Neuschwanstein: King Ludwig‘s dream castle and its secrets | History Stories Special

No other place is as charged with myths, legend and secrets than Neuschwanstein Castle. The childhood dream of a young prince became the most exciting building project in the world, when
the foundation stone of the castle was laid on September 5, 1869. Today, Bavaria's most famous building is inextricably linked to the fate of its builder, King Ludwig II. "The sudden death of the king gave the castle a brilliant start in its career as a tourist attraction," says Ludwig, Prince of Bavaria, a relative of the fairy-tale king. "It's a built fantasy. You're not in a house, you're in a dream."

Even when it was built, the castle seems to have fallen out of time. It's the perfect symbiosis of high-tech and medieval. The feeling of not being understood and accepted caused the monarch to slip into ever more enraptured dream worlds. Neuschwanstein became his last refuge.

King Ludwig II. was denied the opportunity to live in his palace in its completed state. On June 12, 1886, he was arrested. The mysterious death of the King in Lake Starnberg a few days later makes the "fairytale king" legend. Six weeks after his death, the castle was opened to visitors, partly to prove how "crazy" the king was.

For decades, the castle lay dormant. It survived two world wars unscathed, misused by the Nazis during the Third Reich as a warehouse for looted art. At the end of the Second World War, US troops reached Neuschwanstein. The castle finds itself on the list of must see sights for GIs stationed in Germany. And so photos of the Bavarian dream castle enter the living rooms of many Americans. On this History Stories special, we reveal the secrets of the castle that became a symbol for a different Germany and immortalized in Disney's Sleeping Beauty.

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00:00 Intro
01:42 The Castle of Ludwigs childhood
05:44 Ludwig becomes the King
08:50 The idea of the Castle
16:03 The construction
20:20 The Rooms and Wonders of the Castle
30:47 Financial Problems
36:04 The Mad King Ludwig?
38:19 The Mysterious Death
43:40 Ludwigs Legacy
50:45 Outro