Medieval Towns of the World: Ten Historic Towns from Prague to Mystras

Walled hill towns, island castles and cities of canals: the best medieval towns still let you walk streets laid out five, eight or even eleven centuries ago. These ten span Europe, North Africa and China, from Gothic Siena and Brugge to the Ibadi towns of Algeria’s M’Zab Valley, the Ming walls of Pingyao and, in Hellas, the Byzantine hillside of Mystras above Sparta.

Most are UNESCO World Heritage Sites, and all are living places or carefully conserved ruins, not film sets. Here is what makes each one special and what to look for when you go.

1. Prague, Czechia

Prague’s Old Town, Lesser Town and New Town grew between the 11th and 18th centuries, but the city’s golden age came in the 14th century under Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV. He founded the New Town, planned as a “New Jerusalem”, established the university in 1348 and in 1357 laid the foundations of the bridge that bears his name.

Charles Bridge, designed by Peter Parler, took 45 years to finish and stretches 516 m across the Vltava, lined with 30 mostly Baroque statues. Walk it early in the morning, then climb to Prague Castle and St Vitus Cathedral on the Hradčany hill. In the Old Town, the late-15th-century Powder Gate and the Klementinum library add later chapters to the story.

2. Oviedo, Spain

In the 9th century, when most of Iberia was under Muslim rule, the small Christian Kingdom of the Asturias built a remarkable group of pre-Romanesque churches around its capital, Oviedo. UNESCO lists six of them as the Monuments of Oviedo and the Kingdom of the Asturias.

The highlights are Santa María del Naranco, a royal hall later turned into a church, and its neighbour San Miguel de Lillo. In the city, see the Cámara Santa inside Oviedo Cathedral, San Julián de los Prados, known locally as Santullano, and La Foncalada, a 9th-century water structure. The sixth monument is Santa Cristina de Lena, a royal chapel from about 850.

3. Carcassonne, France

La Cité de Carcassonne in southern France is one of the great fortified medieval towns of Europe. Its double ring of ramparts carries 45 towers: 26 on the inner wall and 19 on the outer, three of them barbicans. A 12th-century count’s castle sits on the line of the old Roman walls, and the Basilica of Saints Nazaire and Celse keeps 14th-century stained glass.

Much of what you see is also a 19th-century creation. Between 1853 and 1879 the architect Eugène Viollet-le-Duc led a sweeping restoration, and UNESCO inscribed the city in 1997. Stay overnight to walk the ramparts in the evening, after the day visitors leave.

4. Siena, Italy

Siena took on its Gothic appearance between the 12th and 15th centuries, when it rivalled Florence in banking, art and urban planning. Three main streets meet in a valley that became the Piazza del Campo, a shell-shaped square paved in 1349 and divided into nine sections in honour of the Nine, the council that governed Siena from 1292 to 1355.

The Palazzo Pubblico and its Torre del Mangia close the lower side of the Campo, and the Fonte Gaia fountain of 1419 stands at the top. Twice a year the square hosts the Palio, a bareback horse race between the city’s contrade, or neighbourhood districts.

5. Pingyao, China

Pingyao, about 100 km south of Taiyuan in Shanxi province, is one of China’s great walled towns. Its walls were built in 1370 under the Ming Hongwu Emperor: about 12 m high and 6.2 km around, with 72 watchtowers and more than 3,000 battlements. Inside, a grid of Ming and Qing streets, courtyard houses and shops survives almost intact.

From the 19th to the early 20th century Pingyao was China’s financial capital. The Rishengchang, first and largest of more than 20 local banks, once handled almost half the country’s silver trade before failing in 1914. The UNESCO site, inscribed in 1997, also includes two outlying temples: Shuanglin, with more than 2,000 painted sculptures, and Zhenguo.

6. Bruges, Belgium

In the Middle Ages Bruges (Brugge) was a commercial metropolis at the heart of Europe, and in the 15th century it was the home of the Flemish Primitives, including Jan van Eyck and Hans Memling. When its trade declined, the city largely missed the industrial revolution, which is why its canals, brick Gothic buildings and street plan survive.

Start at the Markt beneath the Belfry, then wander to the quiet Béguinage and along the canals. Look out for the late-19th-century Neo-Gothic façades, a style the city developed as it restored itself. The historic centre joined the World Heritage List in 2000.

7. Trakai, Lithuania

Trakai Island Castle rises from an island in Lake Galvė. Grand Duke Kęstutis began it in the 14th century, and his son Vytautas the Great completed the main works around 1409.

After the 17th-century wars with Muscovy the castle fell into ruin. It was rebuilt in the decades after the Second World War, with most of the work done between 1951 and 1961, and today the castle houses the Trakai History Museum. Combine a museum visit with a walk or boat trip on the lake,.

8. York, England

York has more intact city wall than any other English town: about 3.4 km, most of it from the 13th and 14th centuries, built on a line first laid out by the Romans around AD 71. The Multangular Tower in Museum Gardens is the most visible Roman survivor.

Four main gatehouses, called bars, break the circuit. Bootham Bar keeps 11th-century stonework, Monk Bar still has a working portcullis, and Walmgate Bar has the only surviving barbican on a town gate in England. Micklegate Bar was the ceremonial entrance for monarchs, and the heads of traitors such as Richard, Duke of York, were displayed on it in 1461. Walk a section of the walls, then visit York Minster and the narrow streets around it.

9. Ghardaïa and the M’Zab Valley, Algeria

Deep in the Algerian Sahara, the Ibadi community founded five fortified towns, or ksour, in the M’Zab Valley between 1012 and 1350: El-Atteuf, Bounoura, Melika, Ghardaïa and Beni-Isguen, each with its palm grove. Every ksar climbs a hill towards a mosque whose minaret doubled as a watchtower.

Simple cube-shaped houses ring the slopes in concentric circles, an expression of an egalitarian society that valued family privacy. That functional design later inspired 20th-century architects including Le Corbusier and Fernand Pouillon. The M’Zab Valley is a living, conservative community, so visit the old towns with a local guide.

10. Mystras, Greece

Mystras is one of the treasures of Hellas, a Byzantine city spread over a steep hill overlooking Sparta in the Peloponnese. The Frankish prince William II of Villehardouin built the fortress on its summit in 1249, but in 1262 it passed to the Byzantines, and from the mid-14th century until 1460 it was the capital of the Despotate of the Morea.

In those two centuries Mystras became one of the last great centres of Byzantine learning and art. The philosopher Georgios Gemistos Plethon taught here, and Constantine Palaiologos, the last Byzantine emperor, ruled here as despot before taking the throne. Its churches, among them the Metropolis of Hagios Demetrios, the Hodegetria, the Peribleptos and the Pantanassa, still stand on the slope, and the Palace of the Despots, recently restored, is the only Byzantine palace that survives. The town was abandoned in the 1830s, when modern Sparta was founded on the plain below, and was listed by UNESCO in 1989.

Wear good shoes and go early in summer: the paths are steep and the hillside gets hot. For another Greek landscape where Byzantine faith meets dramatic rock, continue to Meteora.

Related reading

• Abandoned-Place Photographs: 24 Locations and the Stories Beyond the Ruins
• 29 great cityscapes from around the world
• Nineteen Distinctive Places: Landscapes, Temples and Gardens
• 19 Sacred Places: Architecture, Living Traditions and Historical Context

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