Hartenfels

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Hartenfels
Coat of arms Location
Coat of arms of Hartenfels
Hartenfels (Germany)
Hartenfels
Administration
Country Flag of Germany Germany
State Rhineland-Palatinate
District Westerwaldkreis
Municipal assoc. Selters (Westerwald)
Mayor Arno Siry
Basic statistics
Area 8.15 km² (3.1 sq mi)
Elevation 350 m  (1148 ft)
Population 856  (31/12/2006)
 - Density 105 /km² (272 /sq mi)
Other information
Time zone CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2)
Licence plate WW
Postal code 56244
Area code 02626
Website www.selters-ww.de
Location of Hartenfels within Westerwaldkreis district
Map

Coordinates: 50°34′26″N 7°47′14″E / 50.57389, 7.78722

Hartenfels is an Ortsgemeinde – a community belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde – in the Westerwaldkreis in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. The community belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Selters, a kind of collective municipality found only in Rhineland-Palatinate.

Contents

[edit] Geography

Hartenfels together with the Burgberg
Hartenfels together with the Burgberg

[edit] Location

Hartenfels lies 4 km from Herschbach and 8 km from Selters on the Holzbach.

[edit] History

Hartenfels Castle was first mentioned in old writings in 1249. The community is known for its castle ruins, of whose former shape only a few walls and one tower now remain. It was built in the 13th century to keep watch over the nearby trade road leading from Frankfurt to Cologne. In dialectal speech, the ruins bear the name Schmanddippe. In 1999, the community celebrated 750 years of existence. Seven years later came a chronicle.

[edit] Politics

[edit] Community council

The council is made up of 12 council members, as well as the honorary and presiding mayor (Ortsbürgermeister), who were elected in a majority vote in a municipal election on 13 June 2004.

[edit] Economy and infrastructure

[edit] Hartenfelser Kopf Windfarm

In the summer of 2006, 12 Enercon E-70 wind turbines were installed on the Hartenfelser Kopf. These supply roughly 12,500 households, making it one of the biggest windfarm projects in a forest that has ever been built in the Federal Republic. Four of the turbines stand within Hartenfels’s limits.

[edit] Regular events

In January, in honour of the community’s patron saint, Anthony, whose feast day is 17 January, two concerts are held by the community’s music club on two consecutive weekends. On the Burgberg (“Castle Mountain”), the yearly music festival Rock am Turm is held at Whitsun. At Christmas, a lit, real fir tree (Tannenbaum in German) up to 8 m tall is put up on top of the castle tower. The kermis in Hartenfels is usually held on the first weekend in July.

[edit] Choirs, clubs, etc.

The community is enriched by a music club with many members, a likewise popular volunteer fire brigade, a Möhnenverein (roughly, “Foolish Women’s Club” – it is an organization devoted to the yearly Carnival festivities) with a men’s ballet, as well as a church choir.

[edit] Transport

The community lies west of Bundesstraße 8, leading from Limburg an der Lahn to Siegburg. The nearest Autobahn interchange is Mogendorf on the A 3 (CologneFrankfurt). There are further Autobahn interchanges near Dierdorf and Montabaur. The nearest InterCityExpress stop is the railway station at Montabaur on the Cologne-Frankfurt high-speed rail line.

[edit] Further reading

On the occasion of its 750-year jubilee, the community of Hartenfels published a chronicle, written and compiled by the late Altbürgermeister und Ehrenbürger (“Old Mayor and Honorary Citizen”): Josef Marx.

[edit] External links

This article is based on a translation of an article from the German Wikipedia.