Waldau Castle

Waldau Castle was an order castle of the Teutonic Order in the then East Prussian and today Russian village of Nizovye (German Waldau), around 15 kilometres east of Kaliningrad (German Königsberg). The castle is not only one of the few undestroyed Teutonic Order castles in the Kaliningrad Oblast, but also one of the best-preserved buildings of its type in the former territory of the Teutonic Order State.

Built in the 14th century as the successor of a fortified manor, as a typical administrative castle of the order it was the seat of the Königsberg chamber office and, from the 15th century, also the summer residence of the Grand Master. After the secularisation of the Teutonic Order the Hohenzollerns and subsequently the Prussian state became its owners. From 1858 until 2005 the complex served school purposes. Today it belongs to the Russian Orthodox Church, and a Russian family is restoring it step by step.

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

Waldau Castle ranks #4,736 of 8,134 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #98 of the 145 mapped in Russia. Founded 1264, it is older than 68% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 861 atlas entries founded in the 13th century. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 1,548 times in the last 60 days, more than 60% of the atlas. 6 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Kaliningrad, 16 km away. See how Russia compares in the castle statistics.

View on the interactive castle map →

Read the full history on Wikipedia (in German) ↗