Aizpute New Castle Manor

Castle Manor house early 20th century

Castle Manor house in 2014

The postcard of the beginning of the 20th century shows a view from Baznīckalns (Church hill) across Liepājas Street and Dzirnavu (Mill) Pond to the Aizpute Castle Manor or the New Castle.

The original center of Aizpute Castle Manor, as already mentioned (see Livonian Order Castle), was the Livonian Order Castle in the current № 9 Liepājas Street, but probably in the middle of the 18th century the new Castle Manor Center was established in the area of the current Skolas Street.

The construction of the manor house, the so-called noble house or the new manor, dates back to 1760-1762, as evidenced by the following facts: In 1760, the widow von Behr, the owner of Cīrava (Zirau) and Aizpute (Hasenpoth) Manors, born Julianna Eleonora von Bülow, paid 9,000 Florins for the bricks taken from Kabile to the “Aizpute building structure”, and in 1761, dividing the property among the daughters, J.E. von Bülow determined that the eldest daughter is obliged to pay 1,000 Talers to the youngest who had inherited Aizpute Manor for the completion of "Aizpute building structure". It is believed that these documents refer to the construction of a residential house, because the architecture of household buildings describes them as early 19th century buildings.

In the attached postcard, we see a portico of columns and a classicist-style pediment in front of the entrance facing the Tebra, which unfortunately has not survived to this day. The same can be said about the terraces created on the steep hill of Tebra.

For many former and current inhabitants of Aizpute, this building is known as Aizpute Secondary School, also a gymnasium. Nowadays, it is the Council property, which houses the Aizpute Local History Museum with a Tourism Information Point, the Aizpute District Creativity Center for Schoolchildren, the public agency for disabled children "Saulessvece” (Sun candle), as well as the public organization "Local Products of Kurzeme" and "Eko vīns“ Ltd.

Aizpute District Secondary School in the 1920s

A photograph from the 1920s shows the Aizpute District Secondary School on Skolas (School) Street, established in the spring of 1922 in the former manor house of Castle Manor.

Aizpute State Gymnasium in the 1930s

Aizpute State Gymnasium in the early 1930s

Former Aizpute State Gymnasium in 2016

From 1931 to 1945, the former district secondary school on № 1 Skolas Street was Aizpute State Gymnasium. These photographs from the early and second half of the 1930s also show the Dzirnavu (Mill) Pond and the District Cooperative Mill. Behind the house in front of the mill is a footpath hidden in the foliage of trees, which led to the Knowledge Hill.

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