Arms and Armour

Hoogstraten Castle

The Gelmel Castle or Hoogstraten Castle (Dutch: Kasteel van Hoogstraten or Dutch: Gelmelslot) is a moated castle in Hoogstraten, Belgium. Legend links its origins to a wooden tower raised by the Viking Gelmel in the 9th century, but the first stone fortifications date from the late 12th century. Jan IV van Cuijk rebuilt it as a Gothic stronghold in the early 15th century. Elisabeth of Culemborg and her husband Antoine of Lalaing turned it into a princely Renaissance-style residence between 1525 and 1555. Although fires, sieges and French confiscation destroyed much of its fabric, key Renaissance elements—most visibly the massive gatehouse and corner towers—still stand. Used since 1810 for social and penal institutions and now housing a penitentiary school centre, the castle remains state property.

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See also

• ▸Firearm
• ▸Archimedes Palimpsest
• ▸Equites cataphractarii

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Text from Wikipedia; plate via Wikimedia Commons. Text CC BY-SA 4.0; plate freely licensed (see Commons). Source record. Images and catalogue data are reproduced from open-access collections.