The Bran Castle It is one of the most famous castles in the world also thanks to the association with the character of Count Dracula, born from the pen of Bram Stoker. The castle, built between the 1377 and the 1388 and located at the foot of the Monti Carpazipresents interesting engineering and architectural characteristics, from foundations to towers, secret passages and 57 rooms, plus some hidden. An interesting peculiarity is the Tunnel Timean elevator that descends 32 meters deep during which images are projected regarding the history of the castle. Today the site hosts a museum on the history of Transylvania and on the royal collections, and is one of the most renowned attractions in Romania.
How is Count Dracula’s castle done
From a constructive point of view, Bran Castle consists of one 4 -storey structure, Characterized by a succession of rooms, more or less large, and stairs to access it. The main tower is the Torre di Pietra, on which a staircase is positioned leading to the entrance of the castle. Here is positioned the guard with a large entrance door which, once, was possible to operate through the use of ropes. The lower plan, which has not undergone substantial changes over time, was intended for servitude.
From the guard room, where the soldiers who presided over the entire structure through a series of small windows all around the castle were stationed, we move on to courtyardat whose center there is a fake wellobtained from a Florentine capital of the 19th century. There is a subsequent scale that leads to the 1st floor, inside which there were the Apartments of Queen Maria of Saxony and her daughter Ileana. From the large room of the apartment you can access the secret scale which leads to all the plans of the castle and leads to the 3rd floor, where the library and music room are located, for which the queen had a deep love.
From here you access a loggia from which you can enjoy a beautiful view of the courtyard. The view widens to the whole castle, the roof of the customs and to the surrounding countryside climbing to the terrace of the fourth and last floor, where the apartments of the Prince Nicolawith the study dedicated to drawing and the guest room, which was used by the prince to play cards.
On the 2nd floor, on the other hand, houses the apartments of Re Ferdinand i. Around the second floor there is a balcony which served as a defense walkway and leads to the west to the “round tower”, of cylindrical shape, where a collection of the life of the Count Vladwith documents and some torture tools.
The time tunnel
One of the attractions most interesting than the castle is the Time tunnela elevator which descends to 32 meters deep and characterized by the projections of videos and images about the history of the castle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d1zj_vgdnq
The story of this “tunnel” began almost 641 years agoin 1377. During the construction of the fortress, a traditional well was dug in the stone. Centuries later, in 1930Queen Mary of Romania became the owner of this and, together with the architect Karel Limanthey decided that the well could be transformed into a electric lift. The horizontal gallery was then carved to connect it to the royal park, at the foot of the castle. Immediately after the departure of the royal family in 1948, the two galleries were forgotten and wrapped in darkness and silence.
The project of the new electric lift has requested the use of Ben 100 specialistsbetween architects and construction engineers who have worked for 7000 hours of work on the project and for 29000 hours of work running. In addition to these numbers, they should be reported well 330 cubic meters of rock moved manually in the subsoil from 12 miners, more 420 cubic meters of specially poured concrete.
The legend of Count Dracula
Bran Castle, known in popular culture as the “Dracula Castle“, It owes its international fame to Bram Stoker and to the many works that derived from it. In his famous Gothic novel “Dracula” of 1897Stoker chose the Transylvania as a setting. The protagonist, Count Dracula, resides in an imaginary castle which, according to the descriptions in the book, would be near the Pass of Biscrița, in the massif of Monti Calimani (part of the Carpathians), near the rocky group of “Twelve apostles“Although Romania had never visited, Stoker painted it as a backward land, dotted with medieval villages terrified of vampires who lived in Gothic castles.
In the second half of the twentieth century, Bran Castle acquired more and more tourist popularity such as Dracula’s Castle. By setting history in a historically multi -ethnic region such as Transylvania, Bram Stoker managed to connect his protagonist with European historical figures with bloody fame, such as Attila (Head of the Huns, considered ancestors of the Secleri and founders of the Hungarian state) and the fearsome Viking of Germanic origin. Consequently, in the collective imagination, the story of Dracula is closely linked to Bran. It is assumed that Vlad III of Valacchia was one of the sources of inspiration for the creation of the fictitious character of Count Dracula.
