Castle Landestrost and Its History

The existence of the Castle Landestrost was first mentioned in documents that date back to 1320. To the best of our knowledge, a fire destroyed the castle in 1573 and it had to be built up again by Duke Erich II. The construction plans originated from Dutch and Italian architects, and as the plans were completed, a mighty fortress of castle and city arose. It was only after the death of Duke Erich II, however, that the construction was completed. To cover the costs, the citizens had to perform trade services and accept an increase in taxes. The first illustration of the castle and the fortress Landestrost comes from the year 1650.
Gradually, some essential architectural changes were performed. A new entrance on the northern side was created, while on the eastern side an old entrance was closed. On the side nearest the river Leine, the original windows were replaced with simple wooden windows and, to a great extent; the originals were kept in the internal courtyard.

The castle architecture

Underneath the castle there is a quarry stone Spitztonnen vault, which is connected to the catacombs under the fortress. The walls were built using Friesen, Simsen and other similar bricks. The entrance gates are adorned with decorative sandstone ornaments. The southern wing was the oldest part of the castle and in the 18th century it was already extremely damaged, so that the wing had to be broken down. In the beginning of 1973, reconstruction of the castle and fortress began, and a recreation park, the Amtsgarten, was established.

During construction, a secret door, which was hidden for more than half a century, was discovered beneath the crumbled walls. This door on the eastern side is older than the other three entrances. Each entrance bears the coat of arms of the Duke Erich II. Only above the middle entrance is the coat of arms for his wife, Dorothea, also mounted. The keystone of each entrance is a proud lion’s head.

Vault, walls, and champagne cellar

Originally, a 944-meter rampart encompassed Neustadt. It was supported almost continually by walls totalling 1,863 meters in length, which varied in width from 2.33 meters to 4.67 meters. The ramparts were between 37 and 42 meters thick and the walls and the ramparts stood 9.34 meters tall. The stones that were used for building the castle came from the Deister hills. The red bricks were made in a brick factory in Wunstorf and the quarry stones came from the Stemmer and Gehrdener Mountains. In the year 1888 Fritz Kollmeyer and his French partner Dupres founded the company Dupres in Reims. Dupres and Co. began to produce champagne in Neustadt in the Kasematten (basement) under the castle and in an underground passageway. Beginning with the first bottles, Champagne from Neustadt has been produced using the méthode champagnoise. The champagne cellars of Neustadt have since become the most northern champagne cellars in Europe and are closely related to the history of the castle Landestrost.

Child in the wall

According to legend, during the construction of the fortress in the swamps of the Leine, a living child was purposely enclosed in the castle wall. The Duke had insisted on finishing the construction of the walls rapidly, so the sacrifice of the child was superstitiously made to ensure that the walls did not collapse. As no mother in town was willing to give her child away, they finally asked a gypsy who was agreed to hand over her child in exchange for some money. Soon after the sacrifice the mother had a guilty conscience and drowned herself in the waters of the fortress ditch. A relief in the wall remains to inform visitors of this story.

In the Amtsgarten in the western part of the arrow-shaped fortress, an 18th-century iron cannon is mounted on a Lafette gun carriage reconstructed from oak beams according to historic plans. From east to west a beech grove walkway crosses the Amtsgarten. Treetops from both sides meet in an arch to form a shady footpath.