Königstein Fortress

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The title of this article contains the character ö. Where it is unavailable or not desired, the name may be represented as Koenigstein Fortress.

View from the river Elbe to the fortress

View from Königstein Fortress, looking down onto the Elbe and the town of Königstein

Königstein Fortress (German: Festung Königstein), the "Saxon Bastille", is a famous historic mountaintop fortress near Dresden, in Saxon Switzerland, Germany, near the town of Königstein. The fortress, which for centuries was used as a state prison and which is still intact, is one of Saxony's foremost tourist attractions, with 700,000 visitors per year.

The first reference to a castle at Königstein is from 1241. At that time the region was split between the Kingdom of Bohemia and the Bishopric of Meissen. To delimit the boundary running between the two states, King Wenceslaus I established the castle which controlled the Elbe valley above Pirna.

A castle since the mid-13th century situated on a prominent isolated rock in the "Saxon Switzerland" region, it originally belonged to the Kings of Bohemia, passing in 1408 to the Dukes of Saxony. Between 1516 and 1524, it included a monastery (Celestines), but it always remained a stronghold and a fortress with its own garrison; the fortifications were always updated and enlarged to meet the latest requirements of arms technology.

Because Königstein Fortress was regarded as unconquerable, the Saxon monarchs retreated to it from Wittenberg and later Dresden during times of crisis and also deposited the state treasure and many works of art from the famous Zwinger here; it was also used as a country retreat due to its lovely surroundings. The Königstein also became the state prison until 1922 for the most important prisoners, such as:

the Crypto-Calvinists, including Caspar Peucer
Johann Friedrich Böttger, the inventor of European porcelain
the Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin
the founder of German social democracy, August Bebel

Königstein was never taken, not even during World War II. However, on April 17, 1942, French General Henri Giraud successfully escaped German captivity from the castle.

Because of Böttger, the Königstein Fortress is also a site of the invention of European porcelain. Böttger also built the "Great Königstein Cask" in 1725, the greatest wine barrel in the world (and larger than the one in Heidelberg), with a capacity of 238,000 litres.

In World War I the castle was used as a prisoner of war camp (Oflag) for French and Russian officers. In World War II it again served as an Oflag for British, French, Polish and other Allied officers.