Lichtenberg Castle
Description
Lichtenberg Castle is a ruined castle dating to the 12th century near Salzgitter in the German state of Lower Saxony.
The site, which is extremely good from a strategic perspective, shows the ideal type of ground plan of a hill castle from the High Middle Ages. The builder of the most important fortifications of the Welf dynasty was Duke Henry the Lion. The castle was built to counter the Bishopric of Hildesheim and its Hohenstaufen neighbour in Goslar. In spite of numerous conflicts of those times, it was not destroyed until 1552 by the cannons of a mercenary army.
Since 1892, there has been a Society for the Preservation of Lichtenberg Castle, which was refounded in 1995 as the 'Friends of Lichtenberg Castle' (200 members). In 1861 the bergfried, which had become a 15-metre-high ruin, collapsed and was demolished. Around 1900, the preservation society built a new tower on the old foundations, with the same hexagonal plan, which today has a wooden viewing platform with a height of about 25 metres. From the observation deck there are good views over the Harz Foreland to the Brocken. Investigations of the castle well showed it to be about 60 m deep and dug by hand. Since 2005, there has been a replica trebuchet, a medieval catapult engine, on the castle site. Next to the castle is a tourist restaurant with a beer garden and hotel.
Address
Burgbergstraße 147, Salzgitter, Germany
Established
c. 1180
Wikipedia article