The first written record of Werneck is dated 10 August 1223, as a fief granted by Bodo of Ravensburg, confirmed by the Pope on 9 April 1223. Between 1224 and 1250, possession of the fief was shared between first the
Teutonic Knights and later Conrad of Reichenberg and Conrad of Schmiedefeld, until it finally passed to the
Bishopric of Würzburg. A fort located there was sacked in the
Peasants' War in 1525 and then seized and burnt down by
Albert Alcibiades, Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach in 1553. It was rebuilt in 1601 under Prince-Bishop
Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn, but was again destroyed by fire in 1723 and merely patched up in 1724. The current
baroque palace, Schloss Werneck, designed by
Balthasar Neumann, was built in 1733–45 by Prince Bishop
Friedrich Karl von Schönborn. For half a century it was, with
Veitshöchheim, a summer residence of the Bishops of Würzburg. On 28 November 1802, the last Prince-Bishop of Würzburg,
Georg Karl von Fechenbach, released his vassals there from their oaths of service and recommended them to the new regional overlord,
Maximilian, Prince-Elector of Bavaria. In 1803, following
secularisation, Werneck became a Bavarian possession. In 1805 it was transferred to
Ferdinand III, Grand Duke of Tuscany as part of the formation of the
Grand Duchy of Würzburg. The
Treaty of Paris in 1814 returned it to Bavaria. Beginning in 1853, the palace was converted into a hospital for the mentally ill, the
Unterfränkische Landes-Irrenanstalt (Lower Franconian State Asylum), which opened on 1 October 1855. Its first director was
Bernhard von Gudden (who later wrote the clinical assessment which justified deposing
King Ludwig II and who drowned with him in
Lake Starnberg). The hospital is thus one of the oldest psychiatric institutions in Germany. In 1940, the approximately 800 patients were murdered on the orders of
Otto Hellmuth,
Gauleiter of
Mainfranken, as part of the Nazi elimination of mentally ill and handicapped people,
Action T4. ==Demographics==