The Late Romanesque ruins of Schönburg Castle are on top of a mottled sandstone cliff by the Saale River, which is 40 metres high and declines sharply in the west.

From 1158 at the latest, a free Schönberg noble family that owned property around Naumburg named itself after the castle.

The architecture and decorations found here correspond to other monuments in the World Heritage nomination.

As a landmark the castle is an important part of the lines of sight connecting the cultural landscape as a whole.

[note 1] [3] The World Heritage nomination is representative for the processes that shaped the continent during the High Middle Ages between 1000 and 1300: Christianization, the so-called “Landesausbau” and the dynamics of cultural exchange and transfer characteristic for this very period.