Reifferscheidt Castle

The ruin of Reifferscheid Castle stands at an altitude of 450 meters above sea level near the German-Belgian border between the Eifel and Ardennes in the municipality of Hellenthal. Its name probably derives from a clearing area that belonged to a man named Rifhari, as the names "Rifersceith" or "Rifheres-sceit" mean "forest part of Rifhari".

Of the medieval hilltop castle, only remnants of the surrounding walls, a gatehouse with two flanking round towers and a gabled passage, as well as the widely visible, round and now white-painted keep made of quarry stone masonry, remain.

The ruin is freely accessible and can be visited, and parts of it can also be rented for private celebrations. The "Historical Festival" takes place annually on its grounds, regularly attracting thousands of visitors. Here, old craft techniques are sometimes demonstrated and corresponding products are offered for sale.

Reifferscheid is first mentioned in writing in 1106 in the Chronica regia coloniensis under "Riferschit". The content of the message at that time referred to the destruction of the castle by its then owner Duke Heinrich of Limburg and Lower Lorraine. He burned down his castle to prevent it from falling into enemy hands.

In 1130, Archbishop Friedrich I of Cologne elevated a chapel located near the castle to a parish church, which was looked after by Steinfeld Abbey, and in 1195, the Lords of Reifferscheid are mentioned for the first time in documents. A few years later, the brothers Gerhard and Philipp von Reifferscheid divided their dominion, and a new family branch emerged: the Lords of Wildenburg.

Shortly after Johann V von Reifferscheid took over the dominion, the complex was besieged in 1385 by troops of the Maas-Rhine Landfrieden alliance of the cities of Cologne and Aachen, the Archbishops of Cologne and Liège, and the Duke of Jülich, because Johann had broken the Landfrieden through numerous raids in the surrounding area. However, the siege was unsuccessful, and the allied troops withdrew after three months without achieving their goal.

In 1416, the Lords of Reifferscheid inherited the Niedersalm line of the Counts of Salm and from then on called themselves Salm-Reifferscheid.

After a fire in 1509, the damaged complex was rebuilt. Another fire on June 23, 1669, then completely destroyed the town of Reifferscheid and its castle. On the remains of the old building fabric, its owner subsequently had a representative Baroque-style castle built, and the houses of the former castle freedom were also rebuilt on the foundations of the old castle ring.

But the new splendor did not last long. During the War of the Palatine Succession, the castle was razed in 1689 by troops of Louis XIV. However, the subsequent reconstruction must have happened very quickly, because an ink drawing by Mathieu Throuüet shows the castle completely restored by around 1725.

After troops of the French Revolutionary Army occupied and destroyed the complex in 1794, the Lords of Reifferscheid were dispossessed in 1803. The dominion of Reifferscheid was thus dissolved. The ruin was auctioned for demolition in 1805 and came into the possession of a private individual. In the following decades, it served as a quarry and provided building material for new buildings in the area, before it came back into the possession of the Salm-Reifferscheid family, who had by then been elevated to princely status, in 1889.

Since 1965, the ruin has again been owned by the municipality of Hellenthal. The citizens of Reifferscheid have dedicated themselves strongly to its preservation in recent decades, for which the town has been awarded several times.