Bronnen Castle

Bronnen Castle (rarely also: Bronnen Fortress) is a castle complex near Fridingen an der Donau, Tuttlingen district, Baden-Württemberg, owned by the Lords of Enzberg.

The castle complex, which is not accessible to the public, is located on a steep cliff in the Upper Danube Valley. The Danube flows beneath it. The complex is located in the Tuttlingen district, close to the district border with the Sigmaringen district.

The castle was built around 1100–1150 by an unknown noble family from the Fridingen area. Around 1200, the "Lords of Bronnen" were mentioned for the first time.

In 1241, the castle and the town of Mühlheim were owned by the Counts of Zollern. Both were pledged by Friedrich von Zollern to the Bishop of Constance in 1303. In 1380, Friedrich again pledged Bronnen Fortress together with Buchheim, Worndorf, Beuron, and Irndorf to Swigger von Gundelfingen. In 1389, Swigger included his sister's son, Hans von Zimmern, in the pledge community. The lordship was sold in 1391 by Count Friedrich V von Hohenzollern-Schalksburg, known as Mülli, to Knight Konrad von Weitingen.

Volz and Konrad von Weitingen, in turn, sold Bronnen Castle and the town of Mühlheim in 1409 to Friedrich and Engelhard von Enzberg, who came from the family of the Lords of Enzberg, previously based on the middle Enz river.

In 1516, Friedrich von Enzberg pledged Bronnen Castle for 300 guilders to Johann Gäettling, a citizen of Rottweil. After severe conflicts from 1560 to 1580 between Rudolf II von Enzberg and Beuron Abbey over the protective and patronage rights, Sigmund von Enzberg succeeded in 1615, by renouncing the patronage and administrative rights, as well as all authority and rights over the abbey, in settling the dispute with Beuron.

Between 1731 and 1755, the dilapidated castle was converted into a hunting lodge by Nikolaus Karl von Enzberg and, after his death, by his widow Maria Ursula von Hallwil. In 1755, the castle chapel was newly built.

King Wilhelm I of Württemberg declared Bronnen the free property of the Lords of Enzberg in 1857.

During the National Socialist era, it was expropriated by the Nazi regime in favor of the Nazi Reich Women's Leader Gertrud Scholtz-Klink, who, however, hardly used the castle. A more recent ghost story dates from this period. The victim of the ghost attack in 1935 is said to have been the Reich Women's Leader, who was then living at Bronnen Castle. The ghosts are said to have frightened the Nazi official so much that she fled to the monks at the neighboring Gallushof. Citing the cloister, the monks refused the woman entry, and she had to, according to the story, spend the night in the cowshed.

After the end of the war in 1945, Bronnen returned to the possession of the Lords of Enzberg.

In 1946, the tower burned out. The fire damage was repaired from 1947 to 1949, and a new roof structure was built. In 1988, the Jägerhaus (hunter's house) was also renovated internally.