Niedzica Castle Zamek Dunajec

The castle was an important centre of Polish-Hungarian relations since the 14th century. It was a place where the money lent by the Polish king to the Hungarian king Sigismund had to be returned following an agreement signed in 1412. Once the loan was paid back, the Polish king returned the 16 Spiš towns given to him by Sigismund as collateral. For centuries the castle was a border-post with Hungary. At the time of the Turkish invasion five hundred years ago, a deal was struck at Niedzica to make it a Polish protectorate.

The castle was built by a Hungarian known as Kokos from Brezovica with family rights dating back to 1325. In 1470 it became the property of the aristocratic Zápolya family. However, in 1528, the entire county including the castle was given away by John Zápolya aspiring to the Hungarian throne, and became the property of William Drugeth who received it as a reward for his support. Sixty years later it became the property of Hieronim Łaski and his son Olbracht. At the end of the 16th century the castle was bought by Ján Horváth from Plaveč. The fortress was renovated many times in the fifteenth, sixteenth, eighteenth and in the beginning of the 19th century by its successive owners. The last Hungarian inhabitants remained there until in 1943 when the coming of the front in World War II inspired the Salamon family to abandon it. The last countess left with her children two years before the Red Army marched in. The final reconstruction of the castle was completed in 1963 under the supervision of the Polish Ministry of Culture. It has served as a historical museum ever since.

  The castle was built on a promontory, 572 meters above sea level, on the right bank of the Dunajec River. Hill fell gently on the south-west side, creating a flat slope there, while from the river side, that is on the north, it turned into a steep cliff, originally reaching 80 meters above the bottom of the valley.
   The first castle from the end of the 13th or the beginning of the 14th century consisted of timber buildings and a water tank carved into the rock, located in the highest part of the promontory. Perhaps there was already a stone residential tower or a tower-like building, which was protected by an earth rampart from the west. The water tank was carved in the rock at the southeastern edge of the castle. It had a rectangular shape in the plan, and its dimensions reached about 3.4 by 7.9 meters. In addition to the main defensive-resiedntial buildings at the top of the hill, there was probably also an outer bailey surrounded by an earth rampart or palisade. Within it could be stables, warehouses, a smithy, and other economic buildings.
   After the expansion of Drugeth from around 1330, the castle consisted of a stone perimeter wall and a residential building added to it on the west side. It had four floors: a rock-cut basement with storage functions, a ground floor for economic purposes, and two residential and representative floors. It is known that the basement was covered with a wooden ceiling and had three rooms. Three chambers also functioned at the ground floor level, and the first floor was warmed by a fireplace or stove. From the first floor you could go to the guard porch in the crown of the defensive wall.
   The defensive wall was 1.1 to 1.2 meters thick, about 6 meters high and had rounded corners. Perhaps it was crowned with a battlement. Two gate portals have been pierced in its line: on the south side and the other in the southwest corner. At the latter, traces of a drawbridge were found – rope marks and a timber block in the opening above the gate. During study on the inside of the first gate, shaft carved in the rock was discovered, which was considered a pit or an attempt to create an emergency side exit. It is not certain which of the above portals was originally used as the main entrance gate to the castle.

Before the Czorsztyn reservoir was built, the castle had a very Dracula-like setting, perched high on a wall above the Dunajec River. It was a place rich in tales and legends with some of the former residents resembling characters from gothic novels. In the post-World War II period Polish newspapers wrote at length about Sebastián Berzeviczy[1] (one of Niedzica's owners) who traveled to the New World in the 18th century.[2] According to a popular legend, he fell in love with the alleged Inca princess. Their daughter Umina[3] married the nephew[4] of an Inca insurrection leader Túpac Amaru II, whose assumed name implied descent from Inca kings. Túpac Amaru was eventually executed by the Spaniards after rebelling against the colonial government. The legend goes on to claim that the sacred scrolls of the Incas had been handed down to his surviving family members. His nephew, Andrés Túpac Amaru[4] a.k.a. Andreas[5] with wife Umina[6] and his father-in-law Sebastián Berzeviczy fled to Italy, where Andrés was killed in suspicious circumstances. Consequently, Umina with son and her father fled to Hungary and settled at the castle.[2] Sources claim that Umina was assassinated there some time later.[5] Her testament to son Anton, written in 1797 and stored there, allegedly contained information about the lost treasure of the Incas.[2] There was a leaden case found at the castle with some “quipu” writings, but it was lost in Kraków in the following years.[2] Later, news appeared about expeditions searching for fantastic treasures at Lake Titicaca in Peru. The notion that the Inca treasure map could be hidden somewhere in the depths of the castle is still cherished today.

Other tales follow the exploits of a motley crew of the castle's other former owners. They include stories of counts and jesters who tortured village folk, stabbed priests and misbehaved.

Today, the castle performs museum and hotel functions, being one of the greatest historical attractions in the southern part of Poland. Behind the entrance gate there is a courtyard of the lower ward. Within this part of the castle there are guest rooms.