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the north-eastern corner of the core of the castle, in the northern side of the enclosing wall and in the
western side northwards from the Large Semicircular Tower, in the tower-shaped Southern Block and in
the Small Semicircular Tower. 28.5 × 13.5 × 9 cm large bricks laid in the south-eastern corner of the core
of the castle were dated from the late 14th century by G. Jansons (Jansons 2007, 135). However, for the
construction of the cannon tower near the northern interior gate, which was built a century later – around
1500, long bricks (32 × 14.5 × 8 cm) were again used (Jansons 2007, 133). Since this tower is suitable
for firearms it has not been built earlier than in the late 15th century. There could not be many large-size
bricks, since only the bottom part of the tower has been preserved. Currently no unequivocal explanation
is known why long bricks were again laid into it. It can be only guessed that either more ancient bricks,
from some torn down building, were laid in the tower, or the building materials were brought from a
distant brick-kiln where measurements other than those in Turaida were used.
As shown by the observations published until now, about the size changes of bricks used in the castles
of Riga, Courland and Turaida in the 13th–16th centuries, unfortunately, in the territory of Latvia these
cannot be generalised and related to a definite century. Probably in various medieval Livonian brick-kilns
bricks of slightly differing sizes were produced in one and the same century, since the measurement of
feet used in each of them was different.
Since Turaida Castle was inhabited also during the Early Modern Times, observations of several
researchers should be noted, about the bricks of that time. The sizes of red bricks encountered in Courland
in the 17th century are close to the present-day size – 24–25 × 12–13 × 7.5–8 cm (Erdmanis 1989, 149).
In Riga, in the 17th century, alongside red clay bricks also small-size building elements from yellowish
clay (20 × 10 × 5 cm), imported from the Netherlands, were applied, that are called also Dutch bricks.
Ever increasing import of bricks from the Netherlands, from the first decades of the 17th century till the
18th century, has been registered in written sources of several cities and towns of the Baltic Sea southern
coast, from Danzig (now Gdańsk) to St. Petersburg (Möller 2007, 461). During the investigation of
Turaida Castle it was found that the floor of the Southern Block in the 17th century was repaired using
Dutch bricks sized 24 × 11 × 4 cm (Jansons 2007, 70). At present, the collection of Turaida Museum
Reserve stores several Dutch bricks the sizes of which are even smaller (21–23 × 10.5–11 × 3.5–4.5 cm).
Specially shaped bricks or moulded bricks
For framing of openings of a brick building and for wall decoration both building details of carved
stone and specially shaped bricks or moulded bricks could be used. These were made in special moulds
or cut corresponding to the sample profile. Specially shaped bricks, when laid beside one another, create
an expressive corrugated surface with inward and outward bends. Specially shaped bricks were used in
building vault ribs, cluster pillars, Gothic tracery of windows openings, jambs of perspective portals, wall
cornices and friezes. In case in some place only a few irregular building elements were needed then by
cleaving a common baked brick or carefully knocking off its corner a chamfered edge could be obtained.
However, it was simpler to purchase already finished specially made bricks.
Middle-European researchers have summarised the shapes of specially shaped bricks from a wide
region and have found that some profiles are encountered in a large number of buildings but in separate
Ieva Ose. Building ceramics of Turaida Castle in the 13th–17th centuries