Nordkirchen moated castle by Christiane Schulze

About "Nordkirchen moated castle"

by Christiane Schulze

About the artwork

Copyright: Christiane Schulze Nordkirchen Castle is a baroque castle complex in the southern Münsterland region and is located a good 25 kilometres from Münster in the municipality of Nordkirchen in the North Rhine-Westphalian district of Coesfeld. The listed moated castle is the largest and most important baroque residence in Westphalia and is also known as the "Westphalian Versailles" due to its dimensions and architectural design. The origins of today's castle lie in a moated castle of the Morrien family, which Gerhard III von Morrien had extended at the beginning of the 16th century to become one of the most strongly fortified moated castles in the Münsterland. After the male line of the family died out, the heirs sold the complex in 1694 to Friedrich Christian von Plettenberg, the Prince-Bishop of Münster. In the 18th century, his family had the castle remodelled into a representative Baroque residence in the course of construction work that lasted more than 30 years. After completion of the work in 1734, the Nordkirchen palace garden was one of the most famous gardens in Europe]. When the lord of the castle, Ferdinand von Plettenberg, died in 1737, he left behind an estate that was heavily in debt and that subsequent generations could only maintain with difficulty. When the male line of the von Plettenberg family died out in 1813, ownership of the estate passed to her son Miklós Esterházy de Galántha via the heiress Maria von Plettenberg. He ordered changes to the