Uhrovec Castle

Uhrovec Castle (Slovak: hrad Uhrovec, also called Uhrovský hrad or Uhrovecký hrad) is the ruin of a hilltop castle not far from the municipality of Uhrovské Podhradie in the Bánovce nad Bebravou District in western Slovakia, north-east of the town of Bánovce nad Bebravou. The castle is situated in the southern part of the Strážovské vrchy mountains.

The Late Romanesque castle was built in the 1260s at the behest of the Trenčín count Bás. It was first mentioned in 1295 as castrum Ugrog in a document of the Esztergom chapter. There it is described how Matthew Csák exchanged his less significant possessions in the county of Bars for the castle, which according to later accounts was also done with the help of death threats. After Matthew's death in 1321 the castle became royal property, before Sigismund of Luxembourg handed it over, together with the town of Bánovce and 21 further villages in the domain, to Stibor of Stiborice. After the extinction of the Stibor family (1434) the domain and the castle reverted to the Hungarian crown.

Thereafter, because of constant disputes between various landlords, relatively frequent changes of ownership followed; these came to an end only in 1547 with the arrival of the new castle lord Franz Zay. After Franz's death (1570) his sons divided the castle and the domain among themselves. In the turbulent 17th century, when estate uprisings and Turkish raids afflicted the country, it became a refuge for the Zay family and local members of the nobility. Partly thanks to its relatively remote position it was never attacked by the Turks, but in the second half of the 17th century disputes arose within the Zay family over the maintenance of the castle. Since the Zays preferred life in the mansion in Uhrovec, the castle gradually lost its defensive character and in the 18th century served only as a prison.

Machine-translated from “Burg Uhrovec” on the German Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Uhrovec Castle ranks #5,331 of 8,133 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #79 of the 140 mapped in Slovakia. 3 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Trenčín, 30 km away. See how Slovakia compares in the castle statistics.

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Read the full history on Wikipedia (in German) ↗