Malé Zlievce

Malé Zlievce is the site of a vanished castle standing on a low hill called Várhegy, two hundred and twenty-eight metres above the Stracinský stream valley in southern Slovakia. The hill rises gently from fields and vineyards that stretch towards the nearby villages of Veľké and Malé Zlievce. The castle was built in the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century as the seat of a small noble estate. After a few decades it was abandoned, leaving only grass-covered earthworks and a single ruined stone tower. The remains show a two-part fortress defended by a wide, deep ditch and an outer bank on three sides. The eastern section measures twenty-five by nine metres and shows no traces of buildings. The western section, slightly higher, measures twenty-five by eleven metres and still bears the foundations of a stone house and a small tower. Archaeologists have found pottery and metalwork from the years between 1300 and 1400, confirming the castle’s short life. Visitors walk up a farm track to the hilltop where the ditch and bank form a clear outline of the fortress. Wild thyme and poppies grow among the ruins, and on quiet days the only sounds are skylarks and the wind in the poplar trees below. From the western edge there is a wide view across the valley towards the forested ridges of the Krupinská planina.