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 Defensive bastions, thick walls that exude safety, historical ballads that preserve our heritage, a cassette ceiling added a few years ago – these are the features which the Illyefalva Reformed Castle Church offers its visitors. The admirably restored complex of buildings – church, belfry, castle – and its surroundings offer a beautiful panorama, a spot from which one can see not only the village of Illyefalva but also Lower Háromszék (county) and a good part of Burzenland [Barcaság/Tara Bîrsei].
 The church
The oldest description of the church and the castle dates from 1842 and is found in a visitation register. From the register of papal tithes we are certain that Illyefalva had a church on the present spot, which was rebuilt in the 15th century in Gothic style. Although its restoration had already begun in the communist era, its full renovation took place after 1989. They removed all the whitewash both inside and outside, took up the floor and put down a new brick floor. The former whitewashed ceiling was replaced by a cassette ceiling bearing the painted coats of arms of Háromszék and Transylvania, those of the noble families of Illyefalva and a list of the names of all pastors from the Reformation to the present day. They restored and conserved the painted cassettes on the gallery and pews. In the church gallery a new pipe organ was installed thanks to donations from the Netherlands.
The castle
The church at Illyefalva was once surrounded by a double castle: today, however, only the outer castle walls survive intact, and the inner fortification is evoked by the two remnants of walls on either side of the belfy. The inner castle was built first, some time around the turn of the 15th to the 16th century, and the outer walls - after the sieges by the Germans in 1612 – were erected in the 17th century. The castle’s pentagonal plan, with bastions, or watchtowers, at each corner, were used for safety. A few years after its construction, in 1658 battles with Turks and Mongols ravaged Transylvania, and the first victims were the Sekler region and Burzenland. After a siege that lasted five days, they took the castle by means of a ruse, and slew some of those inside with their swords. Those who survived were taken away into slavery: several thousand people fell victim to the attack, and the castle itself was burned. Two sung chronicles of the events survive. At the cusp of the 19th century the inner castle was still fairly intact, while along the outer castle walls there were 118 storage sheds. Balázs Orbán writes that they kept grain in the corner tower, and the village school operated in the gate tower. A full renovation of the castle would become possible only after the change of regime in 1989, when – at the initiative of Béla Kató, the Reformed pastor – the whole strucure was given a new function. In four of the bastions they installed space for young people, with room for providing eighty people with accommodations in these romantic settings. One of the bastions has been transformed into a stage.
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