The castle (Part 2)

Political entanglements again wreaked havoc. In the year 1671 Liselotte von der Pfalz was forced by her father, elector Karl I. Ludwig to marry Philipp of Orléans, a brother of Ludwig XIV. The Sun King claimed to an inheritance when elector Karl II., who was meanwhile in power, died without having children. After the Palatine war of succession began, Heidelberg and the castle were occupied for two times by french troops. During the time of the first occupation on the 6th of March 1689, the french soldiers destroyed a few buildings and parts of the castle. The second time they made it complete! On the 13th of June 1693 they also destroyed the towers and the defence walls by using 27.000 pounds of gunpowder. This operation was called "Heidelberg Delta"!

The castle of Heidelberg could never be reconstructed completely after the destruction in the war of succession. Mannheim was appointed to be the electoral residence and elector Carl Theodor was doing official business there. The castle was strucked by lightning in 1764 and almost burned down completely. At this time all plans of reconstructing the building were stopped and parts of the ruins were used for other constructions, because of its good building material.

When the times of Romanticism started in the 19th century, the ruins of the castle became world-famous. After reunion of the university in 1803, Heidelberg had its second time of prosperity. Now it was again attractive for students and young artists from all over Germany. They described the ruins as a symbol of German history and perpetuated them in paintings, romantic stories and poems. The most familiar people from this time are Carl Philipp Fohr, Karl Rottmann, Ernst Fries, Achim von Arnim, Clemens Brentano, Friedrich Hölderlin and Joseph von Eichendorff. Even Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was enthusiastic about the city and landscape. You can find it written down in his diaries, as well as in his sketches of the ruins.

Finally it was a Frenchman who saved the castle's ruins. The emigrated count Charles de Gaimberg (1774 - 1864) was the first trying to keep the ruins. Graimberg had been documenting the castle in several detailed sketches. His art collection later became the basics of the Palatine museum ("Kurpfälzisches Museum").