Blumenstein Castle is a castle ruin in the Palatinate Forest probably constructed in the first half of the 13th century as part of a line of defensive castles along the Alsatian border. The castle was first mentioned in 1332 in connection with knight Anselm from Batzendorf near Blumenstein. After a feud with the House of Fleckenstein in 1347, the knight was banished from the castle.
About 1350, the counts of Zweibrücken had one quarter of the castle, the House of Dahn owned the rest. Blumenstein castle was probably destroyed in the German Peasants' War in 1525. The ruin passed from the counts of Hanau-Lichtenberg to the landgraves of Hesse, then to the bishopric of Speyer and finally to the state of Rheinland-Pfalz.
References:The Church of St Donatus name refers to Donatus of Zadar, who began construction on this church in the 9th century and ended it on the northeastern part of the Roman forum. It is the largest Pre-Romanesque building in Croatia.
The beginning of the building of the church was placed to the second half of the 8th century, and it is supposed to have been completed in the 9th century. The Zadar bishop and diplomat Donat (8th and 9th centuries) is credited with the building of the church. He led the representations of the Dalmatian cities to Constantinople and Charles the Great, which is why this church bears slight resemblance to Charlemagne's court chapels, especially the one in Aachen, and also to the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna. It belongs to the Pre-Romanesque architectural period.
The circular church, formerly domed, is 27 m high and is characterised by simplicity and technical primitivism.