Legends about Tallinn, Estonia

Back in the days of yore, an archery contest was held each spring to see who could shoot a wooden parrot off the top of a high pole. It was a serious annual tradition, reserved exclusively for the men of noble families. One year, so the legend goes, none of the contestants was able to hit the target. A plucky boy called Thomas was in the crowd. He was from a poor family, but had learned archery from a young age. Urged on by his friends, he gave it a shot, hit the parrot, and immediately got into trouble. But instead of having his ears boxed as his mother expected, he was made an apprentice guard. Thomas eventually became an expert soldier, performing many heroic deeds during the Livonian War and serving with distinction to a rife old age. Years later locals noticed that Town Hall's weather vane, which is shaped like a soldier with a bushy moustache, looked a lot like their hero guard and started calling it Old Thomas in his honour. Nowadays Old Thomas, as legend and weather vane, is a much loved symbol of Tallinn.

Spooks, ghosts, haunts... whatever you call them, if the stories are to be believed, Tallinn is positively infested with things that go bump in the night. Old Town even has a Ghost street (Vaimu), which residents centuries ago thought was haunted. More recent tales - coming from as late as the 1990s - tell of spectral nuns in the Gustav Adolph high school and a monk-like figure who could be seen drinking wine in the Maiden's Tower. The nearby Short Leg Gate Tower probably takes the prize for the most reported incidents: through the years there have been countless sightings of a pair of monks, a woman in old-fashioned dress, and even a spectral dog. Old Town's most famous haunted house stands at Rataskaevu 16, where legend insists that the Devil once held a wedding party. In any case, for centuries the location has been connected with unexplained, late-night party noises and in the last few years, mysterious, thundering footsteps on its wooden staircase.

When you're here in Tallinn, if a mysterious old man approaches you and asks whether the city is finished yet, your answer had better be an emphatic "no." One of Tallinn's oldest legends tells of the Ülemiste Vanake, the old man from Lake Ülemiste, which sits on the outskirts of town. One dark night each autumn he rises from the lake, knocks on the city gates and asks, "Is the city finished yet, or is there still work being done?" The guards have strict orders to answer no, there's still loads of construction going on and it'll probably be years before it's ready. The disappointed old man then turns and leaves, grumbling all the way back to the lake. The belief was that if the answer were ever yes, the old man would call up the waters of the lake and wipe out the city in a great flood. Luckily, despite ups and downs in the local economy, there's always some construction going on in Tallinn so the city is safe from the old man for the time being.

Legend says that once upon a time the nobles of Tallinn decided to build the tallest church in the world, in hopes of luring more merchants to the city. But where to find a master builder capable of carrying out such a task? Suddenly, a large, quiet stranger appeared out of nowhere and promised to build the church, but the payment he asked was more than the city could pay. The man was willing to forego payment, on just one condition - the city people had to guess his name.

The stranger worked fast and talked to no one. The church was nearly finished and the city fathers grew more anxious by the day. Finally, they sent a spy to sniff out the stranger's name. The spy found the builder's home, where a woman was singing a lullaby to a child: "Sleep, my baby, sleep, Olev will come home soon, with gold enough to buy the moon." Now the city people had the man's name! They called out to the builder, who was attaching a cross on the top of the steeple, "Olev, Olev, the cross is crooked!" Upon hearing this, Olev lost his balance and fell all the way down. Legend tells of a frog and a snake that crawled out of Olev's mouth as he lay there on the ground. Building the enormous structure had required the help of dark powers. Yet the builder's name was given to the church, named after St. Olav.

An additional intriguing detail about St. Olav's comes from the Chronicles of Russow. In 1547, a group of acrobats visited Tallinn and tied a rope from the top of St. Olav's steeple to the city wall. They performed dizzying tightrope tricks, to the delight and dismay of the city folk.

This is a story of one house at Rataskaevu street whose former owner had wasted away his wealth and had no future. One night he became so desperate that he decided to take his life. At the fatal moment a stranger entered the room asking the broke landlords permission to celebrate a wedding on the top floor of his house the following night. In reward he promised the man all the riches but only on onecondition: no one would eavesdrop on the feast otherwise it would cost the eavesdropper his life. The landlord agreed.

At the appointed time the carriages started arriving at the door and lights were lit up on the top floor window. Fabulous music sounded and the whole house shook as if under the weight of great number of dancers. When the clock struck one the whole apparition disappeared.

The landlord the day before head over ears in dept was expecting a huge sum of money. At the same time his butler died unexpectedly and before he died the butler revealed he had been eavesdropping on the devils wedding.

At Rataskaevu number 16 there is nowadays a house with a painted window; the landlord had the corner room walled up for ever and to hide the fact he had a proper window with curtains painted on the wall.

Historians might tell you that marzipan, that sweet confection made from almonds and sugar, comes from Persia or Italy, but local legend insists the delicacy was invented right here at Tallinn's Town Hall Pharmacy. Long ago, so the story goes, a town alderman fell ill and summoned the apothecary to prescribe a cure. The expert apothecary knew an elaborate formula he was certain would work, but the alderman insisted that the apothecary test the medicine on himself. As fate would have it, the apothecary caught a nasty cold, so the preparation (and guinea pig) duty fell to his young apprentice, Mart. Being a clever lad, Mart replaced each bitter ingredient with a sweet one. Not only did the tasty remedy work, but the alderman loved it so much that he ordered it in large quantities and made it famous throughout Tallinn and beyond. The sweet bread-like confection became known as Mardileib, or Mart's bread.

A well-known legend, both in Estonia and Denmark, holds that the Danish flag, the Dannebrog, originated on this very spot, in what's now called the Danish King's Garden. According to the story, Valdemar's forces were losing their battle with the Estonians when suddenly the skies opened and a red flag with a white cross floated down. Taking this as a holy sign, the Danes were spurred on to victory.

Kiek in de Kök
The name of this 38m high tower means "peep into the kitchen," since it was so high that guards joked they could see right down the chimneys of the houses below. It was built in the 1470s, but quickly expanded and strengthened, giving it walls up to 4m thick.

Maiden's Tower
This square tower next to the Danish King's Garden dates to the 14th century. Naming it "Maiden's" or "Virgin's" tower is another example of that wacky, Medieval irony: it used to house a prison for prostitutes. Locals insist it's haunted.

Fat Margaret's Tower
Who was Margaret and how fat was she? Actually "Fat Margaret" is thought to refer to one of the cannons once housed in the tower. The structure was built from 1511 to 1530 to protect Tallinn from attacks by sea, but it was also part of the older Great Coastal Gate, now the town's last intact outer gate.

Read more about Tallinn medieval town wall and towers

KGB Headquarters
It's safe to say that this ominous-looking building with bricked-up basement windows was once the single most feared place in the city. It was here at the headquarters of the NKVD (later renamed the KGB) that perceived enemies of the state were interrogated and then either shot or sent to Siberian work camps. The plaque outside in Estonian reads, "This building housed the organ of repression of the Soviet occupational power. Here began the road to suffering for thousands of Estonians." It's interesting to note that the spire of the neighbouring St. Olav's Church was used by the KGB to send radio transmissions.

Read more about KGB headquarters

Patarei Prison
Barbed wire, attack dogs, execution rooms ... it doesn't get much grimmer than this. Originally built as a fortress in 1840, this seaside complex served as a prison from 1919 until 2004. It recently opened as a museum where visitors can explore the mostly untouched remnants of Soviet prison life.

www.patarei.org