Information Board Translation
King of the mountains theme trail
View in all directions
Ludwig II had a dining and viewing hut built on the summit of the Herzogstand in 1866 at the same time as the royal house on the Vorderer Sattel. The house had a length of 5.60 meters and a width of 3.85 meters, was completely clad with chip shingles and could be entered from the south via a small forecourt. It had a stove and a separate toilet room. According to documents from 1883, the furnishings included a round table and two chairs, a leather-covered sofa bed, a washstand, a bedside table and a mirror. Five large windows provided the king with a weather-protected view in all directions. Close to the dining and viewing hut was a small kitchen hut measuring around nine square meters. It contained a long and a short table as well as a chimney to connect the portable stove mentioned earlier. There were no windows here, just a sash in the wooden cladding to let in daylight and fresh air. The buildings burned down in 1897 as a result of a lightning strike. A short time later, an octagonal rotunda was built on the Herzogstand summit by the royal property administration, which has been renovated several times to this day.
Did you know that ...
... King Ludwig II of Bavaria owned a large number of mountain and hunting lodges between Berchtesgaden and Hohenschwangau? He took over most of them from the estate of his father King Max II in 1865. While Ludwig II did not use the houses near Berchtesgaden, he lived in the huts around Hohenschwangau, Linderhof, Vorderriss, Kochelsee and Walchensee on a regular basis. In addition, there were the mountain houses that Ludwig II had built from 1866 onwards: the royal house at the Herzogstand, the royal house at the Soiernsee lakes and the royal house on the Schachen. Based on letters and official documents, the historian Dr. Franz Merta has compiled a comprehensive list of Ludwig II's stays during his reign, known as an itinerary. Merta was able to reconstruct the king's whereabouts based on the location details on the documents. Ludwig II carried out his government business conscientiously right up to the end, even in the most isolated mountain huts.
Knowledge for children
Do you like reading books? King Ludwig II was a bookworm. Even as a child, he took every opportunity to read. Despite the crown prince's full days, with getting up between five and half past five, lessons until four o'clock in the afternoon plus two hours of homework, Ludwig read secretly in various books all night long. Sometimes he was not well rested when the servants appeared in his bedroom at five o'clock in the morning to wake him up. He retained this enthusiasm for reading as king. His library was extensive and he took some of the books with him on his travels in a reading box. If a particular book was missing, messengers on horseback had to fetch it and take it to the mountain huts. The little house on the summit of the Herzogstand served him not only as a vantage point. Above all, Ludwig II was able to indulge his passion for reading undisturbed in the midst of the wonderful mountain world.