Details
Founded: 19th centuryCategory: Palaces, manors and town halls in Latvia
Historical period: Part of the Russian Empire (Latvia)
User Reviews
Snēpele Palace was originally built at the beginning of the 19th century as a baronial hunting lodge with two room apartments for guests on the second floor. The building has housed the Snēpele primary school since 1924.
The building has decorated columns on both sides of the portico, and the wrought iron railing dates from the first half of the 19th century. The exterior doors are from the second half of the 19th century. The first floor has a hall with a beautiful painting on the ceiling. The second floor has a guest lounge with large rooms.
Preserved in the palace are three fireplaces, four columns and four furnaces. The corridors on both ends of the second floor remain with large semi-circular windows decorated with impressive ornaments. In the basement is the kitchen with auxiliary rooms where the school cafeteria is now located. Meals are taken to the dining room floor through an elevator.
References:Visby Cathedral (also known as St. Mary’s Church) is the only survived medieval church in Visby. It was originally built for German merchants and inaugurated in 1225. Around the year 1350 the church was enlarged and converted into a basilica. The two-storey magazine was also added then above the nave as a warehouse for merchants.
Following the Reformation, the church was transformed into a parish church for the town of Visby. All other churches were abandoned. Shortly after the Reformation, in 1572, Gotland was made into its own Diocese, and the church designated its cathedral.
There is not much left of the original interior. The font is made of local red marble in the 13th century. The pulpit was made in Lübeck in 1684. There are 400 graves under the church floor.