By Denis Conolly copyright 1992

South Africa's oldest building remaining in use, The Castle of Good Hope, had its foundation stones laid on 2nd January 1666 by Commander Zacharias Wagenaer some 220 meters to the east of the site of van Riebeeck's original mud-walled fort. Its construction followed the imminence of maritime war with the Netherlands' trade rival, England. Progress in building was hampered between cessation and resumption of the war and although the Castle was first occupied in 1674 it was not until 1679 that it was completed.

The Castle was designed in accordance with the old defence system of the Netherlands, in a pentagonal shape with five points of the star forming the bastions - the stone walls between bastions 150 metres long and 12 metres high. It was considered to be pretty secure with a powder magazine under each bastion and a 25-metre moat dug around the entire fortification. No attack having ever been launched against the Castle, its strength was never tested.

The five bastions were named after the titles of the Prince of Orange, the Netherlands' ruler at the time. Buren the northern bastion, contained officers quarters and the tollgate, compulory for all produce dealers entering Cape Town from the interior. The garden in this bastion was much used by Lady Anne Barnard during the first British occupation of the Cape. Katzenellenbogen, on the eastern side, contained the 'black hole' and other below sea-level dungeons provided for the incarceration of wrongdoers. Nassau, the south-eastern bastion, contained storerooms and offices and Oranje to the south contained the armoury and gunsmiths' workshop. Leerdam, the western bastion, contained the kitchens and pay office. During the eighteenth century there were approximately one hundred cannon on the fortress in a mixture of 12-, 18-, and 24-pounders.

In the bell-tower over the entrance to the Castle is the original bell, cast in Amsterdam in 1697. The pediment above the entrance bears the United Netherlands' coat-of-arms of the six chambers of the Dutch East India Company and the Company's monogram: V O C (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie)

The Castle was one of the first South African national monuments to be proclaimed and also houses a military museum.

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