Nordeck Castle (Ruin)

The castle ruin Nordeck consists of the remains of the round keep, the prison tower, and some remnants of the foundation walls. It is located northeast of Stadtsteinach in the Upper Franconian district of Kulmbach in Bavaria. The ruin of the spur castle is freely accessible. It stands directly above the isolated settlement of Mittelhammer in the valley of the lower Steinach.

Nearby are other former medieval castles; slightly higher on the same spur lies a motte and an unknown castle site. Immediately southwest, on the opposite side of the Steinach valley, on the so-called Kanzel, an eastward projecting mountain spur, there is another castle site.

About 800 meters southwest lies the ring wall Grüne Bürg or Grüne Burg, a presumably early medieval fortification.

Up the Steinach valley, south of the village of Wildenstein, is the Wildenstein castle site on a rock bar projecting into the valley.

The former Nordeck Castle was built around 1100 by the Counts of Henneberg. Together with Steinach, today's Stadtsteinach, Bishop Eberhard II of Bamberg acquired the castle in 1151. In 1438, the castle was destroyed in the minor war of the Waldenfelser against the Bishop of Bamberg (see also Waldenfelser Feud). In the mid-15th century, it was rebuilt. The robber knight Thomas von Absberg hid kidnapped prisoners there. Until the beginning of the 16th century, the castle was the seat of episcopal bailiffs. It was destroyed again in 1525 during the Peasants' War and abandoned.