Kost Castle

This monumental fortress, hidden in the sandstone valleys of the Bohemian Paradise, belonged from its founding by Beneš III of Vartenberk in the middle of the fourteenth century until the beginning of the fifteenth century to his descendants, after which it became, until 1497, a significant seat of the Zajíc of Hazmburk family. During the first half of the sixteenth century, the lords of Šelmberk and of Biberštejn expanded the living quarters, but under the subsequent owners, the Lobkovic family, the castle ceased to serve as a noble seat and began to fall into disrepair. The neglected grounds were bought in 1637 by the Černín of Chudenic family, who maintained them for roughly a hundred years only for economic purposes, until in 1738 they were acquired by the Netolický of Eisenberk family, from whom the castle was inherited by the Italian line of the Chlumec branch of the Kinský dal Borgo family, to whom it was returned after nationalization in 1945 following the Velvet Revolution. The castle core acquired its present appearance in two building phases after the original castle from the first half of the fourteenth century was deliberately demolished and, in the second half of the same century, replaced by a new structure with a dominant residential tower, an opposing palace with a round corner tower, and a second, smaller residential tower to the north. Later modifications included especially the new residential wing of the Biberštejn family between the second and third gates, and finally the economic buildings in the castle bailey built under the Lobkovic family.