This picture of Anna Berzkalne was taken in 1929. She was born on 15 January 1891, in Vidzeme - midlands of Latvia. She became one of the first academically educated Latvian philologists, having studied at the Kazan Ladies' Higher Courses (1913-1917) to translate the title literally. Well, that was the time when ladies were not so easily admitted into universities...

Her PhD thesis was devoted to a single type of Latvian folk romance (meaning the longer song) - the one telling the story of a lad having died of sorrow for a beloved he cannot marry (the motif is internationally known; the book was published in 1942). To prepare this work she compiled a catalogue of the longer songs, published in the FFC series under the number 123 (Typenverzeichnis lettischen Volksromanzen in den Sammlung Kr. Barons' "Latvju Dainas", 1938).

It was her initiative to establish the Archives of Latvian Folklore, that lies in the basis of the decision taken on 2 December 1924. Anna Berzkalne was also the Head of the Archives until 1929, when she was somewhat inexplicably removed from the position. Being a teacher with a decent salary she worked at the Archives without being paid (her salary as a teacher was 325 Lats per month, with 5 Lats being equal to approx. 1 USD at that time). She never gave up her interest in folklore and returned to the Institute of Folklore in 1945, although she was later found not to have the right biography to work for such an institution and dismissed.

Anna Berzkalne died on 1 March, 1956 at the age of 65. She was buried in the Riga Forest Cemetery (Meza kapi), the part of it that is called "Poets' Hill".