Built on a small island on Lake Traunsee, Schloss Ort is a picture-perfect castle that can be accessed via a 123-meter bridge from the mainland. Built on the ruins of a Roman fortress around 1080 by Hartnidus of Ort, the castle passed to Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor in 1483, after which it was rebuilt due to a fire.
Schloss Ort History
The area around the Traunsee was originally owned by the Counts of Raschenberg. Since the end of the 11th century the knights of Ort, whose seat was the "Veste Ort", have owned the domain of Ort am Traunsee. His area of expertise also included the exercise of the high jurisdiction of the local court and bailiwick over the parishes of Altmünster, Ohlsdorf and Laakirchen. The documented history of Schloss Ort begins with the appearance of the Knights of Ort.
From 1484 to 1491 the castle was ruled by Gotthard von Starhenberg, governor of Upper Austria. In 1492 Bernhard of Starhenberg and later his descendants ruled the castle until 1584. In 1588 the castle was bought by Weikhard Freiherr of Pollheim, but on 6 April 1595 he sold it to the city of Gmunden. However, in the same year Gmunden sold the castle to Rudolf II. The castle then passed to other owners before being definitively acquired by Leopoldo I, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1876, the castle was bought by the Archduke Giovanni Salvatore of Austria (Giovanni di Toscana) (, but on 6 October 1889 he renounced the title and ties with the imperial house of the Habsburgs and changed his name to Johann Orth, the tenth and last son of Grand Duke Leopold II of Tuscany and Marie Antoinette of the Two Sicilies departing for South America in 1890 with his morganatic wife on his ship, the Santa Margherita. Johann Nepomuk Salvator was presumably lost at sea in 1890 and declared dead in 1911 , but his actual date of death is unknown.
The castle was bought by Franz Joseph I of Austria in 1914 and was intended for school students in Gmunden to be able to visit the castle, but this plan was interrupted by the First World War.
Currently the castle is used for a study center of the Federal Ministry of Territory and Forests and is available to host events such as private parties, corporate or cultural events., As well as of course weddings with more than 300 weddings a year and enthusiastic spouses from all the continents confirm this. With its various splendid halls and festive halls and in connection with the first-class gastronomy of the "Orther Stub'n", the Seeschloss Ort is an ideal setting to satisfy every guest's wish.