| The first fortress in the town was erected in 1492 upon order of
Transylvanian voivode Stefan Bathori, and was accomplished somewhere
between 1602 and 1652 under judge Borsos Tamas. Having a pentagon plan,
surrounded by a defense wall, the Citadel has seven forts, five of them
bearing the names of the guild which – according to tradition –
supported its maintenance: the leather dressers’, the tailors’, the
butchers’, the ironmongers’, the coopers’. After the Citadel was
taken over by the Austrian troops, it became the headquarters of the
military garrison based in the town. In the mean time the Baroque style
building was built (on the left hand side of the road in front of the
entrance gate) and in the second half of the 18th century the
construction works of the ‘barkey’ were started, an addition
finished in the 19th century. On the occasion of the Targu Mures days
– which have as central point of performance the Citadel – a museum
center was opened in the gate fort (erected in 1613) presenting the
history of the town and of the Citadel.
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