Rietburg

Artist's impression

The construction of Rietburg castle is dated to the period 1200 to 1204 and ascribed to the lords of Riet. These noblemen were initially vassals of the North Alsatian Benedictine abbey of Weißenburg, later they became ministeriales and feudatories of the then German Hohenstaufen lords. The family came from the region between Speyer and Germersheim and had taken their name from their place of origin along the River Rhine that had been colonised by reeds (German: Riet = "reed"). They were first mentioned in 1149 in a deed belonging to the South Palatine abbey of Eußerthal. The castle was built by Conrad II of Riet, the eldest of six sons of Conrad I and his wife, Adelheid, whom he married in 1184.[1]

Following the death of Conrad II, his cousin, Hermann of Riet, inherited the lordship of the castle (Burgherrschaft). In the conflicts that broke out after 1250 between the Hohenstaufens and the Welfs he remained a Hohenstaufen follower and went down in history as the result of a political hostage taking: in 1255 he took the Welf Queen Elisabeth, wife of the German king, William hostage, together with her escort during a journey from the episcopal town of Worms to the imperial castle of Trifels near the village of Edesheim. She was imprisoned at the Rietburg. A coalition of regional princes and towns forced him to release his prisoners on 4 December 1255. Hermann escaped with his life, but his castle was seized from him and declared an imperial castle that was under the immediate suzerainty of the king. Its first vassal was the Upper Alsatian Landvogt, Otto III of Ochsenstein. When his daughter married Emich V of Leiningen-Landeck, the castle went in the 1280s to a branch of the House of Leiningen. Later, ownership passed to the Bishopric of Speyer.[1]

In 1470, during the Weißenburg Feud between Prince-Elector Frederick the Victorious of the Palatinate and his cousin, Duke Louis the Black of Palatinate-Zweibrücken, the Rietburg was shelled by Leiningen troops and badly damaged, but remained inhabitable. The castle survived the Palatine Peasants' War of 1525 unscathed, but was finally destroyed during the Thirty Years' War (1618–48) and never rebuilt.[1]

During excavations in 1872, 580 gold and silver coins were found, dating to the 16th century. In 1925 the municipality of Rhodt carried out comprehensive preservation work in order to prevent the further ruin of the Rietburg. In 1931 the Palatine Forest Club built a refuge hut in the castle and, in 1955, the castle restaurant was built. Since 1991 the Rietburg Club has worked on the conservation of the site.[1][2] For example, in 2012 25,000 € was invested in a wooden bridge over the historic neck ditch, which was probably originally spanned by a drawbridge.[3]

Blättersberg with Rietburg and Villa Ludwigshöhe, view from Edenkoben

Observation point on the Rietburg

Since 1954, a chair lift, known as the Rietburgbahn has run from the Rhine Plain up to a terrace on the eastern side of the Rietburg. The return journey offers good views over the plain. The bottom station is accessible on foot or by car and is located near the schloss of Villa Ludwigshöhe, a stately residence built from 1846 to 1852 by order of Louis I of Bavaria.

The top station of the Rietburgbahn lies just a few steps away from the castle ruins and a pub, the Höhengaststätte Rietburg has been incorporated into it, which has an open-air terrace with extensive views over the Rhine Plain. From here the whole Bergstraße Route may be seen across the plain from Melibokus in the north to the Königstuhl near Heidelberg. The view continues to Steinsberg near Sinsheim, the highest point of the Kraichgau region; and in clear visibility the Heuchelberg and Stromberg may be seen. To the southeast is the Northern Black Forest from the Badener Höhe via the Mehliskopf to the Hornisgrinde. In exceptionally clear weather, the tall houses of Frankfurt (Westendstraße 1) may be seen to the far north-northeast, to the east Katzenbuckel (immediately left of the Königstuhl) and to the south-southeast, the Central Black Forest as far as Kenzingen, where the Black Forest descends eastwards into the Freiburg Bay.

The Rietburg is the venue for the International Rietburg Hill Run every September, a race which is part of the Palatine Hill Running Cup. It is 8,200 metres long and climbs 420 metres.