The “Schlossberg” in Julbach / Inn

The community of Julbach in the Lower Bavarian Rottal-Inn County offers something special regarding castles: The remains of a medieval castle on top of the “Schlossberg” hill, which has been destroyed during the War of the Lower Bavarian Succession in 1504. Nowadays, ruins of the castle can hardly be seen but its spirit still reveals a fascinating afterlife: The non-profit association of “Burgfreunde zu Julbach e.V.” is keeping the castle’s vitality alive.

A large group of residents actively took part in a first excavation campaign within the Julbach Rural Renewal Project at Burgstall Julbach in 2003. Peoples’ enthusiasm and the strong dedication of some local activists led to the formation of the “Burgfreunde zu Julbach e.V.” in 2004. Since then, the club organized several excavation campaigns on the Schlossberg (2005, 2008, 2013 and 2019) in collaboration with Julbach administration, Bavarian State Forest Authorities as well as the Historic Monuments Protection Authorities. The Schlossberg’s attractiveness was increased for the Julbachians by installing resting areas and seats, information boards incl. an Alpine Panorama and a newly-built “Zeughaus” arsenal (2011). Both, the historic well and the tract of veins underneath the mountaintop have been protected against further decay (2019).

The Burgfreunde club fosters public relations by means of educational activities in schools, releasing press reports and giving lectures at meetings as well as organizing and celebrating castle festivals. A traveling exhibition has been designed and shown on several occasions. The Burgfreunde would like to make the castle’s subtle history and medieval life available to modern people by re-enactment settings of battles and market life.

Burgfreunde zu Julbach e.V. within the ViSIT network

Burgfreunde had a rather broad collaboration with ViSIT via the University of Passau. The club provided several medieval relicts and finds for digitization by means of Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI). These Digital representations sometimes show surface structures with figures and ornaments on coins, clothing and bridle fragments much more impressively than on the originals.

Burgfreunde zu Julbach is an associated partner of ViSIT. The Burgfreunde club supported ViSIT in collaboration with the University of Passau by presenting the activities of Burgfreunde, Passau University and ViSIT at various events in Germany and Austria in order to demonstrate the potentials of ViSIT and to point out synergies of the partners.