The facade painting opens up a view into the former colonnade and conveys a three-dimensional impression of the space., © Rainer Oppenheimer© Rainer Oppenheimer

It is well known that travel took a long time until the invention of aviation. And because all the important personalities were constantly and forever on the move to regulate business of rulers or wage wars, in the Middle Ages it was not ruled from permanent residences or from a capital for a long time, but from bases. These were called Pfalzen (lat. Palatium = palace). They were built at strategically favorable points. A Palatinate had to be as functional as a hotel, as variable as a congress site and as representative as a castle - and all without electricity or W-LAN.

Charlemagne had such a palace built in Ingelheim during his reign, and it was one of the most magnificent facilities of the time.

A few dynasties later, the Salians needed a house of worship for their magnificent church festivals from the middle of the 11th to the middle of the 12th century, which is why a second church, the hall church (today Protestant), was built.

The Hohenstaufens in the 12th century had other things in mind and transformed the Palatinate into a kind of castle with a defensive wall, defensive towers and moat. That didn’t stop the generations afterwards from using the historical building material and building over part of the old walls. That is why the ruins of the Kaiserpfalz are now located in the middle of the residential area of the historic center of Nieder-Ingelheim.

In 1996 a gold coin with a portrait of Charlemagne was found during the rescue excavations in Ottonenstrasse. After her discovery, she toured Germany and Europe for several years. On the Open Monument Day in 2005, it returned to its place of discovery and is now on permanent loan from the State of Rhineland-Palatinate in the Museum near the Kaiserpfalz.

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Contact details:

Tourist-Information im Winzerkeller

Binger Straße 16

55218 Ingelheim am Rhein

Tel: (0049) 6132 710 009 200
E-Mail: touristinformation@ikum-ingelheim.de
Internet: www.ingelheim-erleben.de

Contact details:

Tourist-Information im Winzerkeller

Binger Straße 16

55218 Ingelheim am Rhein

Tel: (0049) 6132 710 009 200
E-Mail: touristinformation@ikum-ingelheim.de
Internet: www.ingelheim-erleben.de