Wildenstein Castle

Wildenstein is a castle in the municipality of Veltheim in the Swiss canton of Aargau. It is located about 1.5 kilometers south of the village on a rocky outcrop at the foot of the Veltheimerberg, part of the Jura mountain range, not far from the western bank of the Aare river.

The origins of Wildenstein Castle are unknown. It was first mentioned in 1301 as an allod of the Schenken von Kasteln, and before 1307 it came into the possession of the Lords of Rinach. The two defensive towers were built around 1350, and the palas was built or expanded around 1400. The complex has the shape of an irregular quadrangle. The two keeps, the curtain wall, the palas, and economic buildings are grouped around the inner courtyard. In 1415, Henmann von Rinach received Wildenstein from the city of Bern as a male fief. In 1491, the brothers Hans Albrecht and Hermann von Mülinen bought Wildenstein Castle and its jurisdiction. From 1640, under Hans Thüring Effinger, the medieval castle was converted into a baroque residential castle. In 1720, Franz Friedrich Effinger sold Wildenstein to the wealthy merchant David Sprüngli (1697-1744), son-in-law of Bern's city architect Samuel Jenner. At the request of the Schenkenberg bailiff Johann Rudolf von Luternau, Sprüngli was forced to sell Wildenstein to Bern so that the bailiff of Schenkenberg could move into Wildenstein instead of the dilapidated Schenkenberg Castle. Until 1798, 15 bailiffs resided at Wildenstein Castle.

After the fall of the Republic of Bern, Wildenstein passed to the newly created Canton of Aargau, which sold the castle to private owners in 1804. In 1816, the French Lieutenant General Jean Rapp bought the castle to retire there. In 1819, the property was auctioned, and the castle building and the associated land parcels were separated. The castle went to lawyer Amsler, Ludwig Albrecht Effinger bought the Wildensteiner Schachen. Niklaus Friedrich von Mülinen was able to acquire the remaining parcels in 1831. Mülinen's brother-in-law Rudolf Emanuel Effinger managed this land and lived in the tenant's house at Wildenstein for this purpose. The Zurich painter Karl Friedrich Irminger (1813-1863) bought the castle in 1840, only to resell it to Rudolf Emanuel Effinger in the same year. From 1894, Pauline von Sinner–von Effinger (1836-1906) owned the castle. She bequeathed Wildenstein Castle as a foundation for charitable purposes, managed by her sister Julie von Effinger. Julie von Effinger soon passed on the administration of the foundation to relatives, from 1908 Anna von May (1876-?) owned the castle, and in 1927 Pastor Adolf Frey, married to Sophie von Wattenwyl, a great-niece of Pauline von Sinner, became the new owner. Frey was the head of the Deaconess House in Bern and from 1928 built a retirement home for the Deaconess House. This existed until 1972.

In 2010, Wildenstein Castle was auctioned off by the bankruptcy office. Samuel Wehrli from Suhr, the new owner, plans to make the castle accessible to the public as a museum after restoration. In March 2014, Samuel Wehrli founded the Wildenstein Castle Foundation, which will ensure the preservation, maintenance, and operation of the castle complex, which will be publicly accessible in the future.