An Alley in Schwaigern Photograph by Sarah Loft

An Alley in Schwaigern

by Sarah Loft

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Title

An Alley in Schwaigern

Artist

Sarah Loft

Medium

Photograph - Photograph

Description

Last week I made a trip with my daughter and her family to the small town of Schwaigern, about a 40 minute drive from Heidelberg. I wanted to visit because it's an ancestral village of my mother whose German ancestors served in the American Revolutionary War. It's a lovely town, tourist-free, and I had a wonderful time with my camera.

Per Wikipedia: Schwaigern is a town in the district of Heilbronn, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany. Schwaigern consists of Schwaigern itself and its districts Massenbach, Stetten am Heuchelberg and Niederhofen. Schwaigern has approximately 11,000 inhabitants.

Finds of the Neolithic era and during the Roman period show an early settlement of this area. The town was first mentioned in writing in the Lorsch codex of 766. Bertilo, Lord of Schwaigern, is first mentioned in 1120. The construction of a church is proved in the 13th century. Bertilo's descendants took on the name "Lords of Neipperg" in 1241, after their castle of Neipperg near Brackenheim. In 1407 they also acquired the Lordship of Klingenberg near Heilbronn. In 1702, Schwaigern became the residence of the Lords of Neipperg, who were elevated to the rank of counts in 1726. In 1766, the County of Neipperg became an Imperial State of the Holy Roman Empire, mediatised to the Kingdom of Wurttemberg in 1806. The last ruling count, Adam Albert von Neipperg, married Napoleon's widow Marie Louise.

The village received the right to hold a market in 1486. After 1630 the Black Death killed a large proportion of the inhabitants. In 1690, during the War of the Grand Alliance, the then Schwaigern Castle was burned down. In 1806, the town came to Wurttemberg by mediatization and Reichsdeputationshauptschluss. The castle was rebuilt until 1839 and is still today owned by the comital family of Neipperg. Several fires destroyed large areas of the medieval town centre in the 19th and 20th centuries. In 1971/1972 Massenbach, Stetten am Heuchelberg and Niederhofen were incorporated.

The town church consecrated to John the Baptist goes back to a building of the 13th century and was enlarged by Bernhard Sporer in the early 16th century. Inside there is the Barbara Altar of Jerg Ratgeb. The witch tower on the south-east border of the medieval town was built in 1461. The previous wine-press is a timber framing of 1659. The rococo castle next to the town church was built in 1702, but was rebuilt and enlarged during the 19th century. The town hall was built in 1905/1906 by Ludwig Knortz.

Wine-growing in Schwaigern was first mentioned in 799. The primary sorts of wine are Trollinger, Riesling, Lemberger and Pinot Meunier. The fourth biggest wine press of Baden-Wurttemberg is located there.

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