The exhibition is a journey back in time to the 15th century and lets the lord of Landshut Castle at that time, Thüring von Ringoltingen, have his say. Fascinated by the French legend of the water fairy “Melusina”, in 1456, he tells his own version of this mythical figure’s fate, of her knight Reymond and the doom of the “forbidden gaze”.
This is what happened to the noble knight when he broke his promise, observed Melusina in the bath and discovered that his wife had “the shape of a large worm from the navel downwards”!
The printing of Thüring’s Melusina novel by a publisher in Basel, embellished with expressive woodcuts, laid the foundation for a four-hundred-year success story! While the exhibition impressively depicts Thüring’s Melusina in artistic illustrations, the visitor is learning exciting facts about fashion, habits and customs in the late 15th century.