The Wiener Hofburg is a large complex of multifarious buildings of various architectural styles that date from between the thirteenth and nineteenth centuries. It was the Viennese residence and legislative centre of the Habsburger Dynasty, the emperors of the ‘Holy Roman Empire’ of the German nation.

An equestrian statue of Emperor Joseph The Second overlooks the homonymous Joseph Square which is enclosed by the National Library and the side wing of the Winter Riding School.

In 1820, on the grounds of the castle’s bastion, the Castle Garden was created which only the members of the imperial family were allowed to enter. It boasts a Palm House which is one of the most beautiful orangeries in Europe and also an adjoining Butterfly House.

Popular with the royal household, the great Austrian composer, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, has a monument dedicated to him in the Burggarten.

The Hofburg was once the residence of the Imperial Family and from what was a momentous time in history, its buildings and artefacts remain, glorious mementoes of an Imperial royal capital city - Vienna!