Toll castle

A toll castle (German: Zollburg) is a castle that, in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Era, guarded a customs post and was intended to control it. They were typically found in the Holy Roman Empire. Toll castles always stood in the vicinity of an important long-distance trade route over, for example, the Alpine passes or the Middle Rhine. Such castles were usually placed at strategic locations, such as border crossings, river crossings or mountain passes, and were manned by armed guards. The actual toll-collecting point lay below at the road or river and was often linked by walls to the castle itself.

The toll castle of Stahleck in Bacharach
Pfalzgrafenstein Castle

Toll castles belonged to the respective territorial lords[1] or to vassals, to whom the duty and right to collect the toll had been delegated by these lords. Most toll castles also had additional administrative and other functions, as border watch posts or residences, such as for example Stahleck Castle above Bacharach on the Rhine. Some, such as Pfalzgrafenstein Castle in the middle of the Rhine near Kaub, were, however, purely customs points and only collected tolls.

Examples

Austria
Aggstein Castle

France

Germany
Maus Castle

Italy
Chillon Castle

Romania

Slovakia

Switzerland
  • Château de Chillon
gollark: "Noble lies" are very uncool.
gollark: Have a disclaimer saying "any text printed on these masks may not reflect my actual opinion on the ideas such text may convey" or something.
gollark: I'm hoping COVID-19 will lead to even more realistic pandemic simulation games eventually.
gollark: Presumably, whoever makes them there doesn't care about the patents.
gollark: It is very expensive to develop drugs, and because many of them are for rather niche conditions now that cost can't be spread over many people.

References
  1. regionalgeschichte.net, accessed on 7 June 2009.

Sources
  • de Fabianis, Valeria, ed. (2013). Castles of the World. New York: Metro Books. ISBN 978-1-4351-4845-1.
  • Horst Wolfgang Böhme, Reinhard Friedrich, Barbara Schock-Werner, ed. (2004). Wörterbuch der Burgen, Schlösser und Festungen. Stuttgart: Philipp Reclam. ISBN 3-15-010547-1. p. 272.
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