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Application of building ceramics in Latvian medieval castles
In most of the territory of Latvia easily-accessible stones are rarely encountered, except on the banks of
the Daugava River and some places in Vidzeme region where dolomite layers are uncovered on the ground
surface. In sandy areas where granite – grey boulders – could not be found in sufficient amounts, the
builders had to search for a substitute to stone. Therefore, a number of brick masonry buildings – several
castles of Livonian rulers, the town wall of Riga, large churches and public buildings as well as dwelling
houses of prosperous city dwellers – were almost wholly built of bricks. Dolomite or boulders were used
only for the foundations. Also in the construction of medieval buildings that were mostly built of natural
stone, building ceramics of red clay was used pretty often, including specially shaped bricks and roof tiles.
In 1987, architect Gunārs Jansons, who researched the building history of Turaida Castle, drew
the map of Livonia showing the distribution of clay deposits and medieval castles – Brick Gothic
buildings (Fig. 5; Jansons 2007, 130). The Riga Archbishop’s castle in Turaida was built of red bricks
as well as castles of vassals in Augstroze/Hochrosen, Straupe/Gross-Roop, and Ērgļi/Erlaa and the
Livonian Order castles in Ventspils/Windau, Piltene/Pilten, Grobiņa/Grobin, Saldus/Frauenburg, Jelgava/
Mitau, Gaujiena/Adsel, Ludza/Ludsen, Dinaburga/Dünaburg. In South Estonia the Order castle in
Pärnu was built of bricks as well as Tartu/Dorpat bishops’ castles in Kirumpää/Kirrumpäh, Vastseliina/
Neuhausen, and Rõngu/Ringen, and also Tartu churches, and the city wall. Red bricks as a supplement
of stone architecture were used for vaults of the castles of Cēsis/Wenden (Dirveiks 2011), Bauska/
Bauske, Riga etc., built of dolomite, as well as for the frames of window openings of several castles built
of stones, for example in Dobele/Doblen, Ērģeme/Ermes, Rauna/Ronneburg, and elsewhere (Caune,
Ose 2004). The Livonian brick masonry castles were mostly roofed with tiles. The expensive metal
sheets were used only for some particular buildings. Thus, on the engraving made by Frans Hogenberg
in 1572, the roofs of the Riga Castle are tinted bluish-grey – probably they were covered with metal
sheets like the spires of large churches, but other urban buildings were roofed with red tiles (Caune,
Ose 2004, 397).
In order to get acquainted with the diversity of the building ceramics used in the Middle Ages, let us
take a consecutive look at articles of different shapes. Since publications of special studies of the building
materials of ancient Livonian buildings are scarce, the general overview can be illustrated only with a few
examples from some buildings in Riga or from the excavation materials of a Latvian castle. In case the
type under discussion has been found in Turaida, a special note will be added.
Bricks
Bricks are rectangular parallelepiped-shaped building materials used for building or coating inner
or outer walls of edifices, for building of pillars – free-standing props, pilasters are built of bricks at the
walls for ceiling support, vaults are made, and sometimes the floor is laid with bricks. The so-called
moulded bricks or specially shaped bricks with cleaved off, rounded or figuratively shaped ends are made
in special moulds, they have a decorative function apart from the practical one. These bricks are used
for decoration of the edges of portals, door and window openings with rich profiling, for building vault
Ieva Ose.
Building ceramics of Turaida Castle in the 13
th
–17
th
centuries