Davensberg Castle

The still preserved round tower of Davensberg Castle is located in the Davensberg district of the North Rhine-Westphalian municipality of Ascheberg in the Coesfeld district. The tower with "torture chamber and witch's stock" now houses a museum operated by the Davensberg local history association. The exhibition focuses on old agricultural cultural implements.

The round tower was part of Davensberg Castle, probably built around 1250, and was presumably erected around 1500/1530 during an expansion of the complex. The founders of the castle were probably the Lords of Meinhövel. Around 1320, half of the complex came into the possession of the noble Lords of Büren, a powerful noble family from the Prince-Bishopric of Paderborn, through the marriage of the heiress Gerburg. Around 1360, after the death of the last male Meinhövel at Davensberg, they also acquired possession of the other half.

In 1589, through the marriage of the heiresses Agnes and Johanna von Büren, the castle passed into the possession of the Lords of Morrien zu Nordkirchen and Wolf von Füchteln. During the Thirty Years' War, the complex was subjected to severe destruction, as Lüneburg troops set it and the adjacent castle freedom on fire in 1634. In 1736, the von Morrien family became the sole owners of the buildings, which gradually fell into disrepair from 1750 onwards.

Of the former castle complex, only the round tower made of brick and rubble masonry, as well as excavated foundation remains and debris, are preserved today. On the upper floor of the tower, last restored in 1971, there is a fireplace room, on the ground floor a prison, and below that a dungeon.