Kremenets Castle

Kremenets Castle crowns a steep hill above the town of Kremenets in Ternopil Oblast, western Ukraine. A stronghold is theorised to have stood here as early as the 8th or 9th century; the 13th-century fortress was first built in wood before being rebuilt in limestone, its walled enceinte measuring roughly 135 by 65 metres with the keep on the west side.

The castle earned a name as an impregnable citadel, attacked by Hungary, the Mongols, the Cossacks and others — for a long time no one could overcome it. In 1261, on the order of Khan Boroldai, it was dismantled by the Volhynian prince Vasylko Romanovich; life on the castle hill revived only twenty years later, in the 1290s, under the Volhynian ruler Mstislav Danilovych. In 1396 it came to the hands of the Lithuanian grand prince Vytautas, who repaired the fortress and restored its battle readiness, and it later served as a stronghold of Prince Švitrigaila.

Besieged and largely destroyed in 1648, the fortress was never rebuilt. What survives on Castle Hill today are stone ruins of the great walled enceinte, with traces of its multiple towers and the prominent gatehouse that once guarded the approach.