S. Perémi Ágota (szerk.): A Laczkó Dezső Múzeum Közleményei 28. (Veszprém, 2014)
Rácz Miklós: A cseszneki felső vár ásatásának (2003, 2005) és a keleti torony kutatásának (2002–2003) eredményei
Gara, brother-in-law of Sigismund, was the palatine of Hungary (1402-1433). Csesznek was built as a county residence for the family, its uniqueness lies in the fact that this is one of the really few newly built castles of the era. What we can see now is mainly from this period. The earlier building, from the 13th century, functioned as the element of the royal estate system, which was created in the 14th century by the Angevine kings. During the excavation we could find wall remains from this era, moreover, numerous finds were recovered under the late medieval floor. Information about the grand process of construction and its phases could be traced from various ways. According to our major observations the eastern building block inside the outer shell of the upper castle was built in a second building phase, when, the cistern court was restricted the second floor of the new building must have included a representative hall. This conversion was proved in detail by the excavations at the eastern part of the castle. The inner bailey was also altered in a number of phases. The northwestern section of the bailey stood alone at first in front of the entrance, later it was continued all around the castle. Thus we can see that the concept of construction changed at a number of points, but it can be supposed that this was one big and expensive building operation, going on for long decades. In the upper casde we only found a relatively small amount of late medieval finds, because the waste was disposed of outside the upper castle. The entrance area of the eastern building is an exception, where a large layer of late medieval waste was found under the floor. There were ceramics within with remains of stove tiles dated to the Sigismund era. The other important deposit of finds was in the northwestern part of the inner bailey, where we found a relatively thick late medieval fill layer. One of these significant number of unglazed stove elements can be dated to the end of the 15th or the beginning of the 16th century, this marks the earliest time, when the filling could have been made. The burnt debris found here, in the fill layer, can be related to a restoration after a late medieval or Turkish destruction or conversion. Even on the Turco drawing of 1570 the castle can be seen without roof. One of the important elements of the castle is the eastern tower, which can be reached through a bridge from the inner bailey. In the 1950s, and later, in 1993—94 conservation projects took place in this tower. The excavation of the bottom floor and the survey of the walls happened in 2002. During this research the building history of the tower could be reconstructed, it can be divided into three major periods: the 15th century, the Turkish era, and the restoration in the 18th century. On the sidewalls of the bottom floor - which had been filled in during the Turkish era - the traces of an inner timber structure could have been seen and documented, based on this the reconstruction of this timberwork was possible. The finds (pieces of ceramics, a rifle) from this fill can be dated to the middle and second half of the 16th century, these are referring to the date of filling and conversion us of the tower. The filling of the bottom floor and the enlargening of the previous loop-holes suggest that a cannon had been placed there once. The construction of the thinner-walled upper floor, opened with huge windows, is the work of the reconstruction after the Turkish era, when it was attempted to emphasize the picturesqueness and romantic appearance of the medieval castle ruins even with these functionally out-of-date building parts. 408
