Pietālava

Pietālava lies in the border country between Latgale and Pskov, east of the lands of Tālava. In the Middle Ages the area stood between the authority of the archbishops of Riga and the Russian lands to the east. The fortified place known as Vyshgorod was established in the fifteenth century and suffered destruction during Stephen Báthory's campaign in 1581. The frontier shifted amid the wars that divided Livonia between its neighbours. By the late eighteenth century Pytalovo was recorded as a village in the Pskov country.