In addition to the Theresienstein house, the second spectacular building in the park! As early as 1877, the idea of “building an observation tower at the height of the labyrinth met with lively approval”. And to this day, the building has lost none of its magic. City architect Thomas planned the artificial castle ruins down to the last detail. The ruined walls could not simply be built up — no! He corrected the course of the Wall in the blueprints in "red" for more excitement. Built in 1877 (to save costs from the remains of the shooting wall at the foot of the labyrinth and from cheap limestone from the Sand quarry), the castle was given a low, bastion-like round tower in 1893, which was "flanged" to the side of the existing ensemble by an archway. The latter came from Hof Castle, which burned down in 1743. Oh yes — when the flag was hoisted on the tower on Sundays, there was a beer bar...
Labyrinth — what an enigmatic name! An ancient manuscript sheds light on the darkness: Johann Will, pastor from Neudorf near Schauenstein, noted in 1692 that "Hoff" had funny mountains, "when there is the labyrinth mountain, there before [earlier] a learned hand of the school youth reached out In 1701, Johann Andreas Planer reveals what the maze looked like in his book “Historia Varisciae” in Latin: The labyrinth would be a round space formed by fir trees. Back then, in the heyday of the Albertinum-Gymnasium (today Jean-Paul) in Hof, mazes were in fashion and you had to find your way out of them in the game. They were inspired by the Greek legend of Daedalus, who built a labyrinth to imprison the dangerous, bull-like Minotaur.