History of Estonia

Common card · No. 245660

The history of Estonia forms a part of the history of Europe. Human settlement in what is now Estonia became possible 13,000–11,000 years ago, after the ice from the last glacial era had melted, and signs of the first permanent population in the region date from around 9000 BC. The medieval indigenous population of Estonia was one of the last pagan civilisations in Europe to adopt Christianity following the Northern Crusades in the 13th century. After the crusaders had conquered the area by 1227, Estonia was first ruled by the King of Denmark in the north (until 1345), and then until 1559 by the Teutonic Order, and by the ecclesiastical states of the Holy Roman Empire, which from 1418 to 1562 covered the whole of Estonia, forming a part of the Livonian Confederation. After 1559, Estonia became part of the Kingdom of Sweden until 1710, when the Tsardom of Russia (Muscovy) conquered the entire area during the Great Northern War of 1700–1721. Throughout this period the local German-speaking...

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