Schloss Blankenhain
Encyclopedia
Castle
A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble...
in Blankenhain
Blankenhain
Blankenhain is a town in the Weimarer Land district, in Thuringia, Germany. It is situated 14 km south of Weimar....
near Crimmitschau
Crimmitschau
Crimmitschau is a town in the district of Zwickau in the Free State of Saxony.-Geography:Crimmitschau lies on the River Pleiße in the northern foothills of the Erzgebirge.-Neighboring municipalities:...
, in the landkreis of Zwickauer Land
Zwickauer Land
Zwickauer Land is a former Kreis in the south-west of the Free State of Saxony, Germany. Neighboring districts were Chemnitzer Land, Stollberg, Aue-Schwarzenberg, Vogtlandkreis, and the districts Greiz and Altenburger Land in Thuringia...
in Saxony
Saxony
The Free State of Saxony is a landlocked state of Germany, contingent with Brandenburg, Saxony Anhalt, Thuringia, Bavaria, the Czech Republic and Poland. It is the tenth-largest German state in area, with of Germany's sixteen states....
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
.
The castle dates back to the 12th century. It is first documented in 1423 as Wasserburg. Half of it burned down in 1661 and was rebuilt in 1699 (some sources say 1700). The castle acquired its current Baroque
Baroque architecture
Baroque architecture is a term used to describe the building style of the Baroque era, begun in late sixteenth century Italy, that took the Roman vocabulary of Renaissance architecture and used it in a new rhetorical and theatrical fashion, often to express the triumph of the Catholic Church and...
appearance, with mansard roof
Mansard roof
A mansard or mansard roof is a four-sided gambrel-style hip roof characterized by two slopes on each of its sides with the lower slope at a steeper angle than the upper that is punctured by dormer windows. The roof creates an additional floor of habitable space, such as a garret...
and domed towers, in 1765.
After World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the Soviet regime ordered the castle destroyed, but it was saved by the intervention of courageous locals.
Since 1981, the castle and the surrounding land have been developed as an open-air museum of agriculture and rural life in central Germany between 1890 and 1990. The museum covers 11 hectare
Hectare
The hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2...
s, including 60 buildings.
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