 |
 |
 |
 |
Hartenštejn, a Late Gothic castle was built in the period preceding 1473 by Henry II. from Plauen. The castle was situated on a prominent hill (Schlossberg) southwest of Bochov. Jindřich (Henry) from Plauen built it as a replacement for the nearby castle Hungerberg, which was destroyed in 1469 by the royal army of Czech King Jiří (George) of Poděbrady. The castle was named New Hartenštejn after the ancestral castle in Saxony, and became a military point of supporting the Bochov estate, remote from the main settlement in Castle Bečov.
The local castle in the 17th century had lost it's function as the military-administrative headquarters and gradually fell into disrepair. In the late 18th century, it was descibed as "demolished." One of the last owners sold the abandoned castle to the postmaster of Bochov, who turned it into a quarry, which was the start of its liquidation. Stone from the castle was used for construction of houses in the city.
The castle is a supreme representative leader in the advanced combination of a gothic active defense artillery battery. The towers share the analogy of the fortification of the Prague Castle (White Tower) with the management of access roads, whose significance goes beyond Bohemia.
Three sides of the castle provide elongated battery half-round towers equipped with key loopholes. Their basements were arched and descended to them from the courtyard. Conservation has been done of the battery northern tower, called Carlsbad, originally with four floors. It was completed in 1936 to its original height and in the early 21st century, was repaired again. Under the eastern battery torso tower, there is a preserved vaulted basement.
An access road rises spirally around the castle hill and the last part of the eastern and northern rampart, and in those times was well defended by the castle towers.