Dřevíč Castle: A Baroque Hunting Lodge in Czechia
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Czechia
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- Eras represented
- Early Modern, Modern
- Civilizations
- Habsburg, Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Domestic
- Remains
- Castle
On this page9 sections
History
Medieval traditions and the early hunting estate
Dřevíč Castle is a former hunting lodge in Czechia, situated in the Křivoklát Forest on the territory of Sýkořice. Older traditions connected the site with a castle called Dřewíč, mentioned in the Chronica Boemorum, the medieval Latin chronicle of Bohemia traditionally associated with Cosmas of Prague, from 1002 onward. The castle was once believed to have stood on the plateau above the Vůznice valley and to have served as a residence for Udalrich, an early medieval Bohemian ruler.
The old place-name Obora was also interpreted as evidence of an earlier hunting castle. The presumed medieval site is now generally placed on Dřevíč Hill near Kozojedy rather than at the present castle. Dřevíč Castle therefore belongs to a later history of hunting use in the Křivoklát domain.
The Habsburg and Fürstenberg hunting lodge
In 1572, Archduke Ferdinand, governor of the Kingdom of Bohemia, commissioned a hunting lodge in the Obora forest, then part of the Křivoklát crown domain. The building formed the starting point for the later estate complex.
Emperor Leopold I sold the Křivoklát estate to Ernst Joseph, Count of Waldstein, in 1685. The Waldsteins, also known as the Wallenstein family, were a major Bohemian noble house. In 1731, Johann Joseph, Count of Waldstein, left the estate to his daughter and universal heir, Maria Anna, Princess of Fürstenberg. Her husband, Joseph Wilhelm of Fürstenberg, subsequently built the hunting château Grund beside the earlier lodge.
The new building was a Baroque hunting residence from the first half of the eighteenth century. In the nineteenth century it was remodelled. The changing names and descriptions of the property also reflect its complex history. Johann Gottfried Sommer’s topographical description of 1845 identified the forestry administration at Grund, while separately mentioning the ruins of a small castle called Dřewič. The contemporary Franziscean land survey marked only the Dřewič hunting lodge.
Fürstenberg, state, and private ownership
Joachim Egon, Prince of Fürstenberg, was born at the castle in 1923. His grandfather, Max Egon II of Fürstenberg, sold the Křivoklát estates, including Grund Castle, to the Czechoslovak state in 1929. After the sale, the property was again called Dřevíč and became the seat of a state forestry office.
During the second half of the twentieth century, the castle passed to the Prague General Directorate of the Agricultural Supply and Purchasing Cooperative and was used as a training centre. Karel Schwarzenberg acquired Dřevíč Castle in 1991, after the Velvet Revolution, the largely peaceful movement of 1989 that ended Communist rule in Czechoslovakia. Schwarzenberg, a Czech aristocrat and politician, was a grandson of Karl-Emil of Fürstenberg, the younger brother of Max Egon II. The castle subsequently served as his private residence.
Remains
The castle grounds and principal buildings
Dřevíč Castle stands on the right-hand side above the Vůznice valley, in the Křivoklátská vrchovina upland and within the Křivoklátsko Protected Landscape Area. The valley to the east lies within the Vůznice National Nature Reserve. The castle ensemble consists of the main residence together with a summer pavilion and service buildings.
Main building
The principal building was erected in the first half of the eighteenth century as a single-storey Baroque structure with a rectangular ground plan. Its mansard roof has two slopes on each side, with the lower slope steeper than the upper one. The building was remodelled in the nineteenth century. A small coat of arms of the Fürstenberg princely family is set above the entrance on the south side.
Summer pavilion and service buildings
The ensemble includes a summer pavilion and service buildings associated with the residence and its estate functions. Together with the main building, these structures preserve the layout of Dřevíč as a hunting and administrative complex.
Chapel of Saint Hubert
West of the castle stands the Neo-Baroque Chapel of Saint Hubert, built in 1899 by the architect Amand Louis Bauqué. Neo-Baroque was a later revival of Baroque architectural forms. The dedication to Saint Hubert, traditionally associated with hunting, suited the chapel’s setting within a former hunting estate. Bauqué also remodelled the Fürstenberg castle at Donaueschingen.
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