The documents of the time mention the existence of a stronghold in the XIV century, situated on the current site of Corvins Castle, a royal fortress with an ellipsoidal shape and a refuge tower on the North wing, barred on the South side by a stonewall.

This estate of the D'Anjou family became the property of the Corvins at the beginning of the XV century (1409), during the times of the nobleman Voicu, as a donation including the fortress and the estate of Hunedoara.

It was during this chronological moment in history that the name of the Corvins were mentioned, when the king Sigismund of Luxemburg offered the above mentioned estate and the castle as reward for special military merits. Voicu's son, Ioan Corvin of Hunedoara (Johannes Corvin of Hunyad), enlarged the construction existing in the XIV century; as a result of two successive construction stages, a new precincts was developed, between 1441-1446, equipped with 7 protective towers - 4 circular ones and 3 rectangular ones.

He also built most of the Chapel, the palace proper (The Council's Hall, The Knight's Hall), the tower of the winding stairway and the South side, which included household facilities, during the second stage (1446-1453). After a number of confrontations with the Ottoman Empire, Ioan Corvin, in the meantime appointed military governor of the Hungarian Kingdom, died after the battle of Beograd (August 11, 1456).

Elisabeth Szilagy, his wife and their son, Matthew Corvin, one of the most brilliant kings of medieval Hungary, had the loggia in the North wing built (the Matthew Loggia); the construction of the Chapel and the Council's Hall completed, and continued the works of embellishing the castle.

In the XV century, the castle was a unique example of nobiliary fortified residence for the area of Transylvania, a dwelling combining specific elements of late Gothic style with the early Renaissance style. The Corvins owned the castle and the estate of Hunedoara up to 1508, followed by 22 other owners up to XVIII century when the castle and the estate became the property of the Hapsburg Empire and the castle itself was turned into the administrative headquarters of the mines and the storage house for the iron products (1724- 1854).

The destiny of the castle is linked, in the XVII century, to the personality of the prince Gabriel Bethlen (1613-1629), who had some interior modifications executed, had the castle remodeled for the defensive demands of the times, by having the white tower, the artillery platform, the inner precincts and the Bethlen palace built- the palace merges middle and late Renaissance characteristic- and had the new entrance into the castle opened through the new gate tower.

After series of minor modifications and fires, the last fire in 1854 having destroyed the whole wooden structure of the castle, the first restoration works was started (1868-1874); as a result, the shingle roof of the castle was replaced with a tile roof, some of the towers were super-elevated, a neo- Gothic facade was built, next to the Bethlen palace, and some interior works and fittings out were executed.

The turning of the castle into a museum (1974) was preceded by another restoration and consolidation stage (1956-1968) and, after 1997, the restoration works has been going on up now.