Hohensalzburg Castle Austria

Legendary

Sitting at a height of over 500 meters, it's one of the largest fortresses in Europe.

Photo by Heather Cowper

This fortress has stood above Salzburg for nearly a thousand years without ever being captured. The closest anyone came was in 1525, when rebelling farmers and miners laid siege to it for two months.

The garrison held out. The rebels gave up and went home.

Construction started in 1077, ordered by Archbishop Gebhard von Helfenstein. He wasn't building it for beauty.

Gebhard had picked a side in a bitter fight between the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor. Expecting trouble, he fortified his home on the hilltop.

Trouble came quickly. The Emperor forced Gebhard into exile the same year, and he never saw his fortress finished.

His successors kept building. In the 15th century, Archbishop Burkhard II added four towers to strengthen the ring walls.

The biggest transformation came under Leonhard von Keutschach, who ruled from 1495 to 1519. He rebuilt the living quarters, added the outer defenses, and gave the fortress the shape it still has today.

Leonhard had an unusual personal symbol: a lion holding a turnip. Look carefully at the stonework and you'll spot it carved throughout the building.

He also commissioned the Salzburg Bull, a huge mechanical organ with more than 200 pipes. It still plays, and its deep sound carries across the whole city.

The fortress stopped being useful for defense in the 1800s. A funicular railway opened in 1892, and visitors have been riding up ever since.

Today it's a museum and one of Austria's most visited attractions. It's also one of the largest fully preserved medieval castles anywhere in Europe.

Ride the funicular up, or walk if you want the climb. Visit the Golden Hall with its gilded ceiling, then the Fortress Museum for armor and weapons. Climb the lookout tower for a view over Salzburg's rooftops with the Alps behind them.