Schloss, Castle in Mainberg, Schonungen, Germany

Schloss Mainberg stands above the Main river bend, 4 km east of Schweinfurt, over the village of Mainberg in the municipality of Schonungen. The pale yellow stone complex has a long multi-storey main block with a row of small dormer windows, two stepped gables at its left end, a square tower with a steep pyramidal roof and finial, and a lower wing with a stepped gable; a red-tiled building sits below.

The castle began as a defensive tower between 900 and 1000 and first appeared in written records in 1245. It subsequently changed hands several times and underwent various reconstruction phases.

The village of Mainberg grew at the foot of the castle, squeezed between the river and the hillside in the narrow Meerbachtal valley. The castle gave the settlement its name, and the surrounding slopes belong to the Mainberger Schlossberg vineyard of the Franconian wine region.

The site sits in a wine region surrounded by deciduous forests and river landscape that invites walking and exploring. Visitors should wear sturdy shoes since the hilltop involves climbing.

The interior redesign of 1915 was carried out by the architect Franz Rank, not by Ernst Sachs himself, who had bought the castle that year. Rank's late-Romantic historicist rooms survive largely intact and are considered a rare ensemble of their kind and period in Bavaria. The castle also served as a military hospital and recovery home at the start of the First World War.