Explore Predjama

About Predjama

Predjama Castle is one of the most cinematically extraordinary buildings in Europe — a four-storey Renaissance castle dramatically built directly into the mouth of a 123-metre natural limestone cliff cave, with the rock face forming the entire back wall of the structure and additional passages tunnelling deep into the karst beyond. The original fortress on this spot dates to 1202, but the building you see today was completed in 1583, and its inaccessible position made it virtually impregnable to medieval and Renaissance siege weaponry — the dramatic 15th-century legend of robber-baron Erazem of Predjama tells how he held out against a year-long Habsburg siege by secretly receiving fresh supplies through a hidden cave passage at the back, only being killed (so the story goes) by a single well-aimed cannonball through his toilet by a treacherous servant who signalled the besiegers below. The visit is genuinely thrilling: you walk through the castle's tilted, irregular rooms (the floors are uneven because they follow the rock), see the kitchen, the chapel, and the dungeon, then descend into the cave passages behind — a 700m walk through karst galleries with bat colonies. Combine in a single half-day with the nearby Postojna Cave (10km).