Lichtenstein Castle () is a privately owned Gothic Revival castle located in the Swabian Jura of southern Germany. It was designed by Carl Alexander Heideloff and its name means "shining stone" or "bright stone". The castle overlooks the Echaz valley near Honau, Reutlingen in the state of Baden-Württemberg. The modern castle was inspired by Wilhelm Hauff's 1826 novel Lichtenstein and was built in 1840–1842. The ruins of an older medieval castle are a few hundred meters away. Geography The castle is located on an escarpment that marks the northwestern edge of the Swabian Jura. It is in the Reutlingen district and has an altitude of . and about above the Echaz river, a small tributary of the Neckar river. The ruins of Lichtenstein Castle's medieval predecessor, the Burg Alt-Lichtenstein, lies away. History Beginning around 1100, a castle belonging to a family of ministerials of the counts of Achalm and later counts of Württemberg, was located on the escarpment above the source of the river Echaz. The castle and its denizens, the lords of Lichtenstein, were not friendly with the Free Imperial City of Reutlingen and were thus under frequent attack. The old castle was destroyed twice, once during the imperial civil war of 1311 and again by the citizens of Reutlingen sometime between 1377 and 1381. A new castle was built in 1390 some from the ruins of the old one. The site selected was the same as that of the current structure. It was one of the most impressive fortifications of the Late Middle Ages. Despite such features as early casemates that made it nearly unassailable, the castle ceased to be the ducal seat in 1567 and fell into disrepair. During the Thirty Years' War (1618–48), it was taken over by the Tyrolean line of the Habsburgs following the death of the last member of the Lichtenstein family in 1687 during the Great Turkish War. The coat of arms of their family, a pair of golden angel wings on a blue background, is still displayed in the Great hall of the castle. In 1802, King Frederick I of Württemberg came into possession of the castle, dismantled it to its foundations and replaced it with a hunting lodge. Modern castle As a consequence of 19th-century Romanticism, medieval virtues like chivalry became increasingly popular among the elites. Parallel to this, medieval architecture, primarily Gothic style, returned to public attention in Germany