The Castle of Kisnána

The romantic Kisnána castle offers new facilities to its guests. Let’s take a virtual journey back to the past.

The excavations of the mid 1960’s pointed out that the castle had originally consisted of the mansion, manor house and a church. Its oldest part dates back to the 11-12th century. In the middle of the 1400’s János Kompolti transformed it into a castle surrounded by two towers at the gate and a moat filled with water. In 1445 a charter refers to it as a castle, which is the first written document of its establishment. A cemetery would accompany the castle church as it is suggested by the two tombstones one of which portraits humans while the other displays the carving of a Greek cross. The decay of the castle is linked to László Móré who turned it into a place accommodating robbers. They would raid Turkish merchants. The pasha of Buda, committed to put an end to raids, attacked the Kisnána castle and demolished it. Legend says that Móré threw gold coins at the Turkish invaders to distract their attention so that he could escape but failed to do so and finally he ended up in the Seven Towers of Istanbul. After 1560 the castle was not restored and served as construction material for those who lived in its neighbourhood. In its current state the Gothic church tower and the palace can be noted. Following the 2010-2011 reconstruction of the castle new user friendly interactive services were introduced. Nowadays it is an attractive historic monument of the region at the foot of the Mátra mountain under the walls of which spectacular tournaments are organised to evoke the glorious past.