkensberg

The Burgstall Falkensberg stands above the hamlet of Goldhasen in the municipality of Rückholz, Schwaben. It was first recorded in 1390 as a farm called Valkersperg, held as a fief of the Hochstift Augsburg. By the early sixteenth century the site had passed through several owners, including Peter Hartung and Christoph von Ried, before Emperor Maximilian I acquired it. Maximilian used Falkensberg as a hunting base and in 1514 created the Schwaltenweiher below the hill for fish. He freed the estate from its feudal ties and sold it in 1515 to Stephan Höhenberger, who may have built a small castle there. The Reichsstadt Kempten bought the property in 1588 and commissioned a larger, grander castle designed by Mathis Heubel from Kempten. Work began in 1590 and the new palace, with its castle farm, was finished by 1593. The city’s plans met resistance from the Hochstift Augsburg over jurisdiction, and in 1610 Kempten sold Falkensberg to the monastery of St Mang in Füssen. The monastery took over local low justice but the high jurisdiction remained contested with Augsburg. During the Thirty Years War the castle was destroyed, its ruins later quarried away until only faint traces remained. Today the site is a partly wooded hill where the outline of the former castle can still be read in the ground. The highest point shows clear earthworks to the west, and a lower area to the east probably carried buildings. No ditches survive, suggesting the place was a lightly fortified manor rather than a full castle. A farmhouse at the foot incorporates reused stonework, though it cannot be proved to come from Falkensberg. The hilltop offers wide views across the surrounding countryside. A plaque fixed to the farmhouse in 1932 marks the vanished monument.