The Fortress

On the way back from the Alps we stopped by the an Esterhazy fortress know as “Burg Forchtenstein.” The fortress was built in the 13^th century and became part of the Esterhazy family in the 16^th century. When we arrived the fortress seemed like it was impenetrable due to the hills that surrounded it, all the trees, the fact that it was on top of a hill and it was surrounded by a large ditch. This would take some brave men to come attack, because Hans-Jorg said that they purposely used a wood bridge as the entrance because they could then burn it down if they needed to so that effectively nobody could get into the fortress. It was constructed with angled walls and with small windows to make it as hard as possible for the opposition to do damage of the people or the building. However, in 1720 after the Esterhazy’s gained control of it, they turned it into a treasury and holding large weapons collections, art collections, and it also was a large archive. We then got a tour of the premises with Petra. Of importance, I would say that Ferdinand II giving the fortress to the Esterhazy family in 1622. Within the premises, we entered an archway went into a courtyard with a bunch of frescos of emperors on the walls. All this is very well preserved, including a crocodile hanging from the ceiling. Our tour guide could only tell us that it was from 1704, that people collect weird things and this is certainly a weird thing, and that it was facing east as a means of protection against the Turks. Inside the castle there were many rooms that we went through showing the different weapons throughout the years and the soldiers armor. When you see all of this, it makes you imagine how big the Habsburg Empire was and how strong they needed to be in both the military and government in order to expand and maintain. Probably the funniest thing was the armor of some of the soldiers, it looked like 11 year-olds could barely fit into them since they were so small. Just goes to show how much has changed in the past few centuries, from the way we fight wars and what our soldiers wear. But anyways, back to the castle. After going through room after room of paintings and weapons and armor, it starts to hit you that the Esterhazy’s were an extremely rich family, and they have these collections that are enormously big, it is really amazing because the entire castle is filled with grenades, cannonballs, guns, flags, everything imaginable. On the bus ride back we ran into some nasty weather… So nasty that either the ground right next to the bus, or the bus itself actually got struck by lightning! Really crazy stuff!