One day a weary crusader was seen riding along the banks of the Rhine.
Wherever he passed, the people asked him if it were true that
Barbarossa was not drowned in the Holy Land, but was living in the
Kyffhäuser Mountain, and would soon come back to his own neglected
kingdom. The crusader barely answered their questions, but urged on
his tired steed along the Rhine. At last the silvery waters of the Ahr
appeared before him, and he saw the gables of the castle. The rider
joyously spurred on his horse, and rode up through the forest to the
fortress where once he had sat on the drawbridge as a poor traveller.
The late guest was ushered up to the lord of the castle.
The knight, now a bent old man, rose from a melancholy reverie to
greet the unknown stranger.
"I am Ronald, and have become a knight through the grace of the
Emperor Henry in the camp at Acre, and now I have come to win your
daughter Rothtraut."
"Win her from death, for it robbed me of her two months ago," said the
proud lord of the castle, turning his head aside in deep grief. Then a
despairing groan thrilled through the chamber. Harsh words passed
between those two, one a man in his disconsolate sorrow, the other a
repentant father.
Ronald strode off to the lonely corner of the garden, and the newly
dug up earth showed him the place where Rothtraut lay. There he
remained late into the night, till darkness had surrounded him and
black night had settled on his soul. Then he turned and went away,
never to come back again.
In the East whence the crusaders had now returned, everyone talked of
the heroic deeds accomplished by Richard the Lion-hearted. The
Saracens well knew the fearless leader and the German knight who
fought at his side. Richard valued his bravery, even though he was
still a young knight. He meant to make him one of his vassals when he
returned to his own country. But his desire was never fulfilled, for
the thrust of a hostile lance which he had so often escaped, pierced
the knight's heart. So the minstrel of Neuenahr found a grave in the
Holy Land; the race of Harfenstein became extinct with the first of
the line, and the castle was never built.