KINGS JOURNAL: Schloss Bürresheim (Patreon)

Last sunday I visited a place all of you have seen before.
Where did you see this castle?
In my Uncharted comic. In "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade". In "The Whipping boy" or "Rumpelstiltskin".
This castle is a secret celebrity.
It is located in the west of the german state of Rhineland-Palatinate, hidden in a small valley, surrounded by forests and a small river.
it is special among castles in Germany and Europe because of its history.
I was lucky and joined a guided tour (the last one on that day) with a very small group - only friends and me. Pretty cool for sightseeing.
Unluckily it is not allowed to take photos inside of the castle.

So why is this place special?! Because it was never destroyed or changed.
In 1157 the castle was noted for the first time. At this time it was a "real" castle. In german you differ between a "Burg" (castle) and a "Schloss" (castle). A "Burg" has defensive walls and a lot of defensive architecture. A "Schloss" does not have defensive architecture. So it is better to describe a "Schloss" as a "palace". In a later century the owners of castle Bürresheim decided to change their home and built new parts, broke defensive walls and the whole building got the look it has today.
Note:
With the invention of gunpowder and explosives building "Burgen" became useless/uncommon and the era of palaces began.

During the Palatinate War King Louis XIV ("Sun King") ordered his troops to destroy all castles, towns, villages - everything in the south western parts of the Holy Roman Empire. But a family member of the Bürresheim owners was a marshal in the kings army and he simply led them around the valley and they did not even know, that there was a castle. XD

During the French Revolution Napoleon invaded big parts of Europe and his troops destroyed lots of nobles properties and many nobles fled.
The Bürresheim nobles tried to escape, too, but they died in an accident.
So Napoleons troops stood literally in front of abandoned castle Bürresheim and waited for Napoleons orders. The heirs of the castle were called "Renesse" - French. Napoleon refused to destroy "french" property and he spared the castle.

The Renesse family lived inside the castle until in the 1930´s the last heir had to sell the castle to Prussia and after WW2 it became property of Rhineland-Palatinate.
All owners of the castle never changed the interior and they never changed the architecture after it became a palace. Each generation lived inside the castle as their home. They furnished their rooms in the style(s) of their lifetime. Today the castle has rooms and furniture for all style eras in european history. The oldest one is a big wooden chest, that is around 900 years old and looks like it was made by vikings. There is also a mask for the "Walk of Shame" (Game of Thrones" moment XD) - it was put on peoples faces and than the "guilty ones" had to walk somewhere and people spitted on them or threw all kind of things... The nobles were also judges and there were also witchcraft trials inside the castle.

The guided tour was great and fun. It took nearly one hour! To compare this: I have been to Castle Neuschwanstein and the tour took 15 minutes. -_-

So if you visit a castle or a palace today they were "customized for tourists". In a certain moment of history parts of them were changed or optimized for tourists. Put that interesting chair from that room into another one for example.
In this context castle Bürresheim is pretty unique. A home for french, german and european history connecting the centuries. Showing their beauty and showing their darkness. Imagine your home or appartement would remain the same for nearly 1000 years! O_O

It is a great experience to visit a place, that looks like a living fairy-tale and to realize, that it is filled with reality.

PS: I love that "simple" garden!