Purvciems is a neighbourhood in the Vidzeme Suburb of

Riga Riga ( ) is the capital, Primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Latvia, largest city of Latvia. Home to 591,882 inhabitants (as of 2025), the city accounts for a third of Latvia's total population. The population of Riga Planni ...

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 ...

. Its name literally translates as "

marsh In ecology, a marsh is a wetland that is dominated by herbaceous plants rather than by woody plants.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p More in genera ...

village". It is located on the east bank 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 ...

, to the east of the City Centre and is defined roughly as the area between A. Deglava Iela and Ieriķu Iela. The area is characterised by apartment blocks from the late

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

and the first years after the restoration of Latvian independence (1980s–1990s), though there is also some detached housing. The district is Latvian and

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 ...

-speaking.

History

Starting the end of 17th century and start of 18th century, the largely unsurveyed territory was called Hausmaņa purvs ('Hausmanis' swamp/marsh'). Until the 19th century, only

yeomen Yeoman is a noun originally referring either to one who owns and cultivates land or to the middle ranks of servants in an English royal or noble household. The term was first documented in mid-14th-century England. The 14th century witnessed ...

lived there. In 1828, the first part of the region was included in Riga's borders, and the area saw rise in single-family house construction. The second part of the region was included in Riga's borders in 1924, when a regional development plan and road construction led to rise in family home construction. The territory remained primarily for single homes until 1963–4. In 1965, the Purvciems housing block plan was conceived, that led to extensive high-rise building throughout 1970–80s. Purvciems together with

Pļavnieki Pļavnieki is a Riga neighbourhood situated to the right of the river Daugava. Territory of the Pļavnieki for many centuries was used as agricultural land and was added to Riga only in 1974. The name "Pļavnieki" is derived from Latvian word " ...

is one of the most densely inhabited neighbourhoods of Riga.

References

Neighbourhoods in Riga {{Riga-stub