Augstroze Cross Hill

2019-12-03 In Cult Identity Hill Latvia Rīga region

Location

State: Latvia
Region: Riga
County: Limbaži
Parish: Umurga

Other references to the location

At Augstroze Church

Coordinates

lat=57.5069444444, lon=25.0011111111
57° 30′ 24″ N, 25° 0′ 3″ E

Description

The Krusts Hill (Cross Hill) is a detached large and broad elevation or a hill opposite Augstroze Church across the road, i.e., in W direction of the church. It is overgrown by large trees, out of which large larches especially stand out. In former times, on the hill, there were also oaks; the stump of a large oak has still been preserved on the S foot of the hill. The surface of the hill is slightly corrugated, it seems that these are remains of former dug-ups. Evidence about an ancient sacrificial site is related to the Cross Hill. Now the information about the Cross Hill was provided by Malda Dundure living in the nearby Krogzemi homestead. She repeated the tale about the beloved couple buried in the hill, which had been recorded many times before. In the past, her father could indicate the place of burial on top of the Cross Hill, from which one could see the Augstroze manor house. In former days, there was an oak cross on top of the hill, which had decayed in the course of time. In modern times of the 1980s, the Secular Trees Liberation Group of Imants Ziedonis installed a new cross, which had been later replaced by another cross, painted brown, standing on top of the hill now. The former cross has been moved to Augstroze Church. Lately, the hill has been done by hunters.

Narrative

1) “Once in Augstroze, there lived a very harsh master. His daughter fell in love with a farmer’s son and they used to meet each other at the hill near the manor house. The master noticed that and once took them by surprise on the very top of the hill. Being enraged, he killed both by sward. Later the master ordered to install a large cross at that site. Thus the hill itself was named the Cross Hill.” (Latvian Folklore Repository 556, 10123) 2) During the Great Northern War in 1710, Peter I presented a broad county in Vidzeme, including Augstroze, to his general Earl Mellin. The Earl sold Augstroze later to a baron from Schleswig Carl von Gersdorff. There is a story that yet in the first half of the 18th century, the inhabitants of Augstroze worshiped ancient Latvian gods, because in the purchase contract, there was a provision about the obligation to cut off the pagan holy oak and to destroy the sacrificial altar on the Oak Hill, nowadays the Krusts Hill. Instead there had to be a cross installed and down the hill – a church, pagan burial grounds to be ploughed up and a Christian cemetery established. (I. Zālīte. Parish of Umurga. The Veiled Stories of the North Vidzeme Landscape. Editor S. Ikauniece. The State Forest Service, 2011, p.152)