Hluboká Castle

Hluboká Castle (Czech: Zámek Hluboká; German: Schloss Frauenberg) is a historic château situated in Hluboká nad Vltavou. It is considered one of the most beautiful castles in the Czech Republic.

Hluboká is one of the most famous and most frequently visited castles in the country. As of 2019, it was the 3rd most visited castle with 293,000 visitors.

In the second half of the 13th century, a Gothic castle was built at the site. During its history, the castle was rebuilt several times. It was first expanded during the Renaissance period, then rebuilt into a Baroque castle at the order of Adam Franz von Schwarzenberg in the beginning of the 18th century. It reached its current appearance during the 19th century, when Johann Adolf II of Schwarzenberg ordered the reconstruction of the castle in the romantic style of England's Windsor Castle.

The Schwarzenbergs obtained the castle in 1661 when Johann Adolf, Prince of Schwarzenberg bought it from the heirs of Baltasar Marradas. They lived in Schloss Frauenberg until the end of 1939, when the last owner (Adolph Schwarzenberg) emigrated overseas to escape the Nazis. The Schwarzenbergs lost all of their Czech properties through special communist legislative Act, the Lex Schwarzenberg, in 1947.

Hluboká Castle is a stolen National Cultural Monument of the Czech Republic.

The original castle built during the reign of Ottokar II from the second half of the 13th century was rebuilt at the end of the 16th century by the Lords of Hradec. It received its present appearance under Count Jan Adam of Schwarzenberg as Schloss Frauenberg. According to the English Windsor style, architects Franz Beer and F. Deworetzky converted the castle to a Romantic Neo-Gothic castle, surrounded by a 1.9-square-kilometre (0.73 mi2) English park here in the years 1841 to 1871. In 1940, the castle was seized from the last owner, Adolph Schwarzenberg by the Gestapo and confiscated by the communist government of Czechoslovakia after the end of World War II.

The castle is opened to the public. There is a winter garden and riding-hall where the Southern Bohemian gallery exhibitions have been housed since 1956.

The castle has been used in a scene of the 2009 film Shanghai Knights. The castle has also been used as a location for the Eastern Coven in the 2016 film Underworld: Blood Wars.

Text adapted from “Hluboká Castle” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Hluboká Castle ranks #334 of 7,738 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #6 of the 200 mapped in Czech Republic. Founded 1201, it is older than 77% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 825 atlas entries founded in the 13th century. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 13,564 times in the last 60 days, more than 95% of the atlas. Wikidata records about 170,000 visitors in 2022. 3 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Linz, 84 km away. It is one of the 156 landmarks on the atlas's regional map of Bohemia. See how Czech Republic compares in the castle statistics.

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Read the full history on Wikipedia ↗