Tschanüff Castle

Tschanüff occupies a rocky spur at about 1240 metres above sea level in a traditional spur-castle layout, with a compact inner stronghold above an outer southern ward. The fabric is composed of masonry, barrel vaulting and visible timber sockets. Two concentric defensive rings once enclosed the inner and outer areas, and a gate building connected them by a vaulted passage leading into the principal courtyard.

The main tower is a multi-storey keep dating to the 12th and 13th centuries and still stands to five storeys. Its entrance is set high on the south face at the level of the fourth floor, a defensive arrangement, and the tower’s stonework is not bonded into the surrounding wallwork, indicating that adjacent enclosures were added later. Internal floors and means of access survive only in part, leaving the tower as a prominent vertical element of the ruin.

Directly south of the tower a range aligns with the high entrance and shows regular beam holes at the height of four storeys, evidence of substantial timber floors that once linked to the keep. South of that range are the remains of an unusually thick protective wall, originally about three metres across and later reinforced—likely when firearms were introduced—roughly doubling its thickness to create a massive, largely solid block probably once capped by a defensive platform.

West of the south-of-tower range a 15th-century four-storey wing forms the southern residential tract; its lower levels were constructed with barrel vaults, some partly collapsed, while the third floor contained a long hall with a wooden ceiling. Above that level a roof area served as a fighting platform with embrasures, and domestic rooms opened toward the courtyard. A two-storey building added around 1500 stands to the west of the main tower, with utilitarian ground rooms and living chambers above; surviving exterior plaster bears traces of sgraffito. Window openings in the western enclosing wall show that the castle once continued further west, but those ranges have since collapsed or slipped away in landslides and now lie lost or ruinous.

Overall the site survives as a ruin of vaulted masonry, collapsed western ranges and multi-storey tower and wall fragments. Consolidation and safety work in recent decades has sought to stabilise the fabric and prevent further loss.