In the early twentieth century Estonian artist Ants Laikmaa created beautiful portraits of Ethiopians and North Africans, while still developing a distinct Estonian art. The range of his portraiture reveals the tolerance and acceptance in Estonia over a century ago. Estonia has always been multicultural, yet recent debates about EU migration quotas tend to suggest otherwise. […]
An Ethiopian in Tallinn, circa 1903 Read More »
New evidence indicates Estonians may have been the first Europeans to settle North America.* Archaeologists excavating in the rocky coast of Maine in the United States have discovered a historical encampment, which, if their theory holds true, will represent the earliest known European settlement in North America – predating Christopher Columbus by centuries and even
Estonians beat Columbus to north America Read More »
Kihnu, a small island in the Baltic Sea, with a population of 600, has a lifelong dream to rebuild an authentic rock-ship model. Originally used by seal hunters and fishermen, Kihnu is now one of the most culturally significant societies in Estonia. The women guard the cultural heritage while the men go off to sea
Kihnu wants to build an authentic rock-ship model Read More »
Estonia’s Swedes survived revolution, invasion and exile. Their struggles tell the story of 20th-century Europe. In 1993 I found myself living on a former collective farm in a remote border protection zone in western Estonia. The place was like small collective farms everywhere in the Soviet Union: there was a cultural hall, a school, a
Minority report: the plight of Estonia’s ethnic Swedes Read More »
Tomas Alexandersson, a young Swede, who moved to Tallinn, started collecting the postcards and travel brochures of the Soviet-era Estonia, ultimately dedicating an entire website to it. During the Soviet occupation of Estonia, there was only one official travel agency in the Soviet Union – Intourist. Founded in 1929 by Joseph Stalin, it was first staffed
20 pictures of Soviet-era Estonia Read More »
Estonian-American writer Charles (Kalev) Ehin tells a moving story in his book of the reconciliation of an Estonian family torn apart by war. In September 1944, approximately 75,000 Estonians fled their beloved homeland. Memories still fresh from the brief Soviet occupation in 1940-41, and the Red Army advancing towards Tallinn, they hoped to avoid what
Book review: Coming Home by Charles (Kalev) Ehin Read More »
A single fossil bone that was kept in Estonia and accidentally discovered by an Australian scientist led to the discovery of the origins of sexual intercourse. John Long, a palaeontology professor at Flinders University in Australia, discovered the fossil bone from the collections of the Tallinn University of Technology where he was handed a box
A fossil bone in Estonia led to the discovery of the origins of sex Read More »
In the autumn of 1970, a rumour about a major hippie gathering coming to the Town Hall Square was spread around Tallinn. All the long-haired guys – and there weren’t many of them – got excited by a vision of a cheerful crowd whose social criticism would be masked by the language of rock music and
Make love, not war – hippie movement in the Estonian SSR Read More »
Estonians are certainly making an impact on and their presence felt in Australia. The way in which Estonians integrate into an existing culture without forgetting their roots has made them welcome citizens in the “land down under”. Waves of Estonians have hit Australian shores with every recession and crisis in Europe and Estonian blood flows
Estonians taking on the world in Brisbane: where we are at and where we have come from Read More »
On 5 September, operatives of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) illegally entered the territory of the Republic of Estonia, a member of NATO and the European Union, and kidnapped by force an officer of the Internal Security Service (ISS) of Estonia. The facts we know today tell us the officer was definitely on the
