Huis Bergh

Huis Bergh is one of the largest castles in the Netherlands, a moated complex of medieval origin on the German border that was the seat of the counts of Bergh. In 1912 it was bought by Jan Herman van Heek, a textile manufacturer from Enschede, who restored it after a fire in 1939 and, more importantly, filled it with a collection that has no equivalent in a Dutch country house: several hundred works including a substantial group of early Italian panel paintings from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, medieval manuscripts and incunabula, wood sculpture and coins. He put it into a foundation in 1946. The result is that a castle in the Achterhoek holds Sienese and Florentine panels that would not be out of place in a major museum, shown in the rooms rather than a gallery, which is the reason to come.

History

The castle's history goes back to the 13th century, with its main parts from the 14th, 15th and 17th centuries, and it was badly damaged by fire in 1735. In 1912 the Enschede industrialist Jan Herman van Heek bought it with everything in it and restored it; after another fire in 1939 it was renovated by 1941, and from the 1960s it gradually opened to the public as a museum (Wikipedia, Huis Bergh).

What's there

• Early Italian panels - Sienese and Florentine work of the 1300s and 1400s in the rooms.
• Manuscripts and incunabula - the medieval books in the same collection.
• A large moated castle - the seat of the counts of Bergh on the German border.
• One collector's work - assembled by a textile manufacturer from 1912.

When to go

April to October. Half a day.

Things to know

Guided routes with set times and reduced winter opening. The pictures are hung in castle rooms with domestic lighting rather than gallery conditions. 's-Heerenberg is small.

Nearby

The German border and Emmerich are east; Doetinchem is north-west.

Key facts