page_title: Ouren Castle
section_title: The castle ruin nowadays
hierarchical_section_title: Ouren Castle / The castle ruin nowadays
caption_attribution_description: English: Castle Ouren Excavation site. Deutsch: Ausgrabungen bei Burg Ouren im Frühjahr 2014.
context_page_description: Ouren Castle is a castle ruin in Ouren in the East Cantons of Belgium. It was the ancestral seat of the lineage of the free nobles of Ouren.
  Dating back to the 11th century the site was originally a segmented, fortificated castle fortress with a palas, a bergfried and a chapel in the higher-located northern part of the castle hill. The outer bailey with the service buildings were situated in the southern area.
  During the Late Middle Ages the castle has lost his fortificated character gradually in favour of the living comfort of its noble inhabitants. Between 1535 and 1615, periods of modification are marking the change to the residence of the nobility. A re-drawing of the lost water colour by Joseph-Ernest Buschmann from the mid-19th century shows the site as a – probably romanticized – Baroque castle. After its demolishment by French Revolutionary troops in 1794 the castle became uninhabitable and was nearly fully demolished after 1845.
context_section_description: Today the former castle is considered being an archaeological site. On the surface there are still remains of the foundations and parts of the former enclosing walls visible. Because of the scanty written sources, knowledge on the building history and historical development of the castle and the place is only attainable by archaeological methods.
  Since 2012 the Archaeological Department of the German-speaking community of Belgium is conduction excavations on the castle hill. Prior to that, the Société Archeologique du Sillon Mosan (S.O.S. fouilles) conducted its research on the subject in autumn 1988 and January 1989 which was only scanty documented.
caption: Excavation of the Archaeological Department of the German-speaking community on the castle hill of Ouren in spring 2014.
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