Aluksne

Aluksne is a town on the shores of Lake Alūksne in northeastern Latvia near the borders with Estonia and Russia. It is the seat of Alūksne municipality. Alūksne is the highest elevated Latvian city, located in East Vidzeme Upland at 217 m above sea level. The region around Lake Alūksne was originally settled by Finnic-speaking tribes, and from the 8th-12th centuries by Latgalians. The date of settlement at the current location of the town, then known as Olysta, Alyst, and Volyst, is given in the chronicles of Pskov as 1284. The later name "Alūksne" comes from the Latgalian word olūksna, meaning a spring in the forest. The Latgalian inhabitants of the settlement were conquered by the German crusaders of the Livonian Order in 1342. They built a castle named Marienburg on a nearby island, which served to protect trade routes from Riga to Pskov. Aluksne Evangelical Lutheran church built during the times of German Baron Otto Herman von Vietinghoff between 1781 and 1788, under the supervision of Riga architect, Christoph Haberland, the church is one of the most beautiful in Latvia due to its architecture. The altar painting of the church "The baptism of Jesus" was renovated in 2000. In 2006, the renovation of the organ constructed by the famous organ master, August Martin, was completed. The parish of the Orthodox church started its activities in the middle of the 19th century. In 1895 an eclecticism style church was constructed in Alūksne. The interior of St. Trinity Orthodox church was made according to the traditions of the Orthodox church. The altar part of the church is decorated with a two-level iconostasis and small side altars with the icons made at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, and the images of saints.