At last we managed to scramble through a window, and then luxuriated in the great ruin; blocks of stone and bushes usurp the ancient place of knights and ladies, and no sound is heard but the song of birds. This castle was built by the Count Palatine Henry, in 1209, after he came back from the Holy Land; he was the delegate of his brother, the Emperor Otho IV., and he exercised a sovereign power over the countries adjoining the Moselle. He often resided in his new castle, and had many feuds with the Archbishops of Trèves and Cologne, who enjoyed certain rights of sovereignty in Alken.
These discords gave rise to the celebrated siege of Thuron. It is celebrated, not so much for the deeds of valour there carried on, as for the extraordinary quantity of wine there drunk,—no less than three thousand cartloads having been consumed by the besiegers alone.
SIEGE OF THURON.
The Knight Zorn commanded for the Count Palatine in his strong castle of Thuron, when the Archbishop of Trèves advanced and laid siege to it. The commander of the castle, who was supported by a brave garrison, amply provisioned, laughed the besiegers to scorn.
Finding they made no progress, the Archbishop’s Commander sent to the Archbishop of Cologne for assistance. This was willingly granted, and the united armies blockaded the castle. Zorn expected daily that they would deliver an assault, but to his surprise, day after day and night after night went by, and no movement took place in the camps of his enemies; eating and drinking seemed their sole occupation.
Every house in the neighbourhood was ransacked by the troops of the Church, and every cellar was emptied; carts also arrived in long strings, bringing great butts of wine. Thus they went on drinking and singing, while Zorn from above looked on astonished at these most unusual proceedings.
Occasionally a herald arrived, and summoned Zorn to surrender; but no assault was delivered.
The empty casks of the Church were piled up in heaps, and at the end of two years they formed a mass which looked like a great fortress; and a message was sent to the castle, that if the garrison did not surrender they would continue to drink till the whole country was dry, and the empty casks sufficient to form a fortress larger and stronger than Thuron.
Zorn now agreed to capitulate, and at length it was settled, that he and his garrison should retire unmolested, that the soldiers of Cologne should at once leave the country, and that the castle should be dismantled.