By 10 a.m. we went to the free bus and up to the Roncolo Castle (Runkelstein). Now that was something different, lay medieval art in reasonable condition instead of sacred art in churches.
Be prepared for a steep climb up to the castle.
The 14th century Tristan and Iseult story room was is amazing condition. Much of the art has a primitive, simplistic quality to it. As though drawn by a handy amateur. Some animals along the top of the wall are barely recognizable species, realism wasn't their forte.
But then there were so many castles and so little time. I was particularly surprised by the number of castles on the regional map; there are hundreds.
List of castles in South Tyrol.
The art is directly on the walls and so parts have disappeared. Reading the overall history of this fortress/castle points to the fact that they lost their reason for being with the introduction of cannons in the 16th century, removing any strategic advantage their inaccessible locations may have provided. They became somewhat inconvenient residences and were maintained halfheartedly by rich people of the time.
Eventually, it was given one more restoration and handed to the city of Bozen in 1893. Done.
Now they put on shows there and have an excellent little restaurant on site.
South Tyrol travel guide - Wikitravel
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| The one in the museum has a dozen such wax seals on ropes |
Some artifacts really surprised me such as the contract transferring the property in 1363. Instead of signatures, it had a string woven into the bottom of the cloth of the contract text with over a dozen blobs of wax where each pressed the »"signature key»". They used a lot of wax!
