Secrets of the Grunewald hunting lodge
Legends and secrets, hard to believe or just rumours: Strange stories have existed at all times and of course also in the castles and gardens of the foundation. We will get to the bottom of the stories at irregular intervals with the question "Is it really true?" This story takes us to the Grunewald hunting lodge.
An inscription on the building of the hunting lodge in Grunewald indicates that the foundation stone for his hunting lodge, the house “zum Grünen Wald”, was laid by the Elector (each of the princes who was to elect the Emperor) Joachim II on 7 March 1542. However, Joachim was not in Grunewald on that day, but was evidently in Speyer on 5 March and probably did not leave there until 13 April. The foundation stone was therefore probably not laid until 7 May 1542.
There are some mysterious stories surrounding the Grunewald hunting lodge, such as that of Anna Sydow, the "White Woman" of Grunewald.
The Grunewald hunting lodge was built in 1542/43 for the Elector of Brandenburg Joachim II. The hunting lodge in the green forest was designed as a moated castle and still retained some defensive elements such as: B. Embrasures and battlements at the place where the hunting material store is located today. It is located directly on Lake Grunewald, which until the 19th century had a significantly higher water level.
Living rooms were set up on the first floor for the elector couple. In 1535, Joachim II married the Polish king's daughter, Hedwig, who also accompanied him on hunts. In 1549, she was so seriously injured in an accident at the Grimnitz hunting lodge that she needed a walking aid from then on and could no longer accompany her husband on his hunting trips.
In Grimnitz, Joachim II also met the beautiful wife of the master gunsmith and bell founder: Anna Sydow, married to Dieterich. He made her his mistress. Her husband remained silent and ran the Grimnitz foundry until his death in 1561. Anna had three children from her marriage to Michael Dieterich. The Elector gave a village to one of her sons. Joachim II named his daughter Magdalena, born in 1558, Countess of Arneburg. His son Andreas, born in 1562, died at the age of seven.
In the absence of the Elector, Anna was entitled to use the hunting lodge in Grunewald. She accompanied him on hunts, and Joachim II was not shy about appearing publicly with his mistress and children. This sometimes caused strong resentment among the subjects of Brandenburg, because adultery was severely punished, in some Protestant countries even by death. On such occasions, Joachim II would turn to Anna and say: "Can't you step aside?"
The father repeatedly made the Elector Johann Georg promise to protect Anna and the children even after his death.
When the Elector died on 3 January 1571, the true extent of his debt became clear. The successor looked for culprits and found them in the master of the electoral mint and his father's mistress. He had Anna imprisoned in the Juliusturm of Spandau Fortress in 1571 on charges of blackmail. The master of mint Lippold ben Chluchim was also arrested. The embezzlement of funds of which he was accused could not be proven. Three days before his house arrest was due to end, he was accused of witchcraft and forced to confess under torture. Lippold was executed in barracks on 28 January 1573 on the New Market opposite St. Mary's Church. His property was confiscated. All Jews had to leave the Markt of Brandenburg.
Anna Sydow died in her Juliusturm prison in 1575. Elector Johann Georg stripped his daughter Magdalena of her noble title. However, he married her off in middle-class fashion to the electoral court's pension clerk, Andreas Kohlen. She is said to have asked Kohlen: "Will you be my brother-in-law?" Magdalena died in Berlin in 1610 a highly respected woman. Her marriage was childless.
After her death, Anna Sydow's future life began as a "White Woman". Eight days before her death, on 9 January 1598, she is said to have appeared to Elector Johann Georg at the Berlin Palace to announce his impending end. Or was it simply Johann Georg's guilty conscience?
In any case, from then on Anna Sydow was the ghost of the house of the Hohenzollerns, Electors of Brandenburg, Kings of Prussia and, from 1772, German Emperors. In Europe she is not an isolated case as a "white woman". "White women" also appeared in other castles in Germany, France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovakia and the Baltic states and announced sinister events for the future. Strictly speaking, the Hohenzollerns even have two "white women", because such a spirit also appears in Plassenburg in Upper Franconia. However, this "White Woman" is two centuries older than our Anna. She is said to have last appeared at the Berlin Palace on the evening of 26 May 1940. However, there was no longer an elector or king to whom she could inform of her impending death.
One version of our legend says that Elector Johann Georg had Anna locked up alive in a staircase tower in the Grunewald hunting lodge. And so it is that, in addition to the large Wendelstein, which is used by all visitors to the exhibition, there is a second, smaller Wendelstein that connects the first and second floors. Legend has it that in the time of Joachim II this staircase still reached down to the ground floor...
Guests at children's birthday parties can use this small spiral stone to climb up to the second floor, just as Joachim II did. None of us have ever encountered real ghosts in the Grunewald hunting lodge. However, a window in the entrance area to the large courtyard has come loose from its anchor several times and fallen with a loud crash into the hallway. Luckily, no one was hurt. It was just a shock.
But who knows, maybe she is watching us, the “White Woman” in the hunting lodge in the green forest, the beautiful foundrywoman Anna Sydow.
Author Kathrin Külow
ManHistories
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