Hesperange Castle is a ruin located high above the town of Hesperange

Hesperange

Hesperange is a commune and town in southern Luxembourg. It is located south-east of Luxembourg City.The total population of the commune is 13,103 persons...

 in southern Luxembourg

Luxembourg

Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...

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History

The castle probably dates from the early 13th century when the Counts of Luxembourg gave Hesperange to the Lords of Rodenmacher who sided with the French when the Burgundians

Burgundians

The Burgundians were an East Germanic tribe which may have emigrated from mainland Scandinavia to the island of Bornholm, whose old form in Old Norse still was Burgundarholmr , and from there to mainland Europe...

 conquored Luxembourg in 1443. Maximilian of Austria

Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor

Maximilian I , the son of Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor and Eleanor of Portugal, was King of the Romans from 1486 and Holy Roman Emperor from 1493 until his death, though he was never in fact crowned by the Pope, the journey to Rome always being too risky...

dismantled the castle in 1480 and 1482 after battles with Gerard of Rodenmacher. In 1492, he transferred it to the Lords of Baden who had to pawn it in 1692 and could only reclaim it in 1740. After the French captured the castle in 1796, the French government nationalized it and sold it by auction in 1798. Later parts of the ruins were sold individually and by 1820 seven houses stood on the castle grounds. Now a national monument, the ruins are still privately owned.