Burg Wassenberg

Burg Wassenberg stands on a hill called the Burgberg, ninety-two metres above sea level, at the edge of the town of Wassenberg in the Heinsberg district. The present buildings rise inside the old town wall and date mostly from 1420. A four-storey square keep built of brick in the early fifteenth century crowns the hilltop and now serves as an observation tower with wide views over the Rur valley. The fortress began as a Roman fortification long before the Middle Ages. In 1020 Emperor Henry II gave the site to Gerardus of Antoing, who took the title Gerhard Graf von Wassenberg and founded a dynasty that later created the duchy of Guelders. After the Third Crusade Gerhard III built the nearby St George’s Basilica, consecrated in 1118 by Bishop Otbert of Liège. The counts married into Limburg and Geldern, and by the thirteenth century the lordship of Wassenberg had become a separate title. Visitors climb the brick keep for panoramic views of the surrounding countryside. The south-western gatehouse still shows a pointed Gothic arch on its inner face, while its upper storey and roof were added in the eighteenth century. Inside the courtyard the restaurant occupies the medieval halls, where guests dine beneath vaulted ceilings that recall the castle’s centuries as a noble residence.