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Information on your visit

Further sights

The Italian Palace, part of the New Palace Bayreuth, houses the Archaeological Museum of the Upper Franconian Historical Association. The eight rooms contain exhibits covering the period from the Palaeolithic Age to medieval times.

Website of the Upper Franconian Historical Association

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Plassenburg Castle at Kulmbach

 

A further property administered by the Bavarian Palace Administration in the Bayreuth area is Plassenburg Castle.

This massive fortress belonged from 1338 to 1791 to the Burgraves of Nuremberg and subsequent Margraves of Brandenburg, members of the Hohenzollern family. In 1559, Georg Friedrich von Ansbach commissioned Caspar Visher to build a four-winged complex.

The Schöne Hof (Beautiful Courtyard), an arcaded courtyard richly decorated with relief work, is one of the finest examples of German Renaissance art. Further highlights are the "Hohenzollerns in Franconia" Museum, the "Frederick the Great" Army Museum (Windsheimer Collection) and the Margravial Rooms with historic pictures of the construction work, portraits of margraves and the gilt canopied bed of Margravine Maria (ca. 1630).

Plassenburg Castle also houses the German Tin Figure Museum and the Landschaftsmuseum Obermain, both run by the municipality of Kulmbach.