We’re in Riga, it’s 2015, I’m roaming around Vecrīga (the “old town”), first-time visitor. In the main square (Ratslaukums 7, Centra rajons), I come across this unusual old Gothic-style building, rather grand with an unusual triangular-shaped double facade done in the Dutch Renaissance manner. This structure, which at first I took for a not-so orthodox church, goes by the strange and enigmatic name House of Blackheads. Blackheads? Sounds a bit dermatological, really quite comical, like “House of Blackadders”. Was it some kind of lavish upmarket amusement parlour, a games arcade perhaps?

The answer is more mundane…part of the Riga tourist trail, the building these days doubles as a museum and events centre. The “Blackheads” in question were an association of young, unmarried foreigners, (mainly German-speaking) merchants and shipowners and the house was a venue where these well-to-do bachelor boys used to party – hard! The Brotherhood of Blackheads have a long history going back to the 1330s and was active in both Latvia and Estonia (in medieval times part of Greater Livonia). According to legend, the brotherhood’s genesis lies in a group of unmarried foreign merchants who participated in the defence of Reval (former name of Tallinn, capital of Estonia) during the Saint George’s Night Uprising (1343–1345)🄰 [A. Davey, ‘The Brotherhood of Blackheads’, Flickr; ‘The Brotherhood of Blackheads’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org].

Paramilitaries, commercial traders and event planners: From its establishment the Brotherhood in Tallinn was more than a guild hall…it performed a military duty as an urban militia defending Hanseatic towns🄱 from external threats. In Tallinn the Brotherhood provided the city with a cavalry detachment to patrol the city walls, supplying weapons for the city’s defence. In the 1560s and 70s the Brotherhood was actively engaged in the long Livonian War, including defending the city against the invading Russians (Davey). It also operated as a commercial association. Over time the social organisational role of the Blackheads—sponsoring social and cultural events such as parties and concerts, collecting fine art—took precedence over its traditional military one🄲 [‘The Brotherhood of Blackheads: A Unique Medieval Club’, Lorris Chevalier, Medievalists.net, www.medievalists.net].

Membership of the Brotherhood was not confined to merchants and shipowners, it ranged across the strata of medieval society to include a mix of occupations – palace stewards, non-noble estate lords, servants, butlers, clerks, scribes, artisans and of course soldiers (Chevalier). Like an American fraternity lodge, the Brotherhood had its own rules and customs which members were required under oath to observe.

The Brothers in Exile: When the USSR annexed the Baltic States in 1940, many of the Blackheads members escaped Riga and Tallinn, moving to Germany where they reestablished the Brotherhood in Hamburg (later relocating to Bremen where it apparently still exists today). The Blackheads house in Tallinn has been more fortunate than its Riga counterpart, it survives and the building is now a branch of the Tallinn Philharmonic.

The Blackheads House visitors can view in the heart of Riga’s Old Town, despite appearances, is not old, it is an historically faithful reconstruction of the original building. The original six centuries-old house was destroyed and obliterated as a result of the actions of first Nazi Germany and then the Soviet Union. After Latvia gained its independence the historic house was rebuilt in the late 1990s and restored to its former glory by the Ridzinieks🄳.

Endnote: Why “Blackheads”?: The source of the organisation’s nomenclature is not known for sure but it is likely to have something to do with St Mauritius (aka St Maurice), a black Roman soldier–commander of Egyptian origins (d. AD 287). St Mauritius, a Christian martyr, is the Brotherhood’s patron saint. He is commemorated on the house’s facade – represented by iconography on the portal and the Brotherhood’s emblem is a black moor’s head. Why these white, affluent merchant boys chose the 3rd century African saint St Mauritius as their talisman remains a mystery.

🄰 an unsuccessful attempt by the Estonian indigenous population to rid themselves of their German and Danish rulers and landlords and their Christian religion

🄱 the Blackheads guilds in Riga and Tallinn were allied with the Hanseatic League (North Sea/Baltic Sea trade bloc), playing a key role in facilitating Baltic trade between the Hanseatic cities in the Middle Ages

🄲 other Estonian cities including Tartu and Pärnu had their own Blackheads branch

🄳 inscribed above the entrance portal (in Latvian and German) are the words, “Should I ever crumble to dust, rebuild my walls you must””