Amöneburg

Amöneburg is a town in the Marburg Biedenkopf district in Hesse, Germany. It lies on a mountain and is built around the castle of the same name, Burg Amöneburg.

Amöneburg lies on a basalt cone that can be seen from a great distance, below which flows the river Ohm, a tributary to the Lahn. From the Vogelsberg massif in the southeast, Amöneburg is split by the Amöneburg Basin, a hollow suspected of being a meteorite crater. In the southwest rise the Lahn Mountains.

In the north, Amöneburg borders on the town of Kirchhain, in the east on the town of Stadtallendorf (both in Marburg Biedenkopf), in the southeast on the town of Homberg (Vogelsbergkreis), and in the west on the community of Ebsdorfergrund (Marburg Biedenkopf).

Amöneburg's coat of arms, like many throughout western Germany, depicts the Wheel of Mainz and Saint Martin of Tours patron saint of the diocese of Mainz cutting off a piece of his cloak for a poor man.

Findings from digs have suggested that the area was already settled in the New Stone Age. It is supposed that in Celtic times there was a town (or oppidum) here. In 721, Saint Boniface built a small monastery and a church below the castle. At the beginning of the 12th century, much of Hesse belonged to Thuringia. The Thuringian lands, however, were so widely scattered that quite often they were interspersed with estates belonging to the Archbishopric of Mainz and its vassals. The parish of Amöneburg belonged to the archbishopric until 1803. Amöneburg's rectangular market square was laid out in this shape in the 18th century. Also worth seeing is the Mainzer Hof with its barn and manor house at the Lindauer Tor (gate). The adjoining church is a neo Gothic basilica. On its north side stands the 14th century church tower with its Baroque cupola. Around the knoll that forms the townsite runs the town wall, still preserved to a great extent. A loop road offers good views of the surrounding countryside. At the southeastern foot of the crags on which the town is built lies the Brückermühle, and old mill, with an old stone bridge (Ohmbrücke) across the river Ohm, which was an historically important crossing. It is known from the Hessians' and Brunswickers' fight against the French in 1762, recalled nowadays by a Baroque obelisk in the yard outside the Brückerwirtshaus (inn). In June 1646 Imperialist forces took the town by treaty.

Around Amöneburg, the abandoned communities of Brück, Brunsfort, Gerende, Heuchelheim, Lindau, Radenhausen and Wanehusen may be found.

Somewhat north of Amöneburg runs Federal Highway B 62 (Biedenkopf Alsfeld) with connections to B 454 to Schwalmstadt and B 3 towards Marburg. The nearest railway connections is 5 km north, in Kirchhain.

Museum Amöneburg: Prehistory and early history of the Amöneburg Basin, agricultural history, mediaeval fortifications and finds from digs, models and dioramas with explanatory notices, and in the attic rooms a nature preservation information centre.