On a rounded mountain peak above the Kocher valley lies Comburg, which the Count of Rothenburg-Comburg donated to the Benedictine Order in 1078, which established a monastery here. The new monastery at first stood under the protection of the Staufers.
The monastery experienced its first heyday in the 12th century under
Abbot Hartwig (1104-1139). The abbot also donated two of the extremely
precious pieces of the furnishings still preserved today: the gilded
"antependium", which adorns the altar table and the Romanesque
wheel-shaped chandelier.
In the course of the 12th century, additional builders were erected: the Cloister (Kreuzgang), around which the most important monastery buildings were grouped, and the Chapter Hall (Kapitelsaal) with the stone lectern.
With the end of the Staufer reign, the slow decline of the thriving monastery began in the 13th century. The monastery order increasingly dissolved and only noblemen were admitted as monks, and a bankruptcy in the years 1318/19 forced the church treasure and parts of the library had to be pawned.
The culmination was the conversion to a Convent of Canons for aristocrats in 1488.
In contrast to the monks, the canons were permitted inheritable personal possessions, however they were required to be unmarried and had to be long to the religious class. The canons only had to be present at the monastery for 14 days a year. They were supported by canon curates of common birth, who conducted church services and anniversary celebrations. The canons and canon curates received their own approbations for each of these actions.
In the 16th century the monastery received much of its present today with a comprehensive redesign that still conveys a well-fortified impression today. A five-1,640 foot (500 hundred meter) long ring wall with covered battlements, towers and roundels and numerous buildings were erected. With the founding of his valuable library and the promotion of the sciences, Dean Erasmus Neustetter (1551-1594) continued the past heyday of the 12th century.
Plans for major structural alterations in the Baroque period were never realized, and only the Romanesque church was torn down and a Baroque hall church was built in 1706-15 by the Würzburg architect Joseph Greising. Only a few parts of the preceding Romanesque building were preserved, e.g. the three church spires and the lower section of the southern transept. The Baroque appointments, the high altar, the side altars, the choir stalls, the pulpit and the organ housing completed the new building.
In the 18th century the monastery was expanded for the last time with the New Deanery (Neue Dekanei), the High Bailiff's Office (Obervogtei) and the Reischach Building (Reischachbau). In addition, gardens were also laid out and an orangery and a house for shooting practice (Schießhaus). In 1802 the monastery fell to Württemberg through the Secularization, and the Convent of Canons was closed by Duke Friedrich II.
In the years 1807-10 the monastery served as an apanage palace for Prince Paul of Württemberg and his wife Charlotte of Sachsen-Hildburghausen. From 1817 to 1909 it was the seat of the Royal Württemberg Honor Corps of Invalids (Königlich-Württembergisches Ehreninvalidenkorps). Impoverished, disabled soldiers lived there, in some cases with their families. Today the Cemetery of Honor Invalids (Ehreninvalidenfriedhof) west of the Granary (Fruchtkasten) provides evidence of hits institution.
Großcomburg became the seat of the first Home Adult Evening School (Heimvolkshochschule) in Württemberg in 1926. This educational institution took a reformed approach to pedagogics. In 1934 the National Socialists took over the school and put on courses in ideological training. In the years that followed and a school for building tradesmen, and from 1939 prisoners of war were housed in the buildings of the former monastery.
After World War II the training tradition was continued in Comburg. In 1947 the first State Academy for Advanced Teacher Training (Staatliche Akademie für Lehrerfortbildung) in Baden-Württemberg for teachers for all types of schools moved in. In the course of two renovation phases in the second half of the 20th century the State of Baden-Württemberg restored parts of the buildings and set up an information center.