Schloss Duttenberg

Burg Duttenberg stands on a ridge above the Jagst valley near Bad Friedrichshall in northern Baden-Württemberg. Once a medieval manor house, it grew from a Frankish settlement founded around 600 near the Kreuzkapelle. The first written mention of the place as Dudunburc dates from 798/799. By the 14th century the castle had become a Reichslehen held by the Lords of Weinsberg, who granted it to local nobles including the Lords of Bieringen and later the Lords of Wittstatt. The castle formed a walled rectangle at the eastern edge of the village. A stout tower, a large wine press, and the Kilianskirche with its own defences lay within the same enceinte. Hans von Sickingen built the village’s outer wall about 1460, and remains of both the castle ditch and the surrounding walls can still be traced. After the Wittstatt line died out in 1586, the Palatinate took over and later sold the estate to the Teutonic Order in stages between 1599 and 1668. Today the site is known locally as the Reißenhof. The plain sandstone manor house, once damaged by fire in 1673, preserves its 18th-century farmyard character. The old wine press and the fortified church remain, marking the limits of the former castle precinct. A vanished brewery and a Renaissance oriel removed in 1860 have left the ensemble with its present unadorned appearance.