Liebstedt Castle

The castle was originally built in the 10th century. It was constructed as a lowland castle with a moat on one of the most important medieval long-distance trade routes, the Copper Road. The origins of the Copper Road date back to prehistory. The road connected Jutland in the north with Venice in the south until 1846. Anyone traveling on this road inevitably had to pass through this castle.

In 956, "Libenstete" (Liebstedt) and "Azmenstat" (Oßmannstedt) were gifted by Otto I to the Quedlinburg Abbey. In 1300, the castle came to the Pforte Abbey and in 1304 to the Hersfeld Abbey. In 1314, the Landgraves of Thuringia acquired the castle, and it became a fief of Count Heinrich von Beichlingen. In 1331, the castle came to the Teutonic Order, which established a Komturei, an administrative district, comprising Liebstedt, Goldbach, and Wohlsborn.

Unique is the castle's defense system, a triple moat-and-rampart system, a combination of a water moat, a dry moat, and ramparts. The ramparts even enclosed the entire village. The water moat, filled with groundwater, surrounded the core castle, forming an artificial island accessible only via two drawbridges with gate towers. The water moat has been partially reconstructed and refilled today.

A special feature is the brick construction. During a profound renovation in the 15th century, this construction method, previously unknown in these latitudes, was applied and probably spread from here, promoted by the Teutonic Order, throughout Thuringia (Brick Gothic).

In 1809, the Teutonic Order was dispossessed by order of Napoleon. After the Congress of Vienna, the Grand Duchy of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach received the castle.

The complex today covers approximately four hectares. The outer bailey, which served as an economic courtyard (coach house for carriages and wagons, stables, servants' quarters), also features an unusual roof construction in the barn, without vertical support beams.

The knightly family "von Liebstedt" of the same name, of the same lineage as the knights "von Oßmannstedt" and "von Denstedt", is documented from 1211 to 1348. In 1221, the knight Heinrich von Liebstedt is mentioned as a Vogt in a document of the Oberweimar Abbey, in 1265 Heinrich von Liebstedt as a lay brother of the Pforta Abbey, and in 1285 a Ludwig von Liebstedt as a witness. All three lines bore a rooster in their coat of arms.

The entire castle grounds have been managed by the Ordensburg-Gilde since 1998. Through annual events, such as the Medieval Spectacle at Easter, the Gautschfest in August, and the Kaiser Maneuver in September, the castle is brought back to life and has become a cultural center of Thuringia, and can also be used for private purposes. The castle was sold by the Thuringian State Development Company in early 2011. A winery was to be established in the outer bailey. However, the municipality of Liebstedt insisted on its right of first refusal. As there are divided legal opinions on the conditions of the right of first refusal, the future of the castle is unclear. The resulting legal dispute is ongoing to date (as of March 2013). At the end of 2011, the municipal supervisory authority of Weimarer Land overturned the municipality's right of first refusal. A lawsuit filed by the municipality against this decision was dismissed by the Weimar Administrative Court in September 2012, as the plaintiff municipality [...] itself had not presented a concept for the 14th-century castle [and] the court [...] also saw no indications that the permanent preservation of the monument would be endangered by the sale to the winemaker. However, the annulment of the right of first refusal is not yet legally binding.