Lichtenwalde Castle

The origins of Lichtenwalde date back to 1230, when the Margraves of Meissen built a castle on the Zschopau riverbank. This served as protection against neighboring lordships. After changing owners, including the Burgraves of Meissen and the Honsberg family, the castle fell to the Harras family in 1447. Eustachius von Harras had the old castle converted into a residential palace in 1550. After his death without male heirs, Lichtenwalde passed to the Electoral House of Saxony in 1561. In 1694, the Bünau family acquired the property. In 1719, Jakob Heinrich Graf von Flemming bought the estate but sold it in 1722 to Christoph Heinrich Reichsgraf von Watzdorf, who had the existing structures demolished and the current Baroque castle erected. His son Friedrich Carl von Watzdorf began creating the park around 1730. After Watzdorf's death without descendants, Lichtenwalde came into the possession of the Vitzthum von Eckstädt family in 1764, who held the castle until its expropriation in 1945.