Burg Baldenau

The Burg Baldenau stands as the ruin of a water castle in the Hunsrück hills, between the villages of Hundheim and Hinzerath. It lies in a high valley at 465 metres above sea level, fed by the upper reaches of the Dhron stream. A moat surrounds the remains, which sit in boggy ground and remain freely open to visitors at all times. Built from 1315 by Archbishop Balduin of Trier, the fortress guarded Trier’s lands against the rival counts of Sponheim. A 1332 privilege granted town rights to a nearby settlement, though no town was ever founded. By the 15th century the castle had passed to noble families as a pledge, showing its reduced importance. French troops under Louis XIV destroyed it for good in 1689 after earlier damage in the Thirty Years’ War. From 1982 the ruin was secured, and in 1981–82 it served as a film set for the first Heimat trilogy by Edgar Reitz. The castle’s wedge-shaped plan stretches about 52 metres long and 20 metres wide. At the southwest tip stands a 24-metre round bergfried with walls up to 3.2 metres thick. Opposite, scant remains of the main building rise over at least three storeys, reached by a stair turret. Traces of a kitchen hearth mark the ground floor, and a well once supplied water beside the entrance. A curtain wall with arrow slits and the remains of a fighting platform encircles the courtyard, where smaller buildings once stood. The Stumpfe Turm above Hinzerath, built on a Roman road ridge, once gave early warning of approaching danger.