Neues Palais Arnstadt mit Schlossmuseum: A Baroque Palace and Museum in Germany
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.5
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Germany
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Early Modern
- Civilizations
- Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Domestic
- Remains
- Palace
On this page13 sections
History
Neues Palais Arnstadt mit Schlossmuseum is a Baroque palace and museum in Germany, commissioned between 1729 and 1734 by Fürst Günther I of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen for himself and his wife, Elisabeth Albertine, born Princess of Anhalt-Bernburg. Conceived as a future widow’s residence for Elisabeth Albertine, it also served the couple’s residential and representational needs and provided space for their extensive art collections.
Construction and princely use
The foundation stone was laid on 25 May 1729 in the absence of the princely couple. The palace was ceremonially inaugurated on 10 November 1734. Its dual purpose shaped the building as both a residence and a setting for court representation, while its rooms housed and displayed objects collected by the princely household.
From civic collection to museum
The Arnstadt Museum Society was founded in 1894. The following year it asked local citizens to gather objects for a future museum of local history. The collection grew quickly, was exhibited in the town hall in 1898, and moved to the Neues Palais in 1919.
After Günther Victor of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt abdicated on 25 November 1918, the state parliament of the Free State of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen established the Museumsstiftung zu Arnstadt on 22 April 1919. The foundation was intended to open the Neues Palais to the public as a museum. The Schlossmuseum Arnstadt now brings together the former princely collections and the town’s historical collections, reflecting both princely initiative and the work of the Museum Society.
Remains
The Neues Palais is arranged as a three-wing complex around a courtyard, with its principal display facade facing east. The central corps de logis, the main residential block, has 17 window axes. Its projecting central avant-corps is marked by a high carriage entrance and an altan, or raised balcony, with a gilded balustrade. A triangular pediment carries the coats of arms of Günther I and Elisabeth Albertine.
The north and south wings are each three stories high and have seven or ten window axes. Rusticated pilasters give the facades vertical emphasis, while continuous cornices and simple shouldered window surrounds organize them horizontally. In the central avant-corps, simple triangular and segmental pediments further emphasize the windows. On the west, the courtyard side is connected to a stable building. A pleasure garden extends southward, where an orangery stood until early 1989.
Princely rooms and collections
Porcelain Cabinet
The southern piano nobile, the palace’s principal reception and living level, contains restored Baroque rooms. The Porcelain Cabinet survives almost in its original condition and presents nearly 800 different objects, including Chinese and Japanese porcelain, stone carvings, faience, and Meissen porcelain.
Picture Cabinet
The Picture Cabinet contains paintings and furniture from the former princely collection, including two small cabinet cupboards. Together, these furnishings and artworks form part of the room sequence associated with the palace’s courtly collections.
Pilaster Room
The Pilaster Room, also called the Small Dining Room, displays early Meissen porcelain and Böttger stoneware. Its restored Baroque setting belongs to the southern piano nobile and forms part of the rooms devoted to the former princely art collections.
Additional collection rooms
Other rooms contain sixteenth-century Flemish tapestries, including Monkeys Feasting in the Forest, as well as Dorotheenthal faience and Baroque ceremonial goblets. These objects extend the range of the collections beyond porcelain, combining textiles, ceramics, and courtly vessels.
Later interiors and specialist exhibitions
Festival Hall
The festival hall is presented in the historicist form it received in 1881. Three Baroque chandeliers remain major elements of its interior appearance.
Johann Sebastian Bach exhibition
The permanent exhibition on Johann Sebastian Bach occupies the first attic level. Bach, a major German Baroque composer and organist, is represented centrally by an organ console presented as an instrument he played.
Mon plaisir
Mon plaisir occupies the ground floor of the southern corps de logis. This historically unusual doll city consists of dolls associated with Auguste Dorothea of Schwarzburg-Arnstadt, a seventeenth- and eighteenth-century princess. The collection came from her former Schloss Augustenburg, which no longer exists.
Nearby sites
