The Castle of the Teutonic Order in Malbork is the largest medieval brick fortress in the world measured by land area.

It was built between the 13th and 15C by the Order of Brothers of the German House of St Mary in Jerusalem (aka Teutonic Knights). The Knights were initially founded as a military order around 1190 to aid Christians in the Holy Land and in the Baltics in the Middle Ages, and to establish hospitals. “To help, defend and heal”was their motto.

Poles and Germans have fought wars for centuries but the origins of Malbork castle display a rare example of their military cooperation – albeit one that backfired. In this case, a 13thC Polish prince, Konrad Mazowiecki, asked the Knights to help his soldiers defeat the Prussians, a Baltic people who blocked Poles access to the sea. The Knights moved their headquarters out of Venice and set out to convert or kill thousands of Prussians. By the early 14thC they were ruling their own expanding state from Malbork, fighting both the Prussians and Poles who finally defeated them at the Battle of Grunwald in 1410.

 In 1466, both castle and town became part of Royal Prussia, a province of Poland. It served as one of the several Polish royal residences, interrupted by several years of Swedish occupation, and fulfilling this function until there were 3 partitions by Russia, Austria and Prussia -which divided up the Polish/Lithuanian Commonwealth lands among themselves progressively in the process of territorial seizures. These resulted in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years.

With the rise of Adolf Hitler to power in the early 1930s, the Nazis used the castle as a destination for annual pilgrimages of both the Hitler Youth and the League of German Girls. In 1945, during World War 2 combat in the area (Soviet Red Army driving east), more than half the castle was destroyed.

Renovated in the second half of the 20th century and most recently in 2016. Nowadays, the castle hosts exhibitions and serves as a museum.

To explore the whole site inside and outside would take days…I had time to experience the large high square castle within the ramparts – comprising meeting halls, huge wooden doors on draw bridges, cloisters, refectory, sleeping quarters, chapel, rose garden – different levels of the castle being linked by internal steep and somewhat hidden stone and wooden staircases, quite a rabbit warren. But ably guided around by my GPS enabled audio guide that switched its description depending on the passageway or room I entered. Amazing technology.

And as an aside… I couldn’t believe how rail-thin Polish women walked easily in heels, HIGH HEELS, over the extensive cobblestone pathways…and then there’s me, with my sensible walking shoes (read hiking boots), stumbling about in the drizzle. 🙂

Incredible paintings, sculptures, frescos,  ceiling and fireplace decorations, including “Jesus at Gethsemane”, a masterpiece of Gothic sculpture (c. 1390) originally from Torun, which is on display at the Castle.