Czersk Castle

Czersk was the seat of the dukes of Mazovia before Warsaw was, and the castle they built here around 1400 still stands as three brick towers, two round and a square gatehouse, linked by a curtain wall on a low bluff, with a long brick bridge running to the gate over what was once the ditch. Two things ended it. The Vistula shifted its channel away from the bluff in the sixteenth century, which took the river trade with it, and the dukes had already moved their residence to Warsaw. By the Swedish wars of the 1650s it was already decaying through neglect; a repair of 1762-1766 added the brick bridge, and in the Prussian period part of the walls was pulled down, so what survives is a ruin that has been stabilised rather than restored - walls, towers you can climb for the view over the old riverbed, and empty ground inside where the buildings were. Below, the flat land is orchards; this stretch of Mazovia is one of the biggest apple-growing districts in Europe.

History

A wooden and earth stronghold stood here in the eleventh century as the chief seat of the Duchy of Czersk, and the brick castle was built at the turn of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. When the land passed to the Kingdom of Poland in 1526 the castle became royal property and its round towers were raised; from 1547 it belonged to Queen Bona, who replaced the wooden buildings in the courtyard with brick ones, and a repair of 1762-1766 under Franciszek Bieliński added the bridge over the moat (Wikipedia, Czersk Castle; Polish Wikipedia, Zamek w Czersku).

What to look for

• Three brick towers - two round and a square gatehouse, on the bluff.
• The approach bridge - a brick span of the 1760s over the former ditch to the gate.
• An abandoned riverbed - the Vistula moved away in the sixteenth century.
• Orchards below - one of Europe's largest apple districts on the flat ground.

When to go

April to October. Two hours.

Practical notes

It is a stabilised ruin, not a furnished castle - there are no interiors. Tower stairs are steep and close in bad weather. Opening is seasonal and shorter in winter.

Nearby

Gora Kalwaria is three kilometres away; Warsaw is north.

Key facts