Karlštejn Castle (; ) is a

castle A castle is a type of fortification, fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by Military order (monastic society), military orders. Scholars usually consider a ''castle'' to be the private ...

in the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...

. It is a large Gothic castle founded in 1348 by King Charles IV. The castle served as a place for safekeeping the

Imperial Regalia The Imperial Regalia, also called Imperial Insignia (in German ''Reichskleinodien'', ''Reichsinsignien'' or ''Reichsschatz''), are regalia of the Holy Roman Emperor. The most important parts are the Imperial Crown of the Holy Roman Empire, C ...

as well as the Bohemian Crown Jewels, holy

relic In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains or personal effects of a saint or other person preserved for the purpose of veneration as a tangible memorial. Reli ...

s, and other royal treasures. Karlštejn is among the most famous and most frequently visited castles in the country.

Location

Karlštejn Castle is located in the market town of

Karlštejn Karlštejn Castle (; ) is a castle in the Czech Republic. It is a large Gothic architecture, Gothic castle founded in 1348 by King Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor, Charles IV. The castle served as a place for safekeeping the Imperial Regalia as ...

in the

Central Bohemian Region The Central Bohemian Region ( ; ) is an administrative unit () of the Czech Republic, located in the central part of its historical region of Bohemia. Its administrative centre is in the Czech capital Prague, which lies in the centre of the regio ...

. It is situated on a hill overlooking the

Berounka The Berounka () is a river in the Czech Republic, a left tributary of the Vltava River. It flows through the Plzeň Region, Plzeň and Central Bohemian Region, Central Bohemian regions to Prague. It is formed by the confluence of the Mže and Radbu ...

river and the market town proper, roughly southwest of the capital city of

Prague Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...

Tourism

Karlštejn is one of the most famous and most frequently visited castles in the

. As of 2019, it was the 5th most visited castle with more than 200,000 visitors per year.

History

Founded in 1348, the construction works were directed by the later Karlštejn burgrave Vitus of Bítov, but there are no records of the builder himself. Some historians speculate that Matthias of Arras may be credited with being the architect, but he had already died by 1352. It is likely that there was not a progressive and cunning architect, but a brilliant civil engineer who dexterously and with a necessary mathematical accuracy solved technically exigent problems that issued from the emperor's ideas and requests. Instead, Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV personally supervised the construction works and interior decoration. Construction was finished nearly twenty years later in 1365 when the "heart" of the treasury – the Chapel of the Holy Cross situated in the Great tower – was

consecrated Sacred describes something that is dedicated or set apart for the service or worship of a deity; is considered worthy of spiritual respect or devotion; or inspires awe or reverence among believers. The property is often ascribed to objects (a ...

. Following the outbreak of the

Hussite Wars The Hussite Wars, also called the Bohemian Wars or the Hussite Revolution, were a series of civil wars fought between the Hussites and the combined Catholic forces of Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor, Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund, the Papacy, a ...

, the

were evacuated in 1421 and brought via Hungary to

Nuremberg Nuremberg (, ; ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the Franconia#Towns and cities, largest city in Franconia, the List of cities in Bavaria by population, second-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Bav ...

. In 1422, during the

siege A siege () . is a military blockade of a city, or fortress, with the intent of conquering by attrition, or by well-prepared assault. Siege warfare (also called siegecrafts or poliorcetics) is a form of constant, low-intensity conflict charact ...

of the castle, Hussite attackers used

biological warfare Biological warfare, also known as germ warfare, is the use of biological toxins or Pathogen, infectious agents such as bacteria, viruses, insects, and Fungus, fungi with the intent to kill, harm or incapacitate humans, animals or plants as an ...

when Prince Sigismund Korybut used catapults to throw dead (but not plague-infected) bodies and 2,000 carriage-loads of dung over the walls, apparently managing to spread infection among the defenders. Later, the Bohemian crown jewels were moved back to the castle and kept there for almost two centuries, with some short breaks. The castle underwent several reconstructions: in late Gothic style after 1480, in

Renaissance style Renaissance architecture is the European architecture of the period between the early 15th and early 16th centuries in different regions, demonstrating a conscious revival and development of certain elements of Ancient Greece, ancient Greek and ...

in the last quarter of the 16th century. In 1487, the big tower was damaged by fire and during the 16th century there were several adaptations. During the

Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War, fought primarily in Central Europe between 1618 and 1648, was one of the most destructive conflicts in History of Europe, European history. An estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians died from battle, famine ...

in 1619, the coronation jewels and the archive were brought to Prague, and in 1620, the castle was turned over to

Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II (9 July 1578 – 15 February 1637) was Holy Roman Emperor, King of Bohemia, King of Hungary, Hungary, and List of Croatian monarchs, Croatia from 1619 until his death in 1637. He was the son of Archduke Charles II, Archduke of Austr ...

. After having been conquered in 1648 by Swedes, it fell in disrepair. Finally, a

neo-Gothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half of the 19th century ...

reconstruction was carried out by Josef Mocker between 1887 and 1899, giving the castle its present look. In 1902 the castle and estate were bought by the industrialist from the Austrian politician , who had lived there previously. The nearby village was founded during the construction of the castle and bore its name until it was renamed to Buda in the wake of the

. Renamed to Budňany in the 18th century, it was merged with Poučník and called

. There is a golf club named after the castle nearby.GOLF RESORT KARLŠTEJN a.s.
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Architectural description

The castle was built upon a

promontory A promontory is a raised mass of land that projects into a lowland or a body of water (in which case it is a peninsula). Most promontories either are formed from a hard ridge of rock that has resisted the erosive forces that have removed the s ...

from the south side of Kněží Hora hill, divided from it by a narrow sag. The first gate, a square, two-storey tower with a tall hip roof, stood above a

moat A moat is a deep, broad ditch dug around a castle, fortification, building, or town, historically to provide it with a preliminary line of defence. Moats can be dry or filled with water. In some places, moats evolved into more extensive water d ...

at the western slope of the promontory. It was connected with the rampart traverse by means of a small portal. The traverse was protected by battlement and divided by a covered

bastion A bastion is a structure projecting outward from the curtain wall of a fortification, most commonly angular in shape and positioned at the corners of the fort. The fully developed bastion consists of two faces and two flanks, with fire from the ...

in the middle. The second gate led to the Burgrave House courtyard. Drawbridges closed both entrances. The Burgrave House formed the Karlštejn settlement, it was fortified with a two meters wide rampart, the Well Tower stood slightly lower. In the burgraviate's rampart a third gate was staved – the main entrance into the inner castle. The core of the castle consisted of three parts placed on three levels-differentiated terraces; every level express different importance. On the lowest terrace there stood the Imperial Palace, above it there was the Marian Tower and the Big Tower stood the highest. The Palace is a single-tract building, about wide and long, closed in the east by a semi-cylinder tower, had – aside of the cellar dug in the rock – the ground floor and two walled floors; the third floor under the roof was built from half-timbered work. The ground space is open to the courtyard, the rest was occupied by a granary. Three rooms form the first floor; largest is the central room, the so-called Knight Hall. The emperor inhabited the second floor of the palace; the floor was divided into four rooms by self-supporting partitions. A spiral staircase connected it with the third floor in which – according to the record from the 16th century – there was a residence of the "empress with her female retinue". The layout and equipment of the second and third floor was approximately the same: bedrooms on the eastern side, then the stateroom, a hall and the rooms in the west. Karl Fourth Bohemia Anna Schweidnitz

The central area of the high and separately

fortified A fortification (also called a fort, fortress, fastness, or stronghold) is a military construction designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Lat ...

Big Tower, with walls thick, is the Chapel of the Holy Cross; it has no analogy in concept elsewhere in the world. In the safety of the chapel, behind four doors with nineteen locks to each key was guarded independently, the valuable documents of the state archive were kept along with the symbols of the state power – the

, later the Czech Crown Jewels. The Well Tower, being the logistical centerpiece the castle could not function without, was the first part of the castle to be built. Miners were brought in from the mining town of

Kutná Hora Kutná Hora (; ) is a town in the Central Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 22,000 inhabitants. The history of Kutná Hora is linked to silver mining, which made it a rich and rapidly developing town. The centre of Kutná Hora, i ...

, however, water was not encountered even after the depth of the well was , well below the level of the nearby

river. An underground channel was therefore excavated to bring in water from a nearby stream, yielding a water column of , sufficient to last for several months. The reservoir had to be manually refilled roughly twice a year by opening a floodgate. Considering the significant strategic weakness incurred to the castle by the lack of an independent water source, the existence of the underground channel was a state secret known only to the Emperor himself, and the burgrave. The only other persons aware of its existence were the miners, who were however allegedly massacred on their way from the castle after the construction, leaving no survivors.

Gallery

Karlstejn8200619.jpg, Karlštejn Castle and the market town Meister Theoderich von Prag 001.jpg,

Pope Gregory I Pope Gregory I (; ; – 12 March 604), commonly known as Saint Gregory the Great (; ), was the 64th Bishop of Rome from 3 September 590 until his death on 12 March 604. He is known for instituting the first recorded large-scale mission from Ro ...

, by Theodoric of Prague, 1360–1365, Chapel of the Holy Cross Chapel of Karlshtein 12.JPG, A wall in the Chapel of the Holy Cross Burg Karlstein.jpg, Oldest depiction, from 1720 Karlstein 1976 617.jpg, Karlštejn in 1976 Karlštejn 5.jpg, Aerial view Karlstejn - letecký pohled na romantizující gotiku - panoramio.jpg, Aerial view Karlštejn 6.jpg, Aerial view of Karlštejn town and castle Karlštejn Castle, Czech Republic.JPG, View from the hill

References

External links

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Unesco
{{DEFAULTSORT:Karlstejn Royal residences in the Czech Republic Beroun District Imperial castles Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor Castles in the Central Bohemian Region Museums in the Central Bohemian Region Historic house museums in the Czech Republic National cultural monuments of the Czech Republic World Heritage Tentative List