Hiiumaa Island

Hiiumaa - an island in the Baltic Sea, rich by versatile, beautiful and intact nature and nice people. Its good to live on Hiiumaa. There are one thousand and one reasons for people to come here back again and again.

Already about 455 million years ago  in the vicinity of the present-day Kärdla a round archipelago with approximately 10km in diameter arose as a result of a meteorite explosion. These were the first islands in Hiiumaa area and the mentioned millions of years make Hiiumaa really one of the oldest island in the world.

In Estonia it is difficult to find a place with more picturesque nature than it is on the island Hiiumaa. The variety of landscape is what makes Hiiumaa a desired place to come. The types of picturesque landscape are changing  immensely quikly. The landscape in one end of the island is totally different from the one in another end, varying in the beauty and diverse miniature, interlacing smoothly and making Hiiumaa the unique place to stay. During a sunny summer one could enjoy kilometres long alluring sandy beaches along the coastline of Tahkuna and Kõpu peninsulas.

For Hiiumaa small islets around the island are like colourful pearls around the neck of a beautiful woman. Some of these more than 200 islands and islets have no flora and fauna for they have only recently merged from the sea. Some of them are aforrested.

Thanks to the surrounding sea, the climate on Hiiumaa is a bit different from the one on the continent. There are more sunny days with and less rainy days.

The inhabitants of Hiiumaa are peaceful and tolerant by character. They live close to nature, love it and are children of nature in their soul. The most important thing is to have a sense of humor - people of Hiiumaa love jokes.

In many senses Hiiumaa is too rich to be thoroughly experienced during a one-time short visit. And to tell you the truth, it could never be totally experienced and will remain inexhaustible. One should only truly wish to experience all the endless richnesses of Hiiumaa - the Island of The Daylight.

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Archaeological evidence of the first human settlement in Hiiumaa dates to as early as the 4th century BC. The first documented record of the island of Dageida was made by contemporary chroniclers in 1228, at the time when Hiiumaa, along with the rest of Estonia, had been conquered by Germanic crusaders. In 1254, Hiiumaa was divided between the Bishopric of Ösel-Wiek and the Livonian branch of the Teutonic Order, who were also partly acting on behalf of the Hanseatic League.

The island was part of Swedish Estonia from 1563–1710, after which it passed to the Russian Empire as part of the Governorate of Estonia. Most of the island's previously numerous Swedish-speaking population emigrated or were "Estonianised" during the period of Imperial Russian rule.

Hiiumaa was occupied during World War I by the Imperial German Army, in Operation Albion. After the war, it became a part of independent Estonia. It was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940, by Nazi Germany in 1941, and by the Soviets again in 1944. It was then a part of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic until the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991. Since then, it has been a part of independent Estonia.

en.wikipedia.org