Nitra

Nitra lies in the Nitra River valley, about 90 km northeast of Bratislava, at the foot of Mount Zobor, the southern tip of the Tribeč range. It is the seat of the eponymous region and claims the title of the country’s oldest city: in the 9th century it was the center of Prince Pribina’s principality and later one of the seats of Great Moravia, and the first mention of a church in its territory dates from that period.

The castle sits on a limestone hill surrounded on three sides by the river. On the top are the bishop’s palace and the cathedral, which actually comprises three churches from different eras, the oldest from the 11th century. Nitra has been a bishopric since 880. Below the castle stretches the Upper Town (Horné mesto), with palaces, the Piarist church and sloping streets, and further down lies the commercial center, with the Andrej Bagar Theatre and the pedestrian street.

The synagogue, built between 1908 and 1911 by the architect Lipót Baumhorn, was restored and houses the national exhibition on the Holocaust in Slovakia. On the city’s outskirts, the Slovak Agricultural Museum combines an open-air museum and a field railway.

Mount Zobor, at 587 m, closes the view to the north. Trails climb its slopes, covered in vineyards, and pass through a steppe nature reserve up to the Pyramída viewpoint, from which you can see the town and the Danube plain.

This destination brings together 1 city: Nitra.