Cesky Sternberk Castle

Zdeslav of Divisov built a castle on a narrow rock ridge above the Sazava around 1241 and took his name from it - Sternberg, the star mountain, with a star in the arms - and his descendants have held it ever since, apart from the years between nationalisation in 1949 and restitution in 1992, when the last owner Jiri Sternberg stayed on as the castle's custodian and guide under the state. That continuity of nearly eight hundred years in one family is unusual anywhere in Europe. The building is Gothic in structure, remodelled in early baroque in the 1660s with stucco ceilings by Carlo Brentano, and the rooms hold family portraits, arms and a collection of some five hundred copperplate engravings of the Thirty Years War. It is lived in by the family, which is visible in the way the rooms are kept. The setting on the ridge above the river is the other reason to come.

What you actually see

• One family since 1241 - held continuously apart from the Communist decades.
• Baroque stucco over Gothic - Brentano's 1660s ceilings in the state rooms.
• Thirty Years War engravings - about five hundred copperplates in the collection.
• A rock ridge over the Sazava - the setting that made the site.

When to go

April to October. Half a day.

Honest expectations

Guided tours only, on set times, and seasonal - closed for much of winter. Parts remain the family's private home. The village below is tiny with limited parking.

Nearby

Sazava monastery is downstream; Konopiste is west.