Tartu, Pärnu & Southern Estonia

The south was the land of the ancient Ugandi and Sakala peoples, whose hill forts at Otepää, Tartu and Viljandi fell to German crusaders in the early 13th century. Tartu, first mentioned in 1030 when a Kyivan prince built a fort there, became the seat of a bishop and a Hanseatic town trading with Pskov and Novgorod; Pärnu, on the western coast, was a Hanseatic port. Saaremaa, with its own bishopric of Ösel-Wiek, joined the great Estonian rising of 1343 and resisted the German knights longer than the mainland.

The Livonian War of the 16th century ended the bishops' rule in Tartu and left Viljandi in ruins. Saaremaa passed to Denmark and then, in 1645, to Sweden, and in 1632 King Gustav II Adolf founded the university in Tartu that shaped the whole region. Russia had taken everything by 1710, and Baltic-German landlords ran the manors of the south until 1919.

Tartu was the cradle of the 19th-century national awakening: the first Estonian song festival was held there in 1869, and the Vanemuine society founded the first Estonian-language theatre. Independence was first proclaimed in Pärnu on 23 February 1918, and the Treaty of Tartu of 1920 won Soviet Russia's recognition. Under Soviet rule Saaremaa was a closed border zone and Tartu housed a large military airfield at Raadi. After 1991 the Seto lands were split by the new border, leaving their old centre of Pechory in Russia. Tartu was European Capital of Culture in 2024.

The south is where Estonians look for their roots. Tartu considers itself the country's intellectual capital, with the old university, the Estonian National Museum and a student life of choirs and corporations. The countryside keeps distinct identities. Võru speakers in the south-east use a regional language different enough from standard Estonian to have its own school classes and newspaper; the Mulgi of Viljandi County were prosperous farmers known for buying their land early; and Saaremaa's islanders keep their own accent.

The Seto of the south-east are Orthodox, keep saints' day feasts at village chapels and cemeteries, and are known for leelo, a polyphonic singing tradition led by a lead singer with a chorus, inscribed by UNESCO as intangible heritage. Each summer the Seto Kingdom Day elects a representative of the Seto "king". The smoke-sauna tradition of Võromaa, in which a chimneyless sauna is heated for hours, is also on UNESCO's intangible heritage list, as is the cultural space of Kihnu island off Pärnu, where women still wear striped skirts.

Music runs through everything: the Viljandi Folk Music Festival, Pärnu's summer concerts and the village song days.

Tartu, with about 95,000 people, is Estonia's second city and its university town; students and researchers set much of its rhythm. Pärnu, with more than 40,000, lives largely from tourism and spas. Viljandi has about 17,000 people, Kuressaare, Saaremaa's capital, around 13,000, and Võru, Valga and Põlva are small county towns; Valga is a twin town with Valka in Latvia, the border running through its streets.

Beyond the towns the south is farms, forest and lakes, with timber, dairy, grain, and increasingly tourism and remote work. Rural depopulation is the defining issue: villages empty as the young move to Tartu and Tallinn, though some return to renovate farmsteads. Saaremaa lives from fishing, dairy farming and summer visitors.

Days follow the seasons more than the clock. Summer is spent at the country house, the lake and the weekend sauna; winter is dark by mid-afternoon and spent skiing, working and waiting for spring.

Southern Estonian cooking is farm cooking. The Mulgi country around Viljandi gave the nation mulgipuder, mashed potato and barley with fried bacon and onion, and mulgikapsad, sauerkraut stewed with pork and barley. Kama and curd dishes also come from the south, and the Seto make sõir, a firm cheese cooked from milk, curd and eggs.

Along Lake Peipus the Old Believer villages grow onions along the so-called Onion Road and sell fish from the lake. Pärnu and Kihnu eat Baltic herring, fresh or salted. Kihnu is the last place that makes hapurokk, an old drink of fermented rye, and the juniper is Saaremaa's emblem.

Wild foods matter everywhere: chanterelles, ceps, bilberries, cranberries and birch sap in spring. Otepää and Võrumaa farms make goat's cheese, honey and fruit wines, and a few Estonian growers now make grape wine as well.

Tartu's classical Town Hall Square, with its Kissing Students fountain, runs up to Toome Hill, where the ruined brick cathedral holds the university history museum. The university main building, the science centre AHHAA and the Estonian National Museum, in a long modern building on the old Raadi airfield, are the other sights. East of Tartu the Old Believer villages line Lake Peipus.

Pärnu has a long white beach, the 1927 Mud Baths building, the Tallinn Gate in its old ramparts and a promenade of wooden villas. Inland lies Soomaa National Park, and offshore Kihnu island. Saaremaa, reached across Muhu, has Kuressaare Castle, the Kaali meteorite crater, the Angla windmills, the Panga cliff and Vilsandi National Park.

Viljandi sits above its lake, with the Order castle ruins on the hill. To the south-east, Otepää has ski trails at Tehvandi and the lake of Pühajärv; Valga faces Latvia; and Võrumaa holds the Rõuge lakes and Suur Munamägi, at 318 metres the highest hill in the Baltic states, with a viewing tower. In Põlva County are the sandstone cliffs of Taevaskoja on the Ahja river and the Piusa sand caves. Beyond, the Seto lands around Värska and Obinitsa have mineral springs, the Värska farm museum and village chapels.