Vecpiebalga (german: Alt-Pebalg) is a
village
A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred ...
in
Cēsis Municipality
Cēsis Municipality ( lv, Cēsu novads) is a municipality in Vidzeme, Latvia. The municipality was formed in 2009 by merging Vaive parish and Cēsis town, which became the administrative centre. As of 2020, the population was 16,291.
On 1 Ju ...
in the
Vidzeme
Vidzeme (; Old Latvian orthography: ''Widda-semme'', liv, Vidūmō) is one of the Historical Latvian Lands. The capital of Latvia, Riga, is situated in the southwestern part of the region. Literally meaning "the Middle Land", it is situated in ...
region of
Latvia. Vecpiebalga had 501 residents as of 2017.
Vecpiebalga is an important village in Latvian cultural identity.
The first Latvian novel, ''"The Time of the Land Surveyors"'' (orig. ''Mērnieku laiki'') was written by two school teachers,
Reinis Kaudzīte and
Matīss Kaudzīte, in Vecpiebalga. Written in 1879, the novel details the transition from a communal way of life to a more modern, individualistic way of life. The village was also an important center of weaving Latvian textiles. The ruins of
Vecpiebalga Castle lie in the village.
References
Towns and villages in Latvia
Cēsis Municipality
Kreis Wenden
Vidzeme
{{Vidzeme-geo-stub