Hardenburg Castle

Hardenburg Castle, on the eastern edge of the Palatinate Forest near the Rhineland-Palatinate district town of Bad Dürkheim, is still one of the most powerful castles in the Palatinate, even as a ruin.

The hilltop castle is located above the eponymous western district of Bad Dürkheim-Hardenburg on a 200 m long spur to the right above the Isenach valley, whose opening to the Rhine plain it formerly controlled. Access is via federal highway 37 (Bad Dürkheim–Kaiserslautern) and is signposted.

Hardenburg Castle shares many sections of its history with Limburg Monastery, located almost 2 kilometers to the east, from its construction onwards. Opposite, above the left bank of the Isenach, lie much older testimonies to the region's past, e.g., the Celtic ring fort Heidenmauer or the Roman quarry Kriemhildenstuhl.

At the latest between 1205 and 1214, Hardenburg Castle was built by the Counts of Leiningen, who had their ancestral castle Altleiningen ten kilometers further north. For this, they unlawfully appropriated land belonging to Limburg Monastery. Count Friedrich II of Leiningen is considered the founder. In 1237, the castle passed to his son Count Friedrich III in a first Leiningen inheritance division. In 1317, another inheritance division led to the creation of the Leiningen-Hardenburg line under Count Jofried. In the inheritance dispute after his death, the Leiningen-Rixingen line split off in 1345.

After the imperial ban was imposed on Count Emich IX in 1512, Hardenburg Castle was besieged by the Elector Palatine, Ludwig V. The Leiningen family surrendered the castle before it was damaged and received it back in 1519. At the end of the 15th and beginning of the 16th century, they expanded the castle and fortified it even more strongly against enemy artillery fire. Thus, it also offered refuge to the population of the surrounding villages during the Thirty Years' War.

From 1560 to 1725, Hardenburg was the main residence of the Leiningen family and was expanded into a residential palace during this era. It survived the Palatinate War of Succession (1688–1697), in which troops of the French "Sun King" Louis XIV under General Mélac devastated the Palatinate west of the Rhine, but at Hardenburg, they only destroyed the fortifications in 1692. In 1725, the Counts of Leiningen-Dagsburg-Hardenburg moved their residence to the nearby Dürkheim Castle. In 1794, the residential buildings of Hardenburg were set on fire by French revolutionary troops, destroying the valuable interior. Gradually, the castle fell into ruin. Dürkheim Castle also went up in flames. In 1801, all German territories west of the Rhine fell to France, which is why Prince Carl zu Leiningen was compensated in 1803 by the Reichsdeputationshauptschluss with former Mainz and Würzburg possessions in the Odenwald and briefly ruled the new Principality of Leiningen with its seat in the former Amorbach Abbey, which is still owned by the princely house today. In the Palatinate Forest, besides Hardenburg (and the medieval possession Landeck Castle further south), the remains of the former hunting lodges Kehrdichannichts, Murrmirnichtviel, and Schaudichnichtum still commemorate the former rule.