Ysenburg Castle (Staden)

Staden Castle (also Ysenburg Castle) is a medieval moated castle of unknown social affiliation on the northern edge of Staden, municipality of Florstadt in the Wetteraukreis in Hesse.

The remains of the castle are located on a river island enclosed by the Nidda and a side arm later used as a mill stream for the castle mill located to the west. The location in the river lowlands necessitated its construction as a moated castle.

Not far from the castle grounds, the Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes runs past in a north-south direction. A small Roman fort (Kleinkastell Staden) was located at the opposite, southern end of the village.

First mentioned in 1156, when the nobleman Wortwin enfeoffed the castle to Fulda Abbey. The castle must therefore have been built shortly before its first mention, i.e. around the middle of the 12th century. Wortwin is possibly identical with an Ortwin mentioned in documents between 1133 and 1145, and thus a brother of Gerlach von Büdingen.

In 1233, the castle was owned by Gerlach von Büdingen and his relatives Heinrich and Gerlach von Isenburg (later Counts of Isenburg). With the extinction of the Lords of Büdingen, the complex remained with the Isenburg-Limburg line. Johann I von Limburg acquired town rights for the place in 1304 and had the Fulda fief renewed in 1308.

Johann II von Isenburg-Limburg sold the castle to several noble families in 1405. The joint inheritance was distributed among 19 co-heirs, who were included in the castle peace. Later, the castle was partly owned by the Burgraviate of Friedberg, the Löw zu Steinfurth family, and the Counts of Isenburg-Büdingen. The Löw von Steinfurth had a castle built outside the castle in 1746, the Löw'sche Schloss.

The co-heirs presumably had several manor houses built in the outer bailey area, of which only the Renaissance building, built in 1574 and now called Ysenburg Castle, has been preserved. The name is probably of more recent date, as the complex only came completely into the possession of Isenburg-Büdingen in 1788. The castle's fortifications were largely dilapidated or demolished by this time. The outer bailey area was leased from 1821, and finally managed as an agricultural estate from 1852.