2024-02-02 13:30:00
Germany has officially handed over to UNESCO headquarters in Paris a complete set of documents on the inclusion of the castles of Ludwig II on the World Cultural Heritage List. This was done before the beginning of February in accordance with the stipulated deadlines for new applications.
As the dpa agency notes, the proposal will be reviewed by UNESCO experts, after which it will be included in the list of candidates for voting in the summer of 2025. We are talking about the residences of Ludwig II in Bavaria – Neuschwanstein, Herrenchiemsee, Linderhof and the Royal Estate on Schachen.
The application, called “Dreams Built” or “Fantasies in Stone” (“Gebaute Träume”), took about a quarter of a century to prepare, including a referendum held in the municipality of Schwangau, where Neuschwanstein Castle is located. The referendum was necessary to gain support from the region’s population. About 1.4 million people visit this castle alone every year.
Castles of Ludwig II – monuments of the era
As emphasized in the application, the royal palaces of Ludwig II should be considered as single works of art – Gesamtkunstwerk. These residences of the historicist era, in which the dreams of the Bavarian “fairy-tale king” were embodied, are among the most important such monuments of their time, making it possible to trace the development of staging as a phenomenon of the 19th century.
Ludwig II fell in love with ancient German tales and legends as a child. Having become king at a young age, the young monarch-dreamer began to create these fictional worlds around himself in reality – to stage legends in order to hide from reality in this world of his, imagining himself as one of the fairy-tale heroes.
The castles of Ludwig II were supposed to become a kind of scenery for these re-enactments. It is no coincidence that when creating the plans for Schloss Neuschwanstein, according to the will of the king, sketches of the scenery for Richard Wagner’s operas “Lohengrin” and “Tannhäuser” were used. At the same time, this castle itself, as the king wanted, was to become a special place for demonstrating Wagner’s performances for the main admirer of this composer’s work, who provided Wagner with the most important help and support.
Fountain in front of Herrenchiemsee CastlePhoto: Zoonar/picture alliance
The country palace Herrenchiemsee (Neues Schloss Herrenchiemsee), founded in 1878, is located on an island in the middle of Lake Chiemsee – the largest in area in this federal state of Germany. The architects were given instructions to build the Bavarian “Versailles” – including creating their own Mirror Gallery, which was implemented, but they did not have time to decorate and furnish some of the halls in this residence before the death of Ludwig II.
Linderhof CastlePhoto: Andreas Vitting/Imagebroker/picture alliance
Linderhof (Schloss Linderhof) was the only one of Ludwig II’s castles that was completely completed during the lifetime of this Bavarian monarch. The king spent a total of about seven years at this residence in a mountain valley near Garmisch-Partenkirchen. According to the application, the UNESCO list also proposes to include the Royal Estate on Schachen (Königshaus am Schachen), a small house on a mountain in Upper Bavaria, built for Ludwig II in 1869-1872 in the style of a Swiss chalet.
Royal manor on SchachenPhoto: Iris Kürschner/Imagebroker/picture alliance
World Heritage in Germany
At the moment, more than fifty cultural and natural monuments in Germany already have the status of World Heritage Sites. The first was the Aachen Cathedral in 1978.
In 2021, this list included, in particular, the Art Nouveau monument Art Colony in Darmstadt, the German resorts of Baden-Baden, and Bad Ems, Bad Kissingen, as well as “Jerusalem on the Rhine” – monuments of Jewish history in the German cities of Speyer , Worms and Mainz. In 2023, the medieval Jewish monuments of Erfurt were added to the list.
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