The Ogre is a river in

Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...

. The 188 kilometers long Ogre is a right tributary of the river

Daugava The Daugava ( ), also known as the Western Dvina or the Väina River, is a large river rising in the Valdai Hills of Russia that flows through Belarus and Latvia into the Gulf of Riga of the Baltic Sea. The Daugava rises close to the source of ...

. In the 13th century, the Ogre was called Wogen or Woga.

Etymology

There are three main versions of the etymology of Ogre's name (both town and river). According to the first, the name of the river from which this city derives its name is of

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

origin (угри, ''ugri'', meaning "

eel Eels are ray-finned fish belonging to the order Anguilliformes (), which consists of eight suborders, 20 families, 164 genera, and about 1000 species. Eels undergo considerable development from the early larval stage to the eventual adult stage ...

s") because there used to be many eels in the river Ogre. A popular folk legend says that

Catherine the Great Catherine II. (born Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst; 2 May 172917 November 1796), most commonly known as Catherine the Great, was the reigning empress of Russia from 1762 to 1796. She came to power after overthrowing her husband, Peter I ...

of Russia was the one who gave the river this name because of the abundance of eels in the river; however, this version lacks any evidence. Whereas Estonian linguist Paul Alvre takes into consideration an older form of the Ogre river's name (''Wogene, Woga'') first found in

Livonian Chronicle of Henry The ''Livonian Chronicle of Henry'' () is a Latin narrative of events in Livonia (roughly corresponding to today's Estonia and Latvia) and surrounding areas from 1180 to 1227. It was written by a priest named Henry. Apart from some references ...

(1180–1227), and argues that it is cognate with Estonian word ''voog'' (with possible meanings: "stream, flow, waves"), therefore showing connection with

Finno-Ugric language Finno-Ugric () is a traditional linguistic grouping of all languages in the Uralic language family except for the Samoyedic languages. Its once commonly accepted status as a subfamily of Uralic is based on criteria formulated in the 19th century ...

s, most probably early

Livonian language Livonian ( or ) is a Finnic language whose native land is the Livonian Coast of the Gulf of Riga, located in the north of the Kurzeme peninsula in Latvia but also used to be spoken in the Salaca River valley. Although its last known native ...

. A third etymology gives a reconstructed form *''Vingrē'', related to Lithuanian ''vingrùs'', "meandering, curly" or Latvian ''vingrs'', "nimble;" thus meaning "the meandering river"; the village of Engure has the same root.

References

Rivers of Latvia {{Latvia-river-stub

Etymology

See also

References