Danube Cruise #14 Storming Bratislava Castle, Solvakia and Nosferatu

Bratislava Castle

In today's blog, the 14th about our vacation Viking cruise along the Danube River, we're still in Bratislava, Slovakia. Today we'll take you to Bratislava Castle (we didn't "storm" the castle, but it did STORM when we were there)!

ABOUT THE CASTLE-Bratislava Castle is the main castle of Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. The massive rectangular building with four corner towers stands on an isolated rocky hill of the Little Carpathians (mountains) directly above the Danube river in the middle of Bratislava.

SETTLEMENT DATES BACK TO THE STONE AGE - The castle is mentioned in the first written reference to the city, which appears in the Annals of Salzburg of 907, in association with a battle between Bavarians and Hungarians. 
  The castle hill area was populated long before that, as early as the late Stone Age; its first known inhabitants were the Celts, who founded a fortified settlement here called ‘Oppidum’.

LOTS OF HISTORY - 
1) For 400 YEARS -  The border of the Roman Empire, the ‘Limes Romanus’, ran through the area. 
2) 9th Century (appx 833 AD) - During the Great Moravian Empire, Slavs built a fortress that became a significant center.
3) 10th Century (900s AD) - Bratislava became an integral part of the growing Hungarian state; 
4) 11th Century (1000s) - A stone palace and the church of St Saviour and its chapter were built on the castle hill

Rob, Mary Margaret and Don

5) 15th century, in the reign of Sigismund of Luxembourg, a castle was built in Gothic style as an anti-Hussite fortress. During this period, a new entrance to the castle was built on the eastern side – Sigismund’s Gate. 7-meter-thick fortifications were constructed on the western side and a castle well dug in 1437.
6)  16th century, King Ferdinand ordered the rebuilding of the castle in the Renaissance style.

Castle view from the air

7) 17th century -the castle became the seat of hereditary provincial chief, Pálffy, it was rebuilt in the baroque style.
8) 18th century (1740 to 1780) - In the reign of Maria Theresa, the castle was arranged according to the needs of her son-in-law Albert, governor of Saxony and Tessen, who was a fervent art collector and who installed his works in the castle.

FILM FACT - The 1935 silent dracula movie "Nosferatu" was filmed in Slovakia!  
   (Although our tour guide said it was filmed in part at Bratislava Castle, it actually wasn't. It was Orava Castle. The exteriors of the film set in Transylvania were actually shot on location in northern Slovakia (we were in southern Slovakia), including the High Tatras, Vrátna Valley, Orava Castle, the Váh River, and Starhrad

ABOUT "NOSFERATU" -
Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror (German: Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens), or simply Nosferatu, is a 1922 German Expressionist horror film, directed by F. W. Murnau, starring Max Schreck as the vampire Count Orlok. The film, shot in 1921 and released in 1922, was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897) as The Stoker Estate held the books copyright & refused permission. Various names and other details were changed from the novel: for instance, "vampire" became "Nosferatu" and "Count Dracula" became "Count Orlok".

For more information, visit: https://www.visitbratislava.com/places/bratislava-castle/ 

NEXT: THE BEAUTIFUL GARDENS OF BRATISLAVA CASTLE