Burg Frauenburg

The Frauenburg is a ruined medieval spur castle standing on a narrow ridge above the Nahe valley in the Hunsrück region of Rheinland-Pfalz. It overlooks the Aubach and Ellenbach streams that cut into the hillside below. The counts of Sponheim built the fortress before 1327 to control a branch of the Nahe valley. After 1331 it became the dowager seat of Countess Loretta of Sponheim. In 1673 Lotharingian troops demolished the castle during the Wildfang Feud. The ruins still show a rectangular plan with four corner towers and one mid-length round tower on the north-east side. The mid-length tower once guarded the main gate, while the towers on the exposed side remain almost complete. A neck ditch runs across the ridge in front of the walls. Restoration finished in 1988 and again in 2015 after a major programme to preserve the stonework. The 33-metre-high south tower can be climbed by arrangement and offers wide views over the surrounding countryside. Visitors walk along the ridge to the entrance tower and then pass between the standing round towers. The inner ward is grassed and partly walled, with traces of buildings once used by the countess and later by the Sponheim bailiff. The Aubach valley drops steeply on one side, while the Ellenbach valley lies on the opposite slope. The site is quiet, with only the sound of water in the streams and the wind across the ridge.