Hohenzollern Castle
Hohenzollern Castle (German: ) is the ancestral seat of the imperial House of Hohenzollern. The third of three hilltop castles on the site, it is located atop Mount Hohenzollern, above and south of Hechingen, on the edge of the Swabian Jura of central Baden-Württemberg, Germany.
Hohenzollern Castle
The palace itself, sitting upon the outline of the second castle, is an open-air museum arranged in a u-shape that ends with Protestant and Catholic chapels. Sitting on top of the old casemates are the three story Gothic Revival buildings of Friedrich August Stüler's design, decorated with towers and pinnacles. The four towers of the palace are aligned to the bastions, with the Emperor's Tower to the Fuchsloch bastion, Bishop's Tower to the Spitz bastion, Markgraf Tower to the Scharfeck bastion, and Michael's Tower to the garden bastion. Attached to the main residential building, the Count's Hall, is the final tower, the Watch Tower (), which functions both as a staircase to the library and as the flag pole whenever the Hohenzollern family is residing in the castle.