Nurmhusen Castle

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Nurmhusen Castle

The Nurmhusen Castle (Nurmuiža) is located in today's Lauciene (until 1940 Nurmusen or Nurmhuiža) in the Talsi district in western Latvia . The place and the castle take their name from the Livs who settled here before the cures and gave the town its name. Nurm means to Liv as much as " the field ".

history

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church
Altar and epitaphs of the von Fircks

The Nurmhusen Castle (Nurmuiža) was built at the end of the 16th century and is one of the last castles in Latvia to be built by the Teutonic Order . Thick walls and square construction represent the characteristic type of castle of the order in the region. Not built for strategic reasons, it served to organize agriculture and the development of the region.

The estate, which belonged to the Vogt von Kandava before 1566 , was taken over by the Fircks von Kurland family (Georg von Fircks) that year . Presumably at the end of the 16th century the castle was given its current appearance: four buildings enclose a small inner courtyard. The castle is a fortified property consisting of a rectangular two-story central building ( mansion ) with wings of the facade extended to the southeast. A special feature are the sgraffito paintings that decorate the outer walls of the castle: Mannerist ornaments that were placed around windows and doors using graffiti technology , as well as a simple classicist entrance portal that adorns the main entrance of the castle. A chapel with a beautiful Gothic vault on the ground floor of the west wing of the castle completes the whole.

A spacious forecourt, the gate tower and farm buildings were added to the palace complex later and were supplemented with a landscape park .

Georg von Fincks had the Evangelical Church of Nurmuiža built at his own expense in 1594 . Between 1673 and 1687 it was renovated and given new interior fittings. The facility has been preserved to this day. Several monuments attest to the decorative art of Mannerism used . There are the graves of Georg and Anna von Fircks (1600) and an epitaph for Georg (1620) and Christopher (1696) von Fircks.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the castle was rebuilt in a neoclassical style by the architect Vilhelms Bokslafs : the entrance hall , staircase and several rooms of the castle. The representative rooms of the palace, the dining room , reception room and music pavilion have been preserved on the first floor . A multitude of columns, white glazed copies of classicist tiled stoves, an ornate fireplace, and decorative walls and ceilings are testimony to the renovation and are now considered to be one of the most effective examples of neoclassical interiors in the castles of Latvia.

The castle belonged to the Firck family until 1920 (expropriation). Last lord ( Majoratsherr ) on Nurmhusen was probably Ernst Heinrich Otto Freiherr von Fircks (1866–1914), married since 1893 to the writer Freifrau Alice Constance Natalie Virginie von Fircks, née von Rahden .

Todays use

Since 2004 the castle has been managed by “Nurmuižas pils” GmbH (Castle of Nurmhusen) and is again in private ownership.

literature

  • Wolf Lackschewitz: goods of the barons v. Fircks and their owners, Volume I: Part Nurmhusen, Bresilgen, Kivik ( Sweden ) 2012, 235 pages

Web links

Commons : Nurmuiža Castle  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Lauciene (Nurmhusen). Retrieved September 26, 2013 .
  2. ↑ Lexicon of German-Language Literature of the Baltic States and St. Petersburg Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-11-019338-1 . P. 421
  3. ↑ Website of the municipality of Lauciene (in German)
  4. ↑ http://garamuzika.lv ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Goods of the barons v. Fircks and their owners. Part Nurmhusen, Bresilgen @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / garamuzika.lv

Coordinates: 57 ° 13 ′ 37.2 ″  N , 22 ° 45 ′ 40 ″  E