Tale: The Seven Maidens of Oberwesel

I've told this story a number of times to students as we rode a ship up the Rhine. Here's my take on the age-old tale--JD

On a hill above the town of Oberwesel stands a castle known as Schönberg.

It's not a surprising name, for the castle, translated as "beautiful mountain," indeed looks down on one of the most beautiful scenes in the world: the Middle Rhine Valley! In this setting, every hilltop is beautiful, and many hilltops feature castles.

Oberwesel's castle doesn't owe its name to its setting, however. It gained its name long ago when its owner died unexpectantly, leaving behind him seven sad daughters, each one as beautiful as a summer sunrise.

The seven daughters grew up in the castle; their only father was the Rhine. Each morning they would run out of one of the castle's seven doors and roam the countryside together. They picked berries and found honeycomb in the dark gulleys and shadowed streams that rushed down the hillsides. They returned from hilltop meadows with crowns of flowers in their hair. They lived lives of mirth.

As the years passed, the seven maidens grew ever more beautiful. There were few visitors to the castle in these days, but word of their beauty spread throughout the Rhineland. Without a father to arrange marriages for the seven daughters, all suitors had to plead their cases directly to the maidens. Whenever a suitor asked a maiden for marriage, the answer was always a simple, "Nein."

As resolute as the daughters seemed in their decision to remain unwed was the determination of the young men of the Rhineland to change the maidens' minds. They named the castle, "Schönberg," because of its seven, beautiful maidens--and so every lover on the Rhine would know where to find them. Each day found young men knocking at the seven doors, offering gifts, begging a chance to court one of the sisters. The answer, each day, to every suitor, was "Nein."

One evening at a kneipe in Oberwesel, after several bottles of white, Rhenish wine, the suitors came up with a plan. They would lay siege to the main gate of the castle, allowing no one in or out, until the seven maidens agreed to marry. 

Drunk on wine and romance, they wove their way unsteadily to the town wall, followed it up the hill to the castle, and there they laid their siege.

When workers arrived the next morning with food for cooking, they were turned away by the suitors. When the sisters opened the main gate to run out for their day of play on the hillsides, they were blocked and told that the only maidens who would ever leave again would be those who promised to marry one of the young men.

The sisters hurried back inside and barred the castle gate. Now the gatehouse to the castle was guarded by seven arrowslits, high, straight cracks the width of the palm of one's hand through which archers might shoot an approaching enemy. (Pictured: outside view of arrow slits in Schonberg Castle.) 

On the third day of the siege, a face appeared in the arrow slit nearest the gate and a sweet, high voice rang out. "Each sister will pick one Rhineland boy to marry on the morrow," it said. "You will parade along the castle walls, first walking left to right, then again walking right to left. During this parade, we will choose whom we will marry--I and my six sisters. We will stand at the seven arrow slits, we will watch, and we will choose."

Behind each arrowslit inside the castle courtyard was a large embrasure, wide enough for a couple of people to stand. (Pictured: interior courtyard with the embrasures for the arrow slits in the wall.) 

On the fourth day of the siege, the sisters took their places at the seven arrowslits and looked out.

Such an array of Rhineland pageantry was on display! Each boy dressed in his most colorful attire with fine hats tilted at different angles atop their heads. One by one they paraded from the viewers left to their right, smiling and posing like a pageant of peacocks. Then they turned, and the whole array paraded single-file again. They tried to catch glimpses of the seven sisters of Schoenberg, but only caught a sliver of each face through the slit.

When the last Rhineland suiter had paraded past, the sweet, high voice rang out again. "Young men of the Rhine," she shouted down at them, "We have examined you, and we find you very fair. Come back tomorrow. We will inform you of the seven grooms we have chosen."

The young men cheered and left their posts to go down to Oberwesel and prepare for the betrothals.

On the fifth day of the siege, the castle were thrown open. The young men entered the courtyard. The maidens appeared at a window above. Their beauty stunned the young men. They wondered if the castle should be renamed, "Wunderschönberg."

When the last of the young men had entered the courtyard, the castle gate fell shut behind them. The maidens giggled and winked at one another. "You are all very handsome," the eldest sister said. "We will come down and select the husband we will marry." With that, she and her sisters stepped away from the window.

The men let out a hearty cheer. There were six barrels of Rhenish wine in the courtyard, and they opened them and drank freely. Suddenly, a sound crept into the windows of the hall. It was the laughter of seven maidens, and it was growing dimmer. 

One suitor tried the gate. It was locked. The gate to the inner courtyard was also barred. Another suitor, following a path to the back of the castle, could see the seven maidens rushing down the hill toward the Rhine. The suitor called to his comrades. They climbed carefully down the walls of the castle, sliding to painfu landings at the base of the wall. The chase was on.

By the time the young men reached the riverbank, the sisters had boarded a boat and were bound downstream towards Cologne. The young men found several boats, plunged oars into the water, and rowed furiously to catch up to the maidens. Those without an oar, raised their hands to heaven and prayed, "Slow the seven maidens, and let us catch them."

Seeing the young men gaining on them, the girls begged the hired boatman to hasten. They had rounded a bend in the Rhine. Oberwesel had disappeared behind them, and the current surged.

In response, he steered the boat into the main channel. A swell struck the boat as the maidens stood, looking back at the on-rushing young men. It tipped, and the seven maidens tumbled into the Rhine.

None of the maidens could swim. As they struggled there in the water, their prayers ascended, and Heaven heard, "Don't let them catch us."

Suddenly their prayers were silenced, even as white water splashed over the spot where they had fallen.

The young men doubled their rowing, pushing toward the drowned girls. Too late did they realize that seven sharp rocks now blocked the Rhine current. Theirs were the first boats to crash into the seven rocks, just downstream from Oberwesel.

The young men sank out of sight. But they did not die. Instead they were turned to salmon, which swarm  the seven rocks even to this very day. Some say, the best fishing on the Rhine can be found here.

And Schönberg Castle still remains. Its seven arrow slits. Its courtyard. Its amazing view of Oberwesel and the Rhine. 

And its residence remains, too, a place which visitors may recognize to be a very peculiar shade of pink--a darker, richer hue, a color that would best be described as salmon. 

Copyright 2022 by James Dittes