Estonia · 15th century
Porkuni Castle (Estonian: Porkuni piiskopilinnus, German: Schloß Borkholm) – a fortified structure in the settlement of Porkuni, in the municipality of Tamsalu in Estonia, today preserved in the form of fragmentary ruins. It was the property of the bishops of Reval (present-day Tallinn).
Porkuni Castle was built on a hill above a lake in 1477–1479 during the time of Bishop Simon von der Borch. The castle took its name (Borkholm) from the bishop's name.
The castle was built on an irregular rectangular plan, with four towers at the corners. The whole complex was surrounded by a thick defensive wall with eight towers. Four of them were round and three rectangular. The eighth tower was a gate tower, rectangular at its base and round higher up. The upper part of this tower was added at a later period. On the inner side of the castle walls were long, narrow rooms. In the courtyard stood a church with a Romanesque apse and the bishop's residence.
The building was destroyed in 1558 during the Livonian wars. The gate tower, which houses a museum, has survived to the present day.
Machine-translated from “Zamek w Porkuni” on the Polish Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Porkuni Castle ranks #7,094 of 9,079 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #34 of the 36 mapped in Estonia. Founded 1477, it is older than 45% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 554 atlas entries founded in the 15th century. 2 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Tallinn, 87 km away. See how Estonia compares in the castle statistics.
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