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.
Hohnstein Castle (Saxon Switzerland)
In 1925 the mighty castle became a youth hostel ("Jugendburg") and was one of the largest and most attractive youth hostels in Germany (with about 1,000 bedspaces). The "Hohnsteiner Kasper" puppet theatre is named after the town and castle and put on its first performance in 1928 in the castle. In the years 1933/34 a concentration camp was established here for so-called protective custody prisoners ("Schutzhäftlinge"), in practice 5,600 political prisoners. During World War II a prisoner of war camp was housed in the castle and, after the war it was a refuge for displaced persons. From 1949 it was extended to become the largest youth hostel in the GDR; at the end of the SED rule an internment camp for 890 political opponents was planned. In 1953 the National Science Museum for Geology, Botany, Zoology and Ecology of the countryside was established here. In 1997 the castle was turned into a Friends of Nature house and youth guest house, to which the museum belongs today.