Battenberg Castle, Medieval castle ruins in Battenberg, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany

Battenberg Castle is the ruin of a hill castle on the Kieselberg, a spur of the Haardt at the northeastern edge of the Palatinate Forest, at 284 m above sea level beside the village of Battenberg. Its ring wall follows the steep north, east and south sides; the west side was protected by a moat, now levelled. Surviving are the gate building at the northwest corner, a battery tower with a gun embrasure in the middle of the south side, and the ground floor of a dwelling over a vaulted cellar, with a two-storey staircase tower later converted into an east-facing pavilion reached by an iron outside stair.

Count Frederick III of Leiningen (d. 1287) is presumed to have built the castle in the 13th century on the remains of a Salian site. It stayed with the Leiningen family until 1689, when French troops destroyed it in the War of the Palatine Succession. Partly renovated, it remained a Leiningen residence until 1747. In 1794 Prussian troops under Blücher drove out the French revolutionary army.

The castle's name comes from the village of Battenberg, not from the Battenberg princely family; the site was held by the Counts of Leiningen. Today the two 18th-century coach houses next to the gate building, together with part of the courtyard, serve as a restaurant, so the ruin is largely open to the public.

The ruins are privately owned, so it is worth checking access conditions before making the trip. If access is possible, the hilltop position offers open views over the Rhine Plain and the surrounding landscape.

Around the ruins there are unusual rock formations known as Blitzroehren, which are hard columns of iron-rich minerals that formed through natural erosion, not lightning strikes as the name might suggest. These formations are rarely mentioned in guides to the site, making them an easy detail to miss on a first visit.