Stockenfels Castle Ruins

Castle 🏰 Stockenfels is just,
every 1st Sunday from May to October,
to be viewed from the inside ->
Should definitely be done.

Stockenfels castle ruinsStockenfels Castle was probably built around 1300, but was only mentioned in documents in 1340 as the property of Emperor Ludwig of Bavaria. In 1351, the Wittelsbach family pledged the castle to the Auer patrician family from Regensburg, who used it as a starting point for raids against the imperial city. In 1372, the Wittelsbachers recaptured Stockenfels from Wernher im Auer and have occupied it with their keepers ever since. Since 1430 there has been a chain of different owners, some of whom were notorious robber barons.
In 1565, the Count Palatine gave the castle to his councilor Hans Schott; other representatives of this family were employed by the Palatinate Wittelsbachers in Amberg as caretakers at the Wetterfeld and Cham castles. The trace of the Schotts only disappeared with the defeat of their feudal lord, Elector Frederick V of the Palatinate, in 1620 at the beginning of the Thirty Years' War. The subsequent owners continue to change constantly and repairs are only carried out on a temporary basis. Therefore the decline continued into modern times. At the beginning of the 19th century, Baron Karl von Eckart acquired the ruins, which his descendants, the Counts von der Mühle-Eckart, still own today.
The core castle of the Stockenfels ruins consists of a residential tower, the courtyard with a fountain and kitchen building and a subdivided residential building, which form a long rectangle in a linear sequence. The outer walls consist of irregular granite blocks, with the corners made of carefully hewn humped blocks. On the south and east sides you can still make out a rudimentary kennel with a semicircular wall tower. About 10 meters below the castle is the rectangular outer bailey to the west. It was probably added later and enclosed utility buildings.
The residential tower at the north end is particularly interesting. It has 5 floors, 16 m high and 1.7 m thick walls. The entrance is 4 m high. The lower floors date from the time it was built. The upper floors date from around 1515 and were separated by beamed ceilings. The windows on the south side show coats of arms of Upper Palatinate knightly families: there are the Heuraus, the Fraunbergers, the Hofer zu Lobenstein and the Sattelbogen.
The residential building in the south of the core castle has two cellars and a vaulted ground floor with narrow light slits. The upper floor was the main living space in the castle and has larger arched windows.Source: burgenseite.de

Beautiful castle ruins, pleasant paths