Bärnfels Castle: A Late-Medieval Hill Castle in Germany
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.4
- Popularity
- Low
- Country
- Germany
- Primary era
- Medieval
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval
- Civilizations
- Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Military
- Remains
- Castle
On this page6 sections
History
Foundation and Feudal Possession
Bärnfels Castle is a late-medieval aristocratic hill castle in Germany, probably built around 1330 by Siboto I of Egloffstein, who founded the Bärenfels line of the Egloffstein family. It was a castle of the medieval service nobility, whose members served rulers and ecclesiastical or aristocratic lords in administrative and military roles.
The first documented reference dates to 2 August 1389. At that time, Conrad Hans and Ulrich of Egloffstein zu Bärenfels transferred the outer bailey, known as the Lower Fortress, to the Landgraves of Leuchtenberg as a fief after a feud. A fief was a right or holding granted by a lord in return for service and allegiance. In 1483, the holding passed to the Gaillenreuth branch of the Egloffstein family, and the last recorded grant by the Leuchtenberg landgraves took place in 1495.
Destruction and Later Ownership
During the Peasants’ War, the widespread rural revolt in the German lands in 1525, Egloffstein subjects burned the castle. It was never fully repaired afterward. In 1580, the Lordship of Bärnfels and the castle ruins were sold to the Bishopric of Bamberg, an ecclesiastical principality ruled by the prince-bishop of Bamberg. The property entered Bavarian state ownership in 1803 during secularization, when church lands and institutions were transferred to secular authorities.
Large parts of the complex became unstable and were demolished during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In 1877, the Nuremberg pharmacist Kleemann acquired the site and arranged for the surviving remains to be restored. The municipality of Bärnfels carried out another renovation in 1969. The ruins are now once again owned by the Egloffstein family. Bärnfels Castle is designated as an architectural heritage monument in Bavaria.
Remains
Castle Spur and Defensive Tower
Bärnfels Castle stands on a broad, rocky spur of the Bergschmidtsknock at about 515 metres above sea level, above the southern edge of Bärnfels in the Franconian Switzerland–Veldenstein Forest Nature Park. The late-medieval hill and spur castle was built in rubble-stone masonry. Its surviving form is that of a restored ruin, with fragments of the castle walls remaining after the later demolition of unstable sections.
A rocky pinnacle within the ruins supported the bergfried, the principal defensive and refuge tower of a medieval German castle. The tower’s position on the pinnacle formed part of the castle’s defensive arrangement, while the surviving wall fragments preserve elements of the wider enclosure.
Lower Fortress
The former outer bailey, or Lower Fortress, was a distinct part of the castle complex. Its transfer to the Landgraves of Leuchtenberg in 1389 is the earliest recorded event connected with Bärnfels Castle. The ruins lie about 2.2 kilometres north of the church at Obertrubach. Other associated castle sites in the surrounding area include Leienfels Castle to the east, Leupoldstein Castle to the southeast, a former castle site at Obertrubach to the south, and the inhabited castle of Gößweinstein to the north.
Nearby sites
