Iberg Castle is a partly ruined castle in Wattwil

Wattwil

Wattwil is a municipality in the Wahlkreis of Toggenburg in the canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland.-Geography:Wattwil has an area, , of . Of this area, 52.6% is used for agricultural purposes, while 37.3% is forested...

 in the canton

Cantons of Switzerland

The 26 cantons of Switzerland are the member states of the federal state of Switzerland. Each canton was a fully sovereign state with its own borders, army and currency from the Treaty of Westphalia until the establishment of the Swiss federal state in 1848...

 of St. Gallen in Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

.

Castle site

Iberg Castle is located south-west of the town of Wattwil. The central keep

Keep

A keep is a type of fortified tower built within castles during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars have debated the scope of the word keep, but usually consider it to refer to large towers in castles that were fortified residences, used as a refuge of last resort should the rest of the...

 is six stories tall and has an entrance on the north-west corner. The keep is surrounded by a curtain wall

Curtain wall (fortification)

A curtain wall is a defensive wall between two bastions of a castle or fortress.In earlier designs of castle the curtain walls were often built to a considerable height and were fronted by a ditch or moat to make assault difficult....

. The castle hill is protected by moat

Moat

A moat is a deep, broad ditch, either dry or filled with water, that surrounds a castle, other building or town, historically to provide it with a preliminary line of defence. In some places moats evolved into more extensive water defences, including natural or artificial lakes, dams and sluices...

s and some walls.

History

Iberg Castle was built in 1240 by Heinrich von Iberg who was a vassel

Vassel

Vassel is a commune in the Puy-de-Dôme department in Auvergne in central France.-References:*...

 of the Prince-Abbot

Prince-abbot

A Prince-Abbot is a title for a cleric who is a Prince of the Church , in the sense of an ex officio temporal lord of a feudal entity, notably a State of the Holy Roman Empire. The secular territory ruled by the head of an abbey is known as Prince-Abbacy or Abbey-principality...

 of St. Gallen

Abbey of St. Gall

The Abbey of Saint Gall is a religious complex in the city of St. Gallen in present-day Switzerland. The Carolingian-era Abbey has existed since 719 and became an independent principality during the 13th century, and was for many centuries one of the chief Benedictine abbeys in Europe. It was...

. The castle was briefly conquered in 1249 following the Toggenburg

Counts of Toggenburg

The Counts of Toggenburg ruled the Toggenburg region of today's Canton of St. Gallen, Switzerland, as well as parts of the Canton of Glarus, Thurgau, Grisons, Vorarlberg, and Zurich when their influence was most extensive....

 fratricide

Fratricide

Fratricide is the act of a person killing his or her brother....

 and again in 1290 during the rule of the anti-Abbot Konrad von Gundelfingen in St. Gallen. It was damaged during the Appenzell Wars

Appenzell Wars

The Appenzell Wars were a series of conflicts that lasted from 1401 until 1429 in the Appenzell region of Switzerland. The wars were a successful uprising of cooperative groups, such as the farmers of Appenzell or the craftsmen of the city of St. Gallen, against the traditional medieval power...

 in 1405 and soon thereafter rebuilt. During the conflicts leading to the Battles of Villmergen

Battles of Villmergen

The Battles of Villmergen were two battles between Reformed and Catholic Swiss cantons. They occurred on January 24, 1656 and July 24, 1712 at Villmergen, Canton of Aargau, Switzerland ....

 (from 1699-1712), the castle was besieged in 1710. After the Treaty of Baden

Treaty of Baden

The Treaty of Baden was the treaty that ended hostilities between France and the Holy Roman Empire, who had been at war since the start of the War of the Spanish Succession. It was signed on 7 September 1714 in Baden, Switzerland and complemented the Treaty of Utrecht, and the Treaty of Rastatt by...

 in 1718 it was given back to the Abbot.

During the suppression of the monasteries in 1805, the castle became privately owned. Some of the housing was demolished in 1835, but the roof and battlement

Battlement

A battlement in defensive architecture, such as that of city walls or castles, comprises a parapet , in which portions have been cut out at intervals to allow the discharge of arrows or other missiles. These cut-out portions form crenels...

s were rebuilt in 1902 and 1965 by the municipality.