Burg Bechthal

Burg Bechthal stands as a ruined spur castle on a ridge above the Anlauter valley in Mittelfranken. The site lies about 500 metres south-east of the Bechthal hamlet, part of Raitenbuch municipality in the Weißenburg-Gunzenhausen district. Excavations show the ridge was fortified in the Urnenfelder, Hallstatt, Latène and Migration periods. The medieval castle was the seat of the Pechthal family, first recorded in the mid-12th century. The Pechthaler lords built a small independent lordship but later lost control. By 1353 half the castle passed to Konrad von Heideck, and in 1414 the whole estate was sold to Rüdiger von Erlingshofen. After 1544 the Hochstift Eichstätt reunited both halves. The castle was abandoned after the Thirty Years War, when Swedish artillery destroyed it in 1633. In the 19th century locals called it Waldeck, a romantic misnomer. Restoration in 1983–84 stabilised the ruins. Visitors walk along five cross-ditches that once defended the long ridge. Two broad outer baileys stretch east of the main castle mound. The deep eastern neck ditch is cut from rock to a depth of ten metres. The square core of the main castle measures about thirty by thirty-five metres and is ringed by a shallow inner ditch. A tall square bergfried, thirty metres high and five and a half metres wide, dominates the scene. Its high entrance on the west side leads into a vaulted second floor. Fragments of curtain walls and a smaller rectangular tower survive on the south-west corner.