The founder and builder of the Reinsberg Castle is not known with certainty. However, the establishment of castle and village Reinsberg is probably due to a German nobleman named Reinhardt who had the castle built in order to protect an agricultural settlement. Already in 1197, the castle is recorded as the seat of a noble family when a member of the Reinsberg (Regensberg) family appears as a witness in a document. Their lordship did not endure for long, as they already lost major parts of their ancestral properties in the 14th century to the Schönberg family who acquired the remainder, together with the castle, in 1411. The castle remained a seat of the Schönberg family for more than 500 years. Part of the estate was a folwark in Krummenhennersdorf which was operated as a separate manor.
In the GDR, Reinsberg castle was a holiday hostel for employees of Kombinat Schwarze Pumpe, afterwards it passed into private property and was used as a hotel until 1995. It stands currently (2019) empty. The park remains accessible to visitors on foot. A local initiative has formed to save the building from ruin. The adjacent bathing park has been the open-air swimming pool for Reinsberg since 1978. The hiking trail Grabentour passes in its immediate vicinity.
The steep slope towards Bobritzsch river is a likely reason for the choice of the site for a castle-like fortification. The unprotected eastern side of the castle is defended by a moat which could only be crossed on a drawbridge. The castle was crowned by a substantial tower.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.