Ramstein Castle Ruins

En un regard

Le château en bref

The ruins of Ramstein Castle occupy a wooded ridge at about 688 m above sea level, in the upper Schiltach valley between Schramberg and Tennenbronn, in the central Black Forest. The castle was the political centre of the lords of Ramstein, a branch descended from the lords of Obereschach, and it already existed before 1137; the surviving masonry, in rusticated stone, is however dated to around 1250. Around 1280, the lordship passed to the lords of Falkenstein-Ramstein. In 1411, the fortress was captured and destroyed by the troops of Count Konrad of Fürstenberg and the city of Strasbourg, then rebuilt in 1428. In the mid-15th century, it served as the base of Hans von Rechberg, a knight waging a private war against the Swabian League of Cities: two merchants from Ulm were held there for ransom. In July 1452, an army of the cities besieged the castle and took it thanks to fire arrows that set the gate alight; the castle was never rebuilt. Thanks to the 14,000 florins of compensation obtained through imperial arbitration, Rechberg had the neighbouring fortress of Hohenschramberg built. Today, over an area of about 400 m², only a few sections of wall and the foundations survive, in the forest.