CHEAP HOSTELS IN LATVIA

Historic Centre of Riga
City of Riga


Riga was a major centre of the Hanseatic League, deriving its prosperity in the 13th–15th centuries from the trade with central and eastern Europe. The urban fabric of its medieval centre reflects this prosperity, though most of the earliest buildings were destroyed by fire or war. Riga became an important economic centre in the 19th century, when the suburbs surrounding the medieval town were laid out, first with imposing wooden buildings in neoclassical style and then in Jugendstil. It is generally recognized that Riga has the finest collection of art nouveau buildings in Europe.

Struve Geodetic Arc
Latvia


The Struve Arc is a chain of survey triangulations stretching from Hammerfest in Norway to the Black Sea, through ten countries and over 2,820km. These are points of a survey, carried out between 1816 and 1855 by the astronomer Friedrich Georg Wilhelm Struve, which represented the first accurate measuring of a long segment of a meridian. This helped establish the exact size and shape of our planet and marked an important step in the development of earth sciences and topographic mapping. It is an extraordinary example of scientific collaboration among scientists from different countries, and of collaboration between monarchs for a scientific cause. The original arc consisted of 258 main triangles with 265 main station points. The listed site includes 34 of the original station points, with different markings, i.e. a drilled hole in rock, iron cross, cairns, or built obelisks.

Daugavpils Fortress
Daugavpils fortress is stylistically monolithic Classicism style ensemble, reflecting the urban construction ideas of the time. Monumental fortification system consists of ramparts, bastions, ravelins, dungeons with massive brick arches and other elements. The construction of the fortress was started in 1810 (engineer J.F.Hekel). The foundation forms a fortified town, where the territory is divided into quarters. There was an angular square in the middle part and the Jesuit cathedral was located at one side (1737 - 1746) vertical dominant of the ensemble (destroyed in 1944). A detail plan for the fortress was drafted in 1816 after the design of architect I. Truzson. The plan determines functional zones, differentiate streets and other details. The main buildings of the fortress are the barracks, dwelling houses for officers, hospital, staff and commandant buildings, engineers' and artillery arsenal as well as fortress gates and other edifices built in 1816 - 1830 after the design of architect A.E.Shtaubert. Daugavpils fortress is a significant fortification building, the only one of this kind and scale in the Baltic states. It is well maintained and gives an overall impression of the civil engineering achievements of the time. The fortress influenced the development of quality military architecture all over the Daugavpils city, developed as well in the classicism style on the iron-grid based urban lay-out. In 1860 there the St. Petersburg- Warsov railway line and the railway bridge over Daugava were completed. In that way the fortress lost its military significance and was turned to the complex storage building and prison and partly still serves for those purposes.