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Heritage classified

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Origin and history

Birkenfels Castle, located in the Obernai forest on the town of Ottott (Bas-Rhin), was reportedly built around 1260 by Burkhard Beger, a minister of the bishop of Strasbourg. Its construction on an imperial land, without legitimate right, suggests a construction during the great interregnum, before the battle of Hausbergen. The first written mention dates from 1289, when Rodolphe de Habsburg legalized his occupation against an annual rent of a wax book for the Obernai chapel. This castle, without strategic value, probably symbolized the nobiliary ambition of the Begers.

Archaeological excavations reveal a reshuffle of the lower yard and defences at the end of the 15th century, as well as an undated fire. Property of the Begers until 1532, then of the Mundolsheims until the Revolution, the castle fell into ruins after the Thirty Years' War. It was then transferred to Obernai and integrated into the undivided Obernai-Bernardswiller forest. Its unfinished pentagonal dungeon and a geopole at its base testify to its defensive architecture.

Ranked a historic monument in 1984, the site preserves remains of its medieval past: a castle burned in the 14th century, restored in the 15th century, then abandoned in the 16th century. It was used to monitor the ancient Roman road linking Mount Sainte-Odile to the Champ du Feu. Today, its ruins offer an overview of Alsatian feudal history and tensions between imperial power and local ambitions.

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