Nesvizh Radziwiłł Castle

Belarus, Belarus

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Nesvizh Radziwiłł Castle, also known as Nesvizh Castle or Nyasvizh Castle, is a grand residential castle in the town of Niasviž (Nesvizh) in the Minsk region of Belarus, originally built in the 16th and 17th centuries and maintained by the powerful Radziwiłł family until 1939, and together with the nearby Corpus Christi Church it forms a UNESCO World Heritage Site inscribed in 2005. The complex was transformed from an older medieval stronghold into a Renaissance-Baroque fortified palace by the Italian architect Giovanni Maria Bernardoni, who between 1582 and about 1600 designed a central three-storey palace block with four corner towers, thick stone walls, and a pentagonal-bastion system influenced by Italian fortification, making it one of the first examples of this new defensive style in Eastern Europe. The castle is an island-type site, built on a hill and surrounded by water and ramparts, with a movable bridge and several secret exits in earlier times, and over the centuries it was repeatedly rebuilt and adapted, acquiring features of Renaissance, Baroque, Classicism and other styles, while its extensive gardens and parks were developed in the 18th and 19th centuries.