Visegrad Attractions, Hungary

Royal Palace
The first royal palace (Királyi palota) was built under Charles I after he and his court moved to Visegrád in 1316. More than one hundred years later King Matthias had the residence extended and rebuilt for himself and his Aragonese wife Beatrix and summoned Italian, or artists trained in Italy, to Visegrád, which thereby became an artistic and cultural center of the Early Renaissance in Hungary. The praise heaped upon it by contemporaries gives an indication of the former splendor of the palace; the Italian humanist Antonio Bonfini (1427-1503): "The magnificent dining rooms have splendid coffered ceilings. There are also halls with gilded columns and homely rooms, exquisite marble fountains, impressive window grilles, delightful ballrooms, fortified treasure rooms and splendid courtyards with tall marble fountains. There is no lack of gardens, below open colonnades the scent of stocks waft, all kinds of boxwood trees line beautiful promenades. Among the wide clearings in the gardens there would be enough space for council chambers. No less attractive to the visitor are the shimmering green canals, the fish ponds, the show jumping ground and the extensive horse racing track along the banks of the Danube" (quoted from: Janus Pannonius, Humanists in Hungary). During the Turkish wars the complex fell into decay and later into oblivion; what was not buried by the sliding masses of earth was used as a quarry.
The discovery of the legendary palace is credited to János Schulek, son of the famous architect Frigyes Schulek, who led the excavations of the site in 1934.

Citadel
A signposted road in the middle of the town leads up to the 315m (1033ft) high (Fellegvár) citadel, which is still a majestic sight today, even from a distance. In 1250 King Béla IV founded the fortification which was further expanded by his successors up to Matthias and was of great political importance as the place where the royal insignia were kept for a while. Despite repeated sieges and conquests the castle survived the Turkish wars but not the punitive expedition of the Habsburgs against the Rákóczi uprising in 1702. Since then it has remained in ruins and is open to visitors. The middle of the castle, which is surrounded by several protective walls and fortified with a system of gates, narrow passages and drawbridges, consists of three wings around an enclosed courtyard (upper castle yard) which form an irregular triangle. In the east wing is the treasury tower, the former hoard of royal insignia.
A steep staircase leads up to the reconstructed Inner Tower in the east which has the best views over the countryside of the Danube Bend.

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