Muran Castle, is a ruin of a medieval castle situated above the village of Muran, in the Muranska planina National Park in Slovakia. The castle is noteworthy for its unusually high altitude of 935 m. It also figures in several romantic legends about its remarkable owners. Muran Castle was built in the 13th century on a cliff overlooking a regional trade route. Its name was mentioned for the first time in 1271 ("arx Mwran").
One of its owners, the robber baron Matus Baso, transformed the castle into a stronghold of bandits who robbed merchants and looted villages. After a siege by the royal army, the castle fell in 1548 and Matus Baso was executed.
Another famous owner was Maria Szechy, better known as "The Venus of Muran". This astonishingly independent woman divorced her second husband to marry the love of her life – magnate Ferenc Wesselenyi. When Wesselenyi was besieging Muran Castle, which was occupied by her relatives at the time, she even managed to get his soldiers inside through trickery. In 1666, Wesselenyi organized a failed coup against Leopold I, but he died before any major confrontation. Subsequently, Maria Szechy bravely led a defense of the castle against Imperial troops. Outnumbered, she eventually surrendered to Charles of Lorraine in 1670.
The castle was damaged by fire in 1760.
