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ČERVENÝ
KAMEŇ CASTLE
This is a huge, well preserved castle
situated on a hill above village Píla in Small Carpathians. Originally
there was a King’s castle of which the first written records date back
to middle of 13th century. It belonged to a series of medieval border
castles that were built in 13th century for defense of western border of
Hungarian Empire.
At the beginning of 16th century it
belonged to Thurzo family and from 1535 to Fuggers, well known and rich
entrepreneurs, that belonged to one of the richest families in Europe
magnates and financiers. Their richness came from their copper and other
precious metals mines and from trading. Anton Fugger a builder of great
name started to build a new castle on the foundations of the old gothic
castle with huge storage warehousing areas in the basement and
fortification system. As a medieval fortification, it is one of the
best-preserved structures in Slovakia.
The new rebuilding started in 1537 and
it lasted twenty years. At first they built new fortification system
consisting of four cannon bastions that were joined by defense walls
that were defending huge basement warehouse. Later they continued with
building more living quarters and a Chapel and enlarging the warehousing
space. In 1588 the castle was purchased by count Mikuláš Pálffy, who by
the way was husband of Anna Fugger, and he changed the fortress by
building more wings to a renaissance castle. Later remodeling only added
to the value of the castle.
On the main floor a Sala Terrena was
created. The access was provided from the main entrance hall on the main
floor. It has a look of a cave with rich wall paintings by Italian
artists mostly frescoes by C. Tencalov. In 18th century the bastions are
becoming living quarters. The castle remained in the Palffy family until
1945. Palffy’s were also art collectors and collected numerous rare art
artifacts that are part of the museum exhibition now. Today there is an
exposition of historic furniture at the castle.
GO
TO SLOVAKIA'S CASTLES
Published in the Slovak Heritage Live
newsletter Volume
13, No.3, Fall 2005
Copyright © Vladimir Linder 2005
3804 Yale Street, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada V5C 1P6
The above article and photographs may not be copied,
reproduced, republished, or redistributed by any means including
electronic, without the express written permission of
Vladimir
Linder. All rights
reserved.
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