Stumpfer Turm, Medieval tower in Bad Salzuflen, Germany.
The Stumpfer Turm is a ruined round tower of rubble masonry on the Alte Vlothoer Straße in the north of Bad Salzuflen. Its original height is estimated at about ten metres; the surviving stump measures roughly 4.5 metres across and 5.5 metres high. A high entrance is now walled up, and several gun ports remain in the stonework.
Probably built in the second half of the 15th century, the tower served as a watchtower on the Salzuflen Landwehr, overlooking the trade route known as the Frankfurter Weg toward the Weser. Light and smoke signals warned the town of approaching enemies. It was likely destroyed in 1632 during the Thirty Years' War and has stood as a ruin since. In the early 1950s, sand quarrying at its foot damaged the structure, and the quarry owner was obliged to restore and secure it at his own expense.
The name Stumpfer Turm ("blunt tower") refers to the stump of masonry that survives today. The ruin stands on a knoll beside the Alte Vlothoer Straße, in sight of the town it once watched over, and has been a listed monument under number 137 since 29 October 1990.
The ruin stands on a hilltop on the western spur of the Vierenberg, on the Alte Vlothoer Straße in the north of Bad Salzuflen, not in the old town. The entrance sits high in the wall and is bricked up, so the tower can only be viewed from outside. Sand quarrying at its foot damaged the structure in the early 1950s.
The tower's original height is estimated at about ten metres; the surviving ruin stands five and a half metres tall with a diameter of roughly four and a half metres. Its high entrance is now walled up, and several gun ports remain visible in the rubble-stone masonry.
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