Excursion Castles of The East

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Our Western Ukraine – Castles of The East Tour – will evoke legends of the Cossacks fending off the Tatar and Ottoman Empire invasions of the Past.

BUCHACH CASTLE.

Buchach Castle is a ruin of a medieval castle, located in Buchach, Ternopil Oblast, Ukraine built by the Buchacki family in the 14-15th century at around the time the town itself was founded. It was a defensive structure, and saw combat several times. It fell into disrepair following its destruction by the Ottomans in the late 17th century. During the 19th century, while under the Austrian rule, it was partially demolished to reclaim building material. Today, it is a tourist attraction open to visitors.

CHERVONOHOROD CASTLE.

Chervonohorod or Chervone [Czerwonogród in Polish] meaning “Red Town” (from the color of the earth), is a former town in Zalischyky Raion, Ternopil Oblast of Western Ukraine, that was part of the municipal district of Nyrkiv (Ни́рків). It was chartered in 1434 and was the seat of a powiat in the Podole Voivodeship. The local castle was built in the early 17th century as a seat of the Daniłowicz magnate family.

Prince Poniński acquired the ruined castle from the Habsburgs in 1778 and had it demolished and erected a new palace to replace it. The Soviets subsequently dismantled the palace (apart from the two towers), removing Czerwonogród from the map of the Ukrainian SSR.  Since the advent of Ukrainian independence the site has become a major tourist attraction.

KREMENETS CASTLE.

First written citations of Kremenets Castle were found in Polish literature of 1064, but folk legends tell of a fortress having existed at this site dating from the 9th to 10th century.  The castle received great fame after it repelled an unsuccessful attack by Batu Khan and the Golden Horde in the winter time of 1240–41.

The castle remained in Polish-Lithuanian hands until the mid 17h century when it fell to Maksym Kryvonis and his cossack minions during the Khmelnytsky Uprising.  Tombstones remained as a mute reminder of when the fortress fell for the last time never to rise from again ashes. The Castle Hill has now become a tourist destination under the auspices of the Kremenets State Historic Architectural Preservation. Thousands of people come to visit it in order to get a glimpse of the fortress ruins along with a bird’s eye view of the town and vicinity.

TEREBOVLIA [TREMBOVLA] CASTLE.

Terebovlia Castle is a ruined 17th-century castle in the town of Terebovlia in Western Ukraine.  Its ruins are located on the edge of Gniezny canyon, near its mouth to Seret River. There have been at least three fortresses on the castle hill in Terebovlia. The first historical castle in the town, mentioned in the Old Russian writing Primary Chronicle, was erected in 9th to 10th Centuries consisting of a wooden enclosed palisade; only the castle church within was built of stone. But by the early 13th Century the wooden walls had been replaced by stone, nevertheless in 1241, the castle was sacked by the Golden Horde of Batu Khan.

The most recent fortification was built in the 1630s under the leadership of the Terebovlian starosta Alexander Balaban.  Cossacks captured castle in 1648, but after the armistice it was occupied by the Poles and subsequently resisted attacks by Cossacks, Turks and Tatars.  In course of Polish–Ottoman War (1672–1676) Terebovlia castle became an important border fortress after the partition of Podolia by Turkey in 1671. In 1675 a 10,000-strong Turkish-Tatar army under command of Pasha Ibrahim Shyshman began a siege of Terebovlia. Despite considerable force advantage, Shyshman was unable to capture the castle and after a little more than a fortnight retreated south in anticipation of the early start of winter season, saving the rest both of Podolia and Galicia from further attacks. Terebovlia Castle hence became famous for its heroic defense against the Tatars and Turks.

TERNOPIL [TARNOPOL]  CASTLE.

The Ternopil Castle is a stronghold which gave birth to the Western Ukraine city of Ternopil. It was built in the 16th century to protect the southern border of the Kingdom of Poland and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and originated as the residence of a Polish nobleman, Jan Amor Tarnowski.  The castle endured frequent attacks by the Tatars and Turks who reduced the castle to ruins in 1675.

The castle was rebuilt at the beginning of the 18th Century and a century later was re-branded as a “dance casino” by the Russians for social occasions. A century later, Count Korytowski rebuilt the structure into a palace having demolished defense bulwarks, towers, and gates and raised masonry walls instead [see photo above].

The Russian army, in their retreat from the city on July 21, 1917, burned the Old Castle which was restored anew by the Poles during the interregnum. During the Second World War the fort-post was the last defensive foothold for the retreating Wehrmacht then under constant counter-attack by the advancing Red Army. The ruins of a new castle were subsequently cleared out and in its place the Hotel “Ternopil” was built – which is substantially what visitors to the site will see today.

ZBARAZH CASTLE.

Zbarazh Castle is a fortified defense stronghold in Zbarazh – Ternopil Oblast – built during the early 17th Century during the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.  Evidence of fortifications erected near the present site date back to the early 13th Century.  Over time the castle was besieged and burned several times by Cossacks, Turks, the Russians and eventually came under the control of the Potocki family which lasted until the mid 19th Century.

Currently Zbarazh Castle was included into a registry of national historical architectural heritage sites an houses a museum consisting of exhibitions featuring artifacts from the Paleolithic Era, Bronze and Iron Age, Chernyakhov Culture, plus the epoch from early Slavs to the Kievan Rus.

Interested in some of our other Historic Castle Tours?

Check out our Castles of the North Tour and take a gander at our tour of the spectacular medieval forts at Kamianets-Podilskyi and Khotyn.