Postcard Burg Falkenstein in the Eifel, close-up view with chapel and residential building, P.C. Schoren

Postcard from the early twentieth century showing a black-and-white phototype of Burg Falkenstein in the German Eifel, seen this time from a closer vantage point that gathers the different parts of the complex in a single image. On the left a white tower with spire, probably the bell tower of the Romanesque chapel, in the centre a lower crenellated enclosure, and on the right the stepped Renaissance gable of the residential building with its small round turret. In the centre on the rocky plateau, the surviving parts of the medieval residential tower. The whole ensemble is set within the narrow valley between the bare hills of the Our valley. In the lower left, the caption "Falkenstein" in red lettering. Published as number 51 in the Edition artistique P.C. Schoren in Luxembourg-Gare, with the LUX publisher's mark in the lower left of the verso. The verso is unwritten and unposted, with a divided back in red lines. The card is in good condition.

This view shows Burg Falkenstein in a degree of detail that systematically presents the three surviving main building parts: the residential tower, the residential building and the Romanesque chapel. The castle was first mentioned in 1173 as the seat of Ludovicus de Falcunstein and was among the seven castles that secured the possessions of the County of Vianden in the Middle Ages. After the destruction by French troops in 1679, François Sébastien de la Gardelle had a partial reconstruction carried out in 1685, during which the servants' house was restored. The combination of medieval ruin, Renaissance residential building and Romanesque chapel visible on this card makes Burg Falkenstein an architectural curiosity: three building periods coexist in a single complex. P.C. Schoren documented in his Edition artistique these castles of the Luxembourgian-German border region systematically, photographing each complex from several angles to fully capture its complexity.