Laurenburg is a municipality in the Rhein-Lahn district of Rhineland-Palatinate, in western Germany. The town, a health resort situated in the lower Lahn River valley, belongs to the Diez Municipal Association.
Laurenburg Castle is first mentioned in 1093 in the purported founding charter of the Maria Laach Abbey (a document some historians consider fabricated). A „Comes Dudo de Lurenburch“, believed to be Count Dudo-Henry of Laurenburg (ca. 1060 – ca. 1123), is listed fifth on the witness list. Count Dudo, considered the founder of the aristocratic House of Nassau, is thought to be the builder of the castle (perhaps with his father Robert, the Archbishop of Mainz’s Vogt in Siegerland).
The seat of the House of Nassau was moved, under Dudo-Henry’s sons Robert I and Arnold I, to Nassau Castle around 1124. The original castle in Laurenburg was destroyed in the Thirty Years War (1618–1648) and remains a ruin. The donjon of the castle today houses a military museum.
After the removal of…