Germany: What is a Castle?
Before visiting Germany, my experience with castles was limited to Cinderella’s Castle in the Magic Kingdom at Disney World. Of course, I had also seen castles in movies with the setting usually being in England (including my college-years favorite cult movie – “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”!).
We were just in Germany visiting Jodi’s sister Lauri and husband Andrew (yes, another fine Andrew or Andy in our family circle!) and seeing the sites – which included a few castles. In Germany, there are lots of castles in various states of, well let’s say, disrepair – that’s because they’ve been around for hundreds and years. Lauri says some are now basically “a pile of rocks” (we didn’t see any of these rock-pile castles, although maybe we did while driving around the countryside and I just thought it was a pile of rocks).
Some castles, like the one near the small town of Kindsbach where Lauri and Andy live, are largely intact in some parts (you could live there) and mostly fallen apart (or down) in other parts (not a good place to live unless you bring your own roof and walls). Come to think of it, I’ve seen houses like this driving around rural America too! (but still somebody’s “castle”).
Where Lauri and Andy live is fairly close to the southern border of Germany with France. Over the centuries, the Germans and French have warred with each other a lot and this border area was constantly changing hands. Thus, the castle on the high-ground near Kindsbach (Nanstein Castle) was a defensive structure which helped to keep the French and other enemies in check (everybody who has played or followed sports knows the importance of a good defense when battling your neighboring rivals like the Alabama Crimson Tide and Florida Gators – and good gosh do I so much hope the Georgia Bulldogs have a great defense this year under new head coach Kirby Smart – go Dawgs, sic ‘em, woof woof woof!)
We visited another castle in Heidelberg, Germany (Heidelberg Castle) which “back in the day” was mainly a palace for German nobles (Princes or Prince Electors) – but it also had to serve as a defensive structure against enemies of all sorts too. At one time, this was an enormously large and ornate castle palace – however, a good bit of it has fallen down over the centuries. But you can still get a good sense of what the castle palace looked like in its heyday including a moat big enough for boating regattas. Some of the moat area was dry land where the nobles would hunt deer brought in from the surrounding forests and let go in the moat for them to hunt – not a very fair hunt (like catching fish in a barrel) – but I guess if the nobles went out into the forest to hunt, they might be hunted themselves and killed by their rivals’ soldiers.
Another castle we visited in Germany, the Eltz Castle (Burg Eltz), was basically a family home – well, really three family homes all connected in the same castle complex. This was the most well-preserved castle we visited – that probably had something to do with the fact it has been in the same family (the Eltz family) for over 500 years! Different branches of the family built the three connected houses in the castle complex and fortunately lived there in peace and harmony since like all other castles, this castle was also attacked by rivals. It almost seems like building a castle was an open invitation for your neighbors to attack and try to take it over. During the worst attack on this castle, a neighboring rival actually built a small fortress on some high ground above the castle, named it something that basically meant “To Spite Eltz”, and then used it to lob rocks into the castle – this went on for about a year until the rival finally gave up (and you think you have problems getting along with your neighbors!).
So the answer to “What is a Castle” is that it can be many things – the main component of a defense strategy (like a star football linebacker!), a palace for rulers, and/or a family home. We also passed an old castle in Germany that looked like it has been converted to a winery. I’m sure nowadays old castles in Germany and Europe also serve other roles – I invited you readers to comment on the most interesting and unusual uses you have seen castles put to these days (keep it clean!). And remember, every home (including yours!) is a castle in some ways and serves some of the same functions as the castles of old – but that doesn’t mean we need to fight with our neighboring castles! 🙂
For more castle photos, see the “Europe Trip Photos” sections of this blog.
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