Unknown

Mystery Castles
Castles of which I have a photo but cannot identify so far...

Here are a small group of castles and towers, most of which have shown up in travel articles and promotional brochures. Thus far I have been unable to discover the name or exact location of any of them. I'm hoping visitors to the website like you will recognize one or more as a neighboring monument or place you have visited and email me with the name of the castle. You can click on any of the photographs for a larger image. Thank you!!

1. A castle on the Danube. This pretty castle has been several cruise ads offering "Three Great Rivers of Europe". The picture has been shown in this view and with the photo reversed and has a legend that reads "Cruise through the scenic Wachau Valley". The map in the advertisement typically shows the cruise starting at Passau in Germany, and winding through Austria and the Slovak Republic and ending in Budapest. Don't forget to email me at carneycastle@comcast.net if you recognize the castle!

Found: Schönbühel Castle, guarding the Wachau Valley in Austria! Thank you for your lead, Susan Meintel of Phoenix, Arizona.

2. This is a pretty castle, partially ruined. This picture shows a curtain wall with a pretty formidible tower guarding what is left of a dual entrance gate. The curtain wall isn't very high, though, and the gate seems otherwise unfortified. I see no hint of a moat. Buildings around a courtyard can be seen, and I'm guessing this will turn out to be a late medieval château. Perhaps they make famous wines.

Found: St. Pierre-du-Mont Castle - located northwest of the city of Bayeux in Normandy. Thank you once again, Michael Hanenkamp!! [see #3 just below]

3. A town wall in northern Europe. Here for your detecting pleasure is a row a five round and square towers, undoubtedly originally guarding the borders of a city. The nearby homes seem to have plenty of land for gardens are the like. I annotated "? Belgium" above the photo, but likely only because the newspaper ad mentioned daily non-stop flights to Brussels, Stockholm, etc.

Found: The town wall of Dinkelsbühl in Bavaria, Germany! Thank you for your great memory, Michael Hanenkamp of Wietmarschen, Germany, a lovely little town not too far from The Netherlands.

4. An interesting gate with a portcullis. This picture came from an Infinity automobile advertisement. It shows a neat castle gate with extensive quoin use, as is seen at Dover keep. But a number of other structures in the picture use stone dressing similarly, including the possible church tower on the hill. The tile roofs make me think this is in southern France, Italy or Spain.

Found: The tower in the middle of the fortified Puente Viejo into the Spanish village of Besalu! Thank you very much, Pieter Oostendorp, a physchologist in Groningen, The Netherlands, who obviously finds the time to travel occasionally.

5. The inside of a ruined tower. This picture shows a slightly overgrown, roofless tower, possibly part of the residential range of a much larger castle. It was at least three stories tall and has thick walls, and narrow but numerous windows for pretty good lighting. The green plants and the hint of dampness to the ruin suggest Scotland or Ireland to me, though the stone doesn't seem to be a pink as that of Bothwell, near Glasgow, Scotland.

6. This is a nice Irish tower. This interesting tower sports both light and dark stone, and intact Irish merlons atop the tower (both indicating major repair work), but it is abandoned and not signposted. I drove by this castle with its excellent defensive bawn between Corofin and Ennistymon on my way to golf at Lahinch Golf Club. Any ideas?

Found: Ballyportry Castle. Thank you, Mairtin D'Alton, an architect with Gerry Cahill Architects in Dublin. The tower has been restored, but the bawn has not. The "light stone" is in fact plaster.

7. A Near Eastern bazaar? This picture features a very large fortification as the background for a marketplace, complete with camel and large baskets full of new or used computer hardware! The women are dressed brightly and have uncovered faces. The castle is located in the Near East or North Africa, I suspect.

Found: Jaisalmer Palace in Rajasthan, India. Thank you once again, Michael Hanenkamp (see #3 above) who months after his first success at sleuthing has discovered another of my Mystery Castles! I guess the castle was Far East rather than Near East, although I suppose the Indians and Pakistanis consider Europe "Near West" and the United States "Far West" :-)

8. A ruined tower near Ballyvaughn, Ireland. I ran across this five story surrounded by a rectangular bawn 2½ miles northeast of Ballyvaughn, near The Burren in County Clare last summer. There are two better known towers nearby (Newtown and Gleninagh), but this castle is shrouded in anonymity. So can a lovely Irishman or -woman or a worldly traveler assist?

Found: Shanmuckinish Castle. Mairtin [see #6] also identified this old O'Loughlin tower which passed to the Blakes in 1922, twenty years after the north half of the castle collapsed. Shanmuckinish means "Old Pig Island" in Gaelic.

9. A zigzagging battlement. This is a well maintained curtain wall with a corner turret, high above a green valley. The nature of the wall presumably conforms to the contours of the mountaintop. What can be seen of buildings, however, are in ruin, for reasons that are not clear. The merlons come to a point which (possibly erroneously) suggests the southern half of the European continent to me. Hope you can help.

Found: The Moorish Castle above Sintra, Portugal. Excellent memory, Mattias Göransson, a reporter from Göteborg, Sweden. Mattias visited this castle in Estremadura near Lisboa years ago vacationing with his travel agent father and family - and remembered the zigzagging ramparts.

10. A castle atop a hill. This picturesque castle ruin is from a framed photograph Anthony Kroes of Pulaski, Wisconsin sent to me. There are no clues on the picture as to the identity of the castle. The donjon stands high, much taller than most existing round keeps (even though they were originally very tall) and features two sets of corbels for the battlements, one at the top but the other about halfway the tower. Very unusual. There is significant ruin, but an intact roofline in the picture. And pretty countryside. If you know this castle, you can email me and/or Anthony (at akroes@netnet.net.) Good hunting!

Found: Godesburg Castle, in Germany near Bonn. Thank you once more Michael Hanenkamp of Wietmarschen (see #3 above!)

11. Win a trip to France...touts the cover of this "Champagne Country Cruise Sweepstakes" advertisement. One's eyes are immediately drawn to the formidable tower, probably originally gracing a castle or town's curtain wall. Logically it must be somewhere in "Champagne Country", assuming the ad agency has any clue. And there appears to be a notable crack running most of the height of the tower. No other castle or wall remains are to be seen.

Kudoos to Clive Lawton of Tollerton, Nottinghamshire, England who correctly identified the Tour de l'Orle - d'Or, part of the town wall at Semur-en-Auxois in Burgundy, France about 35 miles ENE of Dijon.

12. Finally, a citadel on the shore? This picture I believe came from the same computer wallpaper website as above. The shoreline location, uniformity of battlement and tower height and rifle slit in the tower suggest to me a citadel or cannon fort, but this view doesn't conform to the typical low, diamond-shaped, sloping battlements of so many of these shore batteries. I think it's a pretty awesome picture. Good luck.

Found: Mont-Saint Michel on the coast of France. Thank you Jason Tidwell of Alabama, who must have visited this magnificent fortified abbey. I added a picture of the "citadel" with the photographed section noted.