Frauenstein Castle, Medieval castle ruins in Eastern Ore Mountains, Germany

Frauenstein Castle is a medieval castle ruin sitting on a granite ridge in the Ore Mountains town of Frauenstein, in Saxony, Germany. The site is made up of thick stone walls and a tall residential tower known as Dicker Merten.

Frauenstein Castle was built around 1200 as a border fortress between the March of Meissen and Bohemia, protecting trade routes and silver mining. It was first recorded by name in 1272. In 1438 the Wettins largely destroyed it during a siege, and after a fire in 1728 it was not rebuilt because, unlike the palace, it had no use.

The castle chapel was renovated in 1615, long after the palace was finished and the castle itself stood empty. The name Dicker Merten for the 13th-century tower house is the kind of local nickname visitors hear in Frauenstein. The town received its charter in 1411, while the castle above it belonged to the burgraves of Meissen.

The ruin stands on a 680-metre granite porphyry rock on the crest of the Eastern Ore Mountains above Frauenstein. Access is on foot along local hiking trails, and the ground is uneven, so sturdy shoes help. The Förderverein Burg Frauenstein, founded in 2009, works to keep the site open to the public.

The castle was first recorded in 1272, while the German article gives 1218 as the year of its first documentary mention. The surviving tower house, called Dicker Merten, dates from the 13th century, and the curtain wall is about 1.5 metres thick.