Graben Castle: A Medieval Tower Castle in Slovenia
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.3
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Slovenia
- Primary era
- Medieval
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern
- Civilizations
- Habsburg, Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Military
- Remains
- Castle
On this page6 sections
History
Graben Castle is a medieval tower castle in Slovenia, located near Novo mesto on the right bank of the Krka River. It was the ancestral seat from which the free-noble von Graben family took its name and formed part of the historical region of Lower Carniola, also known as Middle Carniola.
Origins and early owners
Johann Weichard von Valvasor, a seventeenth-century Carniolan historian and polymath, associated the name Graben with a deep defensive moat beside which a tower was built. In this tradition, a wooden stairway led to an entrance set well above ground level. Valvasor identified Conrad and Grimoald of Graben as the earliest known inhabitants, said to have lived around 1170.
The castle originally belonged to the Carniolan branch of the family. In 1330, it was first recorded as the possession of Ulrich II von Graben of the Kornberg branch in Styria. Possession was attributed in 1499 to Virgil von Graben of the Sommeregg branch, whose family was associated with Carinthia and East Tyrol around Lienz. In 1520, the castle returned to the Kornberg branch through the brothers Andree, Wilhelm, and Wolfgang von Graben.
The Mordaxt and later periods
A different chronology places the castle and its lordship under Georg Mordaxt from 1510. The Mordaxt family enlarged the tower on three sides and reinforced the complex with a surrounding defensive wall. Their ownership continued until the beginning of the eighteenth century, when the Counts of Gallenberg acquired the castle and lordship.
In 1751, Graben passed to the Barons Zois von Edelstein. Their heirs sold it to Anton Smola and his wife, Klara, in 1810. The last owners were the Jalen family of Kranjska Gora. Slovenia declared Graben Castle a cultural monument of local importance under the 1992 regulation covering natural attractions and immovable historical and cultural monuments in the Municipality of Novo mesto.
Remains
Tower and defensive complex
The original complex was a tower castle or fortified house associated with a deep moat. The tower stood beside this defensive ditch and was approached by a wooden stairway leading to a gate high above ground level. During the Mordaxt period, the tower was extended on three sides and enclosed by a curtain wall, a defensive wall protecting the fortified complex.
Later building
The building was formerly four storeys high, but alterations reduced it to two storeys. Its present form includes a hipped roof, which slopes on all sides, with a short ridge and a balcony supported by pillars. Apartments belonging to the Krka Agricultural Cooperative now occupy the building. The castle stands between Ragov log and the settlement of Krka, nearly two kilometres downstream from Novo mesto.
Nearby sites
