Kreuzenstein Castle

There was a real castle here, destroyed by Swedish troops in 1645 and left as rubble. What stands now was built between 1874 and 1906 by Count Johann Nepomuk Wilczek, who set out to construct a medieval castle using authentic salvaged material - he bought Gothic and Romanesque doorways, windows, vaults, panelling, furniture and armour from demolished buildings across Europe and had them assembled here into a coherent whole. So the parts are genuine and the building is not, which makes it a peculiar object: a nineteenth-century idea of the Middle Ages made of actual Middle Ages. Wilczek also fitted it with modern plumbing and heating. It is still owned by the family, shown by guided tour, and hosts falconry displays and film shoots.

History

The first castle, like most in Lower Austria, goes back to the 12th century, built by the Counts of Formbach and passed by marriage to the Counts of Wasserburg and through Ottokar II of Bohemia to the Habsburgs in 1278; in July 1527 the Anabaptist preacher Balthasar Hubmaier was held and questioned here before he was burned in Vienna. Never taken until the Thirty Years' War, it fell to the Swedish field marshal Lennart Torstensson, who blew up parts of it when he left in 1645. The Counts of Wilczek, rich from Silesian coal, owned it from the 18th century, and in 1874 Count Johann Nepomuk Wilczek, the polar explorer, began rebuilding it around the surviving outer wall, east tower and chapel, with the architect Carl Gangolf Kayser until his death in 1895, then Humbert Walcher of Molthein and the artist Egon Rheinberger; Wilczek lies in the family vault beneath it (Wikipedia, Burg Kreuzenstein).

What's there

• Genuine fragments, false castle - real Gothic material assembled around 1900.
• Salvaged interiors - doorways, vaults, panelling and furniture bought across Europe.
• An armoury and chapel - fitted out from the same collecting campaign.
• Falconry displays - flown in the castle grounds in season.

When to go

April to October; closed over winter. Half a day.

Good to know

It is a reconstruction, not a surviving castle - visitors expecting authenticity are sometimes disappointed. Access is by guided tour only, mainly in German. A walk up from the car park.

Nearby

Korneuburg and the Danube are south; Vienna is half an hour away.

Key facts