Zniev Castle

Zniev Castle (Slovak: Znievsky hrad) – the ruins of a medieval castle in the historical region of Turiec in Slovakia, today in the district of Martin in the Žilina Region.

The castle was built on the summit of the limestone mountain Zniev (985 m above sea level), the northernmost part of the Žiar mountain group. It rises 500 m above the village of Kláštor pod Znievom. It was the oldest castle in the Turiec Basin. It probably arose as early as the 12th century. As castrum Turus it appears in a document issued in 1243 by the chancellery of the Hungarian king Béla IV, who found refuge there from the Tatar invasion in 1241–1242. The castle's builder, Andrew, son of Ivanka, is known from another writ of Béla IV of 1253.

From the mid-13th century the royal castle belonged to the comitatus (hence the name Turčianský hrad), but in 1320 it passed into church hands. Probably at that time it was extended by a lower section about 100 m away. When in 1339 Turiec was separated from the great Zvolen županate and an independent Turiec comitatus was created, its seat was already the castle of Sklabiňa. The importance of the Turiec castle declined and from that time comes its new name: Zniev.

In 1530 the commander of the castle garrison surrendered Zniev to the supporters of the Zápolyas. Later the castle was captured by the troops of King Ferdinand I of Habsburg, who damaged it heavily. In 1605 it passed into the hands of the insurgents of Stephen Bocskai, in 1681 to the kuruc of Imre Thököly, and in 1705 to the forces of Francis II Rákóczi. After the collapse of the Rákóczi uprising the castle also fell into decline. The ruins of the lower castle have survived to this day in fairly good condition. The buildings of the upper castle are legible only from the configuration of the terrain.

A tourist trail leads to Zniev Castle from Kláštor pod Znievom.

Machine-translated from “Zamek Zniev” on the Polish Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Zniev Castle ranks #6,816 of 8,133 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #101 of the 140 mapped in Slovakia. 7 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Martin, 15 km away. See how Slovakia compares in the castle statistics.

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Read the full history on Wikipedia (in Polish) ↗