The village of Saaleck lies about 4 kilometres west of Bad Kösen. The village is managed by the town Naumburg, some 14 kilometres away, and has a population of roughly 300. Above the village is Saaleck Castle and the castle of Rudelsburg. The River Saale flows past the settlement and gives its name to the village because, at this point in the Saale valley, it turns a corner. Saaleck is surrounded by rocky slopes about 80 metres high. The castles Saaleck and Rudelsburg are situated in Saxony-Anhalt at the heart of Germany.
History
The castles of Rudelsburg and Saaleck are situated in the immediate vicinity with each other. These castles were built to secure the assets within the territory. Rudelsburg castle was owned by the bishops of Naumburg while Saaleck castle was founded by the Schenken von Saaleck, a noble family dependent on the Landgraves of Thuringia. By directly facing each other, the castles of Saaleck and Rudelsburg are symbols of the rivalry among the regional competing powers in the High Middle Ages. Both castles served as strategic outposts above the nearby fords to collect taxes and rights along the Via Regia and the main trade routes that added to the wealth of the region in the 12th century.
Rudelsburg
Rudelsburg Castle was constructed around 1170 during the term of Bishop Udo II of Naumburg. In 1238, Bishop Engelhard gave the castle to Margrave Henry of Meissen as a fief. It marked the border of the realm of the Naumburg bishops. Rudelsburg Castle is a two-part complex comprising a small inner bailey in the west and a large-area outer bailey stretching over the entire plateau. Directly behind the gate there is a square-shaped Romanesque castle keep. This type of castle keep is rarely to be found. The square-shaped castle keep from the 12th century with battlements measures 20 metres and is the symbol of the castle, which can be seen from afar.
Saaleck
The ruins of Saaleck Castle rest on a low tongue of a range of hills about 65 metres above the Saale River, which is flowing around three of its sides. The surviving structures suggest that the castle was erected in the late 12th and early 13th century. The small, two-part castle complex was limited in size also by the natural characteristics of the terrain. It used to be composed of an upper castle and a lower castle. Local shell limestone was used as building material.
Today
The silhouette of the castles Saaleck and Rudelsburg in very short distance to another has become one of the most prominent emblems of the reception of the Middle Ages since the period of Romanticism.
