Wasserleonburg: A Historic Castle Complex in Austria
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.5
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Austria
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern, Modern
- Civilizations
- Habsburg, Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Domestic
- Remains
- Castle
On this page16 sections
History
Wasserleonburg is a historic castle complex above Saak in Austria, in the municipality of Nötsch im Gailtal at the southern foot of the Dobratsch. Its predecessor stood east of the present buildings and was first recorded in 1253 as a fief of the Bamberg bishopric, an ecclesiastical principality whose bishops held and granted estates as feudal possessions. Cholo of the Ras-Rosegg family held the castle and adopted the name Lewenburch, while forms such as Löwenburg and Leumburg also appeared. The family’s coat of arms included the Bamberg lion.
Medieval lordship
The castle remained a Bamberg fief when it was temporarily granted to Frederick III, Count of Nuremberg. Political circumstances prevented him from taking possession, and he received other estates as compensation around 1296 and 1297. During the later thirteenth century, effective control of the fief shifted to the Duchy of Carinthia, ruled by Meinhard II, Count of Tyrol-Gorizia and Duke of Carinthia.
Around 1308, Meinhard’s son, Duke Otto of Carinthia, granted the castle to his vice-dominus Heinrich Gralant. Gralant enlarged it around 1310. After the death of Duke Henry of Carinthia, the castle and lordship passed with Carinthia to the Habsburgs in 1335. The Habsburgs, a major European ruling dynasty, then granted equal shares to the Weißenegg and Ungnad families. In 1346, the Bamberg bishopric tried unsuccessfully to recover the property through a mortgage agreement with Wülfing Ungnad.
Earthquake and rebuilding
On 25 January 1348, a major earthquake severely damaged the original castle. The shock also caused a landslide on the Dobratsch. The displaced earth blocked the Gail River below the castle and created a long, narrow lake. The name Wasserleonburg has traditionally been connected with this event.
A replacement castle was constructed in a somewhat different position during the second half of the fourteenth century and the beginning of the fifteenth. The estate received its own district court in 1404, a jurisdiction it retained until 1643. In 1408, Duke Leopold IV granted the castle, lordship, and court to the brothers Wulfing and Konrad Ungnad.
Ungnad and Neumann ownership
By 1471, a feudal document described the castle as decayed. Around 1522, Hans, Andrä, and Christoph Ungnad sold the castle and lordship to Wilhelm Neumann, a wealthy merchant, district judge, and prominent citizen of Villach. The lordship included associated jurisdictions and privileges, fishing rights, 92 peasant holdings, 11 additional fiefs, and 126 cottages. Neumann had built his wealth through interests in the lead mine at Bleiberg near Villach and mercury mines at Idria.
The later name Wasserleonburg appears from around 1509. The form Wasserneuburg was used in 1528 and still appeared in 1571. Traditional interpretation links Wasserleonburg with the lake formed after the 1348 landslide, while newer research associates Wasserneuburg with Neumann’s rebuilding of the deteriorated castle.
Anna Neumann and later owners
After Wilhelm Neumann’s death, the property passed to his widow Barbara and, from 1572, to their daughter Anna Neumann. Later known as Anna von Liechtenstein and Anna von Wasserleonburg, she administered the estate for about fifty years and died in 1623. Following an inheritance process, Wasserleonburg passed to the Proy family. In 1664, marriage transferred it from the Proys to Johann Andrä Semler of Scharfenstein.
The Semler family remodelled the castle in Baroque style in 1747. When the family became extinct in 1803, the lordship and castle passed to Count Anton Attems. Financial difficulties later resulted in a public auction, at which the merchant Romuald Holenia acquired the estate in 1858. Ownership subsequently passed to Oskar von Schneditz.
Modern history
After 1923, Count Paul Münster of Hanover carried out extensive renovation work and laid out or reconstructed the park. Count Johannes Welczek, the German ambassador in Paris, owned the castle from 1938 to 1950. It then passed to Marquis George de Cuevas until 1957, to Enrico Mayer von Wittgenstein until 1972, and in 1972 to the Frankfurt industrialist Heinz Friederichs. The Heinz and Gisela Friederichs Foundation has owned Wasserleonburg since 2022.
From 5 June to 7 September 1937, the abdicated British king Edward VIII, later the Duke of Windsor, and Wallis Simpson spent their honeymoon at Wasserleonburg. The privately owned castle is protected as a monument by the Republic of Austria under protection number 34778.
Remains
Wasserleonburg forms an elongated complex on a plateau above Nötsch, while the site of the predecessor castle lies to the east. A cypress avenue leads toward the garden terrace. The north side is bounded by a long farm wing from the eighteenth century. The buildings combine medieval fabric with Renaissance, late-Mannerist, Baroque, and nineteenth-century additions.
Medieval and Renaissance buildings
East wing and keep
The three-storey east wing dates from the fourteenth or fifteenth century and contains the oldest part of the present complex, a keep probably built during the same period. Its thick walls, vaulted ground floor, and narrow stone staircases retain a medieval appearance. The keep and enclosing walls also contain nineteenth-century romantic additions, including swallow-tail crenellations.
Entrance and inner courtyard
The two-storey entrance facade stands on the east side. Rusticated and plastered corners frame a broad, round-arched portal. The portal opens into a passage with a vaulted ceiling, which leads to the narrow inner courtyard. The oldest parts of the complex were extended westward during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and the west wing dates from the seventeenth century.
South wing and courtyard facade
The south wing has a ground-floor courtyard arcade covered by groin vaults. Its arches rest on Tuscan columns, while a representative late-Renaissance display wall closes one narrow side of the courtyard. The three-storey facade has two axes and pink limestone rustication on the ground and first floors. Two windows stand above the broad arched portal on each upper level. Niches beside the second-storey windows contain male and female saints. That upper storey was probably added in the late seventeenth century.
The courtyard facade is a late-Mannerist work from around 1650. Late Mannerism was an elaborate architectural language that followed the High Renaissance. Johann Andreas Semler installed the keystone on the inner side of the portal in 1747. The complex also contains a Renaissance arcaded courtyard, upper-storey rooms with stucco ceilings, partly historic and partly modern furnishings, and several old marble fireplaces.
Chapel and service buildings
Chapel of Saint Joseph
The chapel is dedicated to Saint Joseph. Built in 1723 and remodelled in 1747, it stands beside a rusticated main portal. A two-storey portico associated with the chapel has a curved hipped roof and a small bell tower.
Former horse stable
The highly decorated former horse stable was built beside the chapel in the eighteenth century. It is a three-aisled hall with twelve Tuscan marble columns and groin vaulting. The building now serves as a representative event hall.
West-wing dining room
Four wall paintings dating from around 1700 survive in the dining room of the west wing.
Adaptation of the complex
In 1996 and 1997, a 150-square-metre hall was converted and restored for events and dedicated to Anna Neumann von Wasserleonburg. The courtyard, chapel, dining room, and ancillary buildings are also used for events.
